from France, has entered and left the Elysee Palace in the last three days with different positions and missions. First he was prime minister, then he appointed his ministers. Then, after 836 minutes, he resigned, but he had 48 more hours to reach an agreement and, who knows, he could even become prime minister again. The confusion was total. The feeling of a twilight circus took over French politics. Like one of those comedies slapstickthe former Minister of Defense has taken every possible step to avoid legislative elections and continue acting as a shield for the President of the Republic and his good friend, Emmanuel Macron. Until Wednesday night, at 8:00 p.m., when he spoke again on a television set to simply say that after two days of consultations he believes that there is a majority of parties that would like to avoid legislative elections.
“A majority of the National Assembly rejects the dissolution, because it clearly sees that a dissolution does not provide any solution. There are several groups that are willing to agree on a common Budget,” he said, citing, in particular, the left. “I feel that there is a possible path,” he also said, indicating that Macron should name a new prime minister “in the next 48 hours.”
Lecornu arrived on the television set in a hurry, after an hour and 40 minute meeting with Macron at the Elysee Palace. That’s where the decision was made. Or rather the strategy of continuing to gain time. Another agonizing 48 hours to find a prime minister capable of forming a majority. And this time, it seems that everything is leaning to the left, as more and more voices are demanding.
“It is time to try a left-wing prime minister after three failed centre-right attempts,” he asked minutes before Lecornu appeared on television.
The decision, however, would involve suspending the pension reform, as Lecornu himself implied in his television interview. “I am not here to make announcements, since I have resigned, but this issue is, in effect, a real blocking point. We will have to find a way towards the debate on the suspension of the pension reform,” he noted.
The measure was the most unpopular of Macron’s mandate. He raised the retirement age substantially (from 62 to 64) and aroused the ire of the left and the unions. The norm was approved by decree, given the impossibility of obtaining the necessary parliamentary support. Its suppression was an insistent demand of the Socialist Party and the majority of progressive groups that converged in the New Popular Front (NFP) in the last legislative elections, in July of last year.
The reversal of this reform has a complicated fit and provokes the radical rejection of the conservative group of Los Republicanos. Its freezing would cause a significant hole in public coffers that were already quite stressed. Interviewed on the France Inter radio network, Roland Lescure, the resigning Minister of the Economy, stated on Wednesday that his services are working on “many hypotheses.” However, he warned, “modifying pension reform will cost hundreds of millions in 2026 and billions in 2027.” Although he declared himself “willing to make concessions,” Lescure, from the progressive wing of Macronism, added that “they will have to be financed.”
Eliminating the great structural reform that Macron launched, the only one, is also a sign of its decline. The latest polls assign the President of the Republic 14% popularity, the lowest level of his entire legislature and a record (down) for a head of state. 82% declare that they have lost their trust in him, even above the lowest moment of his predecessor, François Hollande.
The crisis and pressure on Macron became unbearable on Tuesday night after the latest ups and downs that arose from the prime minister’s resignation just hours after presenting a government that pleased almost no one. The markets have harshly punished France in recent hours. And Lecornu had to appear at 9:30, even before meeting with the leaders of the Socialist Party, to announce that the talks with the parties are on the right track and remove the possibility of a dissolution of the National Assembly and the calling of elections.
A new dissolution, like the one in 2024, offers no guarantee that a clear majority will emerge. Despite the rise of Marine Le Pen’s National Regrouping, which has decided not to meet with Lecornu to seek a way out of the institutional crisis. This formation has 35% voting intention in the presidential elections, according to the latest Ifop-Fiducial survey for The Figaro Magazine y South Radio.
The extreme right, despite everything, eis far from being assured of a majority, whether absolute or even relative, in new legislative elections. The probability of ending an ungovernable Assembly because it is fragmented, still divided into three irreconcilable blocks—the left, the Macronist space and the extreme right— sremains considerable.
Lecornu, according to the newspaper The Parisian, He presented four questions to the parliamentary leaders of the right and the center (Renaissance, Horizons, MoDem, LR, Liot), whom he received for a final meeting this Wednesday afternoon. Is a dissolution necessary? Is a budget absolutely necessary before December 31? What margin are they willing to have on pensions? Is it essential to appoint a prime minister from the common bloc?
Regarding the composition of the team, the head of the Government acknowledged that it would have to be done “differently.” According to one participant, Lecornu also mentioned the search for a “stability contract, with concrete measures on taxation, pensions and purchasing power.”
The situation is historic. A blockade of this type had never been experienced in the Fifth Republic, the institutional regime inaugurated in 1958. Since then, it has appointed three different prime ministers.
