PARIS — French far-right leader Marine Le Pen on Tuesday accused French President Emmanuel Macron of rushing to appoint top officials in what she sees a power grab.
“It’s a kind of administrative coup d’état,” Le Pen told France Inter radio on Tuesday, referring to press reports saying Macron was rushing through several key high-ranking appointments within the country’s civil service, including top European Union jobs.
“When you want to counter the electorate’s vote, the results of elections, by appointing people of your own, so that they prevent you within the state from being able to carry out the policy that the French want … I call that an administrative coup d’état,” Le Pen said.
This is just the latest episode in an ongoing fight between Macron’s camp and the National Rally over the president’s powers, with the far-right party arguing that it should be up to the next government to appoint key officials.
Over the past days, Macron appointed several top officials in France and pushed for his allies to get key jobs in Brussels.
Last week, Macron proposed confirming Thierry Breton as French European commissioner, sparking Le Pen’s criticism.
The French President also negotiated with other European officials to send his former EU adviser Alexandre Adam to Brussels as deputy head of cabinet for likely returning Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, as confirmed by POLITICO.
During a cabinet meeting last week before the first round of the election, Macron also appointed several top officials including ambassadors, the new chief of staff of the French Air Force and the new EU director at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
French voters will go to the polls again this Sunday for the second round of a snap parliamentary election. The far-right National Rally was the big winner in the first round last Sunday, with 33 percent of votes.
As Macron’s camp is set to lose its majority in parliament, it has fought with National Rally on what the president’s power could be in case of cohabitation — or the president having to turn to the far-right opposition to form a government.
In an interview with POLITICO’s Brussels Playbook, former Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker predicted that “Macron will have very little influence on the direction of European policy because [it] comes under the jurisdiction of the government, which holds the whip hand.”
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