With Les Républicains (LR), Elisabeth Borne was burned by the pension episode. When the Prime Minister announced, Wednesday, April 26, the postponement to the fall – but without giving guarantees – of the immigration bill, she blamed the right, this friable ally in recent months. “Today, there is no majority to vote for such a text, as I was able to verify yesterday [Tuesday] by talking to Republican officials. They have yet to find a common line between the Senate and the Assembly,” she said.
Like Gérard Larcher, the President of the Senate, Eric Ciotti had spoken with her on Tuesday. And the president of LR “finds a lot of coffee reading this interview when she says that there is no majority with us”. During this discussion, the deputy of the Alpes-Maritimes said he reaffirmed to his interlocutor that the right-wing party will not vote for the text “with articles 3 and 4 on the regularization and employment of asylum seekers in trades in tension “.
Mr. Ciotti assures that he did not take anyone as a traitor on this subject: “It has been made very clear from the beginning. Bruno Retailleau was not entitled to a call from Matignon. Irritated by this oversight, the president of the LR group in the Senate judges that Ms. Borne seeks to “discard on LR”. “This crude maneuver will not make anyone forget that it is the divisions of your own majority that force you to postpone the immigration law once again”, attacks the elected representative of Vendée on Twitter.
“No ‘at the same time’ possible”
Majority in the Luxembourg Palace (with their allies from the Union of Democrats and Independents), Les Républicains intended to toughen the text before it was sent as planned to the National Assembly. “The text that came out of the Senate would have been adopted by LR and part of Renaissance, explains LR deputy for Pas-de-Calais Pierre-Henri Dumont. But not by part of his left wing and the MoDem. The problem for them is that on a subject like immigration, there is no “at the same time” possible. It’s either we want more immigration or we want less. At LR, we all agree, we need less. We are not going to split up on this. »
On a subject that has become existential for her, the right also intends to regain control and make people forget the internal divisions on the subject of pensions. “We have decided with Eric Ciotti and Bruno Retailleau to file a common bill carried by Les Républicains”, announced Wednesday, to Les Echos, Olivier Marleix, boss of LR deputies. “We don’t want a make-believe text. An overwhelming majority of French people are waiting for things to change, ”continues the elected representative of Eure-et-Loire.
Alongside this bill stamped LR, Eric Ciotti hammers his idea of a referendum when Elisabeth Borne justifies the postponement of the bill by the fear “of dividing the country”. But for the head of LR, the debate is necessary on the contrary. “We need to get out of the measuring cups on immigration. Migration flows have continued to grow. We need to change the framework and to achieve this, we need constitutional reform. Even absent from the “hundred days” cap set by the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron, immigration risks continuing to be at the heart of discussions between the right and the majority.