PARIS — France’s Socialists have pushed budget talks to the brink of collapse in response to controversial comments made by Prime Minister François Bayrou about migration.
Bayrou sparked a wave of indignation after saying in a Monday interview that France seemed to be suffering from “flooding” by immigrants.
“Contributions from foreigners are a positive for a people, so long as they remain proportionate,” he said in an interview with broadcaster LCI. “But as soon as you get the feeling of flooding, of no longer recognizing your own country, its lifestyle and its culture, the feeling of rejection appears.”
Speaking in the National Assembly on Tuesday, Bayrou doubled down on his remarks, saying that in the French overseas territory of Mayotte and in certain regions of France, “the word flooding is the one that is the most precise.”
“It’s not the words that are shocking but the reality,” Bayrou said.
The left accused the prime minister of spreading far-right tropes concerning immigration. Even his allies, such as the centrist President of the National Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet, have said they were uncomfortable with his choice of words.
The timing of the fracas couldn’t be worse, with budget talks reaching their endgame this week. A parliamentary committee is set to discuss the long-awaited 2025 French budget on Thursday, in the hope that lawmakers may be able to break the deadlock.
The Socialist Party said they had canceled a meeting with the government “following the prime minister’s statement.” Socialist parliamentary leader Boris Vallaud, meanwhile, said he had been “outraged” by Bayrou’s comments and accused him of peddling the “prejudices of the far right.” Vallaud also floated the possibility that the Socialist Party could vote to topple the government in a no-confidence vote.
Losing the Socialists would constitute a serious setback for Bayou’s government, which was appointed after former Prime Minister Michel Barnier was topped last month.
Bayrou had targeted the Socialists as a potential opposition partner with whom his minority government could work to pass a budget cutting France’s eye-watering deficit.
Barnier had previously attempted to negotiate with the National Rally rather than with leftist MPs, but the far-right party eventually voted to bring the government down over his spending plans.
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