France is in shambles.
The crisis that kicked off the week — the resignation of Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu and his newly appointed ministers after just 14 hours — is still in motion, with Macron set to name a replacement for Lecornu on Friday, according to his office.
But bigger questions remain about what comes next. Should Lecornu’s successor also fail, it will force Macron to consider some very unpalatable options. He could yet resign, two years before the end of his term — a move he has repeatedly rejected. Or, he could dissolve parliament and call for a snap round of elections, which could well vault the far right closer to power than ever before.
Here’s what to know as the drama continues to unfold.
What sparked this latest political crisis?
Honestly, it might’ve been a tweet. It’s a running joke in Parisian political circles right now, but there’s a bit of truth to the gallows humor.
On Sunday evening, key ministers in Lecornu’s cabinet were unveiled, and most of them were holdovers from his predecessor’s government — which was toppled last month — and the two most prominent new faces had previously held ministerial posts during Macron’s tenure.
Opposition parties who had expressed openness to working with Lecornu on a budget for next year and potential minority coalition partners were furious. They had made it clear they were looking for signals that Lecornu would be doing things differently after he promised a “break” from Macron’s previous governments.
Bruno Retailleau, who leads a conservative party that was a key coalition partner of recent minority governments, expressed his displeasure in a post on X and said his party would be charting a path forward the next morning.
The next morning, Macron’s office announced that he had accepted the resignation of Lecornu and his government after a grand total of 14 hours on the job.
What does this mean for the nationalist far-right?
Let’s start with Marine Le Pen and her far-right party, the National Rally, because they’re sitting pretty right now. Le Pen has long embraced a Trumpian refrain that the mainstream political parties are inept and out of touch, so a situation like this helps prove her point. The National Rally continues to climb in the polls and should be considered a frontrunner for any potential snap elections or the next presidential election in 2027, which Macron is constitutionally barred from running in.
To understand the dynamics at play, you’ve got to rewind to June 9, 2024, when Macron’s centrist camp was drubbed at the hands of the far right in European elections.
European votes are sort of like the U.S. midterms. They don’t draw high turnout and often serve as a protest vote. Plus, polling had predicted a National Rally victory.
The victory wasn’t a surprise. Macron’s response was. He announced that evening he would dissolve parliament and call new snap elections as quickly as possible, gambling that a high-stakes domestic vote would block the far right’s seemingly unstoppable rise.
What he ended up with was a hung parliament roughly divided into three equal blocks. Most have proven willing to engage in the type of coalition-building exercises common in other European countries like Italy and Germany, despite repeated calls from Macron to do so.
The first prime minister to try to navigate the fractured legislature, Michel Barnier, lasted about three months before being kicked to the curb over his plans to slash the budget by billions to rein in runaway public spending. His predecessor, François Bayrou, lasted nine months but got the boot over his own unpopular budget, which included plans to ax two public holidays.
Lecornu took over for Bayrou in early September, and now here we are.
Why are the markets spooked?
Markets are concerned that France, the eurozone’s second largest economy, has become so ungovernable that it can’t even pay its bills.
France borrowed heavily during the pandemic and is now sitting on €3.4 trillion worth of debt and looking at a projected budget deficit of 5.4 percent of gross domestic product this year.
Everyone agrees the current path isn’t sustainable, but cutting spending is particularly difficult in France, where people remain deeply attached to the country’s generous social welfare system. Paris is also committed to spending on reindustrialization, transitioning to green energy and rebuilding its military capabilities in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and fears of American military retrenchment.
Something’s gotta give.
The two prime ministers who preceded Lecornu both proposed shaving billions off the budget to balance the books, and — to make a long story short — each were shown the door for their troubles. Lecornu came into office prioritizing the budget and, during his 27-day-long tenure, did not find enough common ground for a budget compromise before his resignation.
Why does this pose a threat beyond France’s borders?
Remember about 15 years ago when everyone in Europe was freaking out over sovereign debt crises in Greece and Portugal?
That would be child’s play compared to France, the world’s seventh-largest economy, collapsing under the weight of its own debt. The concern now, as it was in 2010, is that because all these countries share a common currency, the euro, the risk of financial contagion is high.
Most economists agree Paris has a better handle on its financial affairs than either Lisbon or Athens did, and won’t need a bailout in the imminent future. France can still borrow from financial markets at reasonable, albeit increasingly higher, rates, and is not in immediate danger of being unable to pay its debts.
There’s also a precedent issue in Brussels. European Union rules require member states to keep budget deficits below 3 percent of GDP, a limit France continues to run afoul of. Paris has submitted a plan to Brussels to get back on track by 2029, but it’s highly unlikely lawmakers will pass a budget in time this year to stick to that timeline.
If France continues to flout the 3 percent figure themselves, other EU member states might start having second thoughts about playing by the rules themselves.
How much of this turmoil is about Macron, and what does it mean for his political future?
This is squarely about Macron.
He’s spent the 15 months since the snap election trying to defy parliamentary arithmetic by appointing prime ministers from a minority coalition made up of centrists and conservatives. The odds never seemed good, but Macron kept trying. His office said this evening that he’ll choose Lecornu’s replacement in the next 48 hours, and who he picks will be telling.
It’s helpful to know a bit about Macron’s personality here. People close to the French president like to describe him as the gambler who leaves the casino with his pockets empty but convinced he’ll beat the house on the next try.
Call it eternal optimism, call it hubris, call it dogged determination, but whatever it is, it’s driven Macron’s political fortunes into the gutter. And key allies are starting to jump ship, including three previous prime ministers.
One, presidential candidate Edouard Phillipe, called on him to resign. Gabriel Attal, who now heads Macron’s political party, said he “no longer understands” what the president is doing. A third, Elisabeth Borne, called for the suspension of his flagship law raising the retirement age — despite having rammed the law through the legislature during her tenure leading the government.
A centrist politician known to have their finger on the pulse told my colleague Anthony Lattier that many lawmakers from Macron’s camp think he’s trying to sow chaos so Le Pen’s National Rally can come to power — which would offer him the chance to swoop in as a savior who could take down the far-right during the presidential election in 2032. (Macron can’t run in the next election in 2027 because he’s barred from standing in more than two consecutive elections, but there’s nothing stopping him after that.)
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