It’s never too early to settle. Already with an eye on the next presidential election, Laurent Wauquiez called on the right this Sunday to prepare “the big meeting of 2027”, a “huge task” to which he intends to devote himself “entirely” even if he will not be not the next president of the Republicans.
“My conviction is that we have a mission: to prepare today for the post-Macron period”, he said in front of around 200 people who came to climb Mont-Mezenc with him, as he has done every year since 2012.
“Faithful” to his family
“We need to get higher. It is an immense task to which I want to dedicate myself entirely”, he added, explaining his method: “to question oneself, to dive into the deep country, to renew the thread of confidence which has been lost, mobilize the forces of the start”. “And we have to prepare now”, underlined Laurent Wauquiez, who does not “intend to (s’) lock up in an ivory tower”.
The president of the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region announced on July 17 that he would not be a candidate for the presidency of the Republicans but that he intended to build an “alternative” to “go beyond the questions of apparatus”. However, he will remain “faithful” to his political family, he assured Sunday. “He has no desire to give the impression that he wants to short-circuit the party,” said those around him.
In this long-distance race, he will be able to rely in particular on the Parliament where 19 of the 62 LR deputies come from the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region – even if not all of them are Wauquiezists.
Ciotti in support
Laurent Wauquiez also warmly welcomed the presence of deputy Eric Ciotti at his side: “Yes, you are right, it is with authority that we will have to stop mass immigration”, he assured under the applause.
A not insignificant tribute because the deputy of the Alpes-Maritimes is himself a candidate for the head of LR. “If I am president of the Republicans, the Republicans will accompany Laurent Wauquiez to the Elysée and will make him win,” he told journalists.
For the political scientist Emilien Houard-Vial, “Eric Ciotti would be easy for Laurent Wauquiez, unless he considers that a balance of ideological tendencies must be created”.
“Risk strategy”
But preparing for 2027 on the sidelines of the party is, according to him, a “risky strategy”: “if Laurent Wauquiez succeeds in convincing that he is rising and serving his family, people will end up accepting him. But if he shows discrepancies with the party line or tries to build his own network in parallel, it can arouse a form of resentment with, in 2027, a complicated landing ”.
In his speech, Laurent Wauquiez listed his favorite themes, denouncing “a minority of technocrats, judges, active minorities who have gotten their hands on the country”, as well as “allowances at all costs”.
Virginie Calmels, another contender for the head of the party, had for her part preferred to go to the political comeback of the mayor of Cannes, David Lisnard.