Three weeks before the senatorial elections, nothing seems to threaten the domination of the right and the center over the upper house, where the presidential camp will remain a minority on the edge of bitter battles over the budget and immigration.
A flash campaign, low noise and in the end, it is the right that wins. As every three years, half of the Senate will be renewed on September 24. That is 170 seats in around forty departments, from Indre-et-Loire to the Pyrénées-Orientales, without forgetting those of Ile-de-France and Overseas.
The contenders have until Friday 6:00 p.m. to submit their candidacies, which will be decided by 79,000 electors – mainly municipal councilors.
Two voting methods coexist within this “territorial chamber”, which likes nothing more than to cultivate its difference: in the departments where one or two senators are elected, the election takes place by majority ballot in two rounds (one one in the morning, the other in the afternoon); and in the other departments, it takes place by proportional list ballot in one round.
Solidly anchored despite the loss of a few major cities in 2020, the Republicans (145 seats) approach the deadline calmly. Their patriarch Gérard Larcher expects “no upheaval” from it. In the running for a sixth term in his stronghold of Yvelines, the President of the Senate also intends to remain on the “plateau”, after having held the position for 12 years.
“The Senate is the only stable institution in a context of lack of majority” in the Assembly, he also boasted Saturday in Le Parisien.
To do this, he will need to retain the support of the Centrist Union (57), which is beyond doubt even if this group dominated by the UDI has a handful of elected Modems, in theory in the executive camp. . Sign of this cordial agreement, right and center will make a common list in Maine-et-Loire and Pas-de-Calais, among others.
The left also united, with the hope of reaping its gains after the capture of several metropolises. Socialists (64), communists (15) and ecologists (12) thus leave united – sometimes in twos, sometimes in threes – in a good fifteen departments including Paris and Isère.
An agreement without France Insoumise, which is enraged to remain absent from the Luxembourg Palace while it dominates its allies from Nupes to the Assembly.
At the other end of the hemicycle, the extreme right (2 non-registered) would like to grab a few seats. Despite its decline in the last municipal elections, the National Rally is banking on its presence in the North and East to pocket the votes of elected officials without a label. But the threshold of ten senators to form a group seems out of reach.
Emmanuel Macron’s supporters will try, on the contrary, to save the furniture. A Renaissance executive recognizes that the last local elections “have not been great” for his party, forced into alliances with variable geometry depending on the enmities of each other. However, the “Rally of Democrats” has enough members (24) to maintain itself. Their leader François Patriat has no doubts: “Our group will last”, he said on Saturday on France Culture, even ensuring that he could “win a few seats”.
Its Horizons partners, gathered under the banner of the Independents (14) will also want to keep their chapel. And perhaps show their own colors, even if it means lifting a corner of the veil on the ambitions of their leader Edouard Philippe.
Unless they still need the support of a few elected radicals, whose political family more than a century old still has a group (14) despite its historical divisions.
Once the results are known, the new senators will take office on October 2. The first week will be devoted to the distribution of posts: president, vice-presidents, quaestors, secretaries and commissions.
Serious things can then begin, with the examination of the State and Social Security budgets on the return from the All Saints holidays, and perhaps the bill on immigration, which has been repeatedly postponed for a year.
Double or quits texts for the executive, which does not have the weapon of 49.3 to force through the Senate and will therefore have to deal with the right-wing opposition to avoid what Mr. Larcher qualified before the summer of “risk of accident”.
09/04/2023 09:36:40 – Paris (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
