Presidential 2022: at LR, the race for sovereignist shallots – archyde

On October 21, Michel Barnier tastes Alsatian specialties in a restaurant in Saverne (Bas-Rhin) when an “urgent” from AFP relating to the conflict between the European Union (EU) and Poland – which challenges the rule of law European on Polish law – beep on the phones. In a small committee, the candidate for the nomination of the Les Républicains (LR) party soberly comments on the information, finding his reflexes as a senior Brussels leader. “It is very serious, the Polish government wants to break free from the European treaties, to bring the judges into line, it is contrary to our fundamental principles”, he blurted out.

A few weeks earlier, the former Brexit negotiator was giving a very different tone, defending the need to find a “Legal sovereignty” in immigration “To no longer be subject to judgments of the Court of Justice of the EU or the European Court of Human Rights”. A criticism that ulcerated his former colleagues in Brussels. While the centrists of the ex-UMP are numerous to have left for Macronie, Mr. Barnier knows that he must try to erase his image of Brussels technocrat to seduce the sovereignists of LR. “I am not a ‘Eurobeat’, I am a Gaullist, he defends. Sovereignty has never been a dirty word, nor national identity. We need nations to fight nationalism. “

On the right, Mr. Barnier is not the only one to plead for more sovereignty, in particular constitutional, in the wake of the Polish episode. Valérie Pécresse challenges the primacy of European law over “Constitutional identities” from EU member states. Xavier Bertrand proposes to introduce in the Constitution “A mechanism to safeguard the superior interests of France”. Eric Ciotti wishes “Modify Article 55 of the Constitution to assert the primacy of the Constitution over European decisions”.

A dusted notion

For his part, the sovereignist Henri Guaino, former adviser to Nicolas Sarkozy, long in the minority among the Gaullists, feels himself growing wings. In Le Figaro, on October 26, he proposed to return to the principle known as the “screen law”, which prevailed before 1975 and gave the last word to the French legislator. “The Constitutions prevail over the European treaties, even if the Court of Justice and the European Commission think the opposite”, he insists.

Threatened with elimination from the first round of the presidential election, LR leaders seek to exist between Marine Le Pen and Eric Zemmour, who both supported Poland and reaffirmed the primacy of national law over European law, d ‘on the one hand, and Emmanuel Macron who, while strongly condemning the Warsaw decision, does not intend to leave the notion of sovereignty to the opposition, on the other. “The leaders of the right are engaged in a chase, analysis Chloé Morin, from the Jean Jaurès Foundation. They feel that the question facing everyone is the following: how to regain control, avoid decline, resist cultural, security, economic weakening? ”

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