PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron viciously attacked the Les Républicains party Wednesday after the leader of the conservative party said he was open to an alliance with the far right National Rally.
“Since Sunday evening, the masks are falling, and there’s a battle between those who are looking for election gains and those who are fighting for France,” he said at a press conference in Paris.
“The right is striking up an alliance with the far right…the conservatives are turning their back on the heritage of [former presidents] De Gaulle, Chirac and Sarkozy,” he told dozens of journalists gathered in Paris.
Macron called a legislative election on Sunday night after the National Rally trounced his liberal Renaissance party in the EU election by a margin of 31.4 percent to 14.6 percent. While the French president is gambling he can stem the surge of the nationalist, anti-immigration right in a national election, his rivals are testing the waters for a united front.
On Tuesday, Les Républicains chief Eric Ciotti revealed he had been in talks with the far-right’s Marine Le Pen over an entente to defeat Macron’s liberal Renaissance party at this summer’s snap parliamentary elections. “We need to unite our forces,” he said.
Macron also criticized the right and the far-right for having contradictory economic policies, and opposite views on the state pension reforms, which sparked unrest across the country last year.
The French president lashed out at the left, as an alliance of the far-left France Unbowed, the Socialist Party and others appears to be re-emerging, after breaking up over Israel’s war in Gaza.
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