A few days before the great mobilization against the pension reform, Louis Boyard is launching his #BlocusChallenge to encourage young people to mobilize. Visiting a university in Amiens last Thursday, then live on Twitch on Saturday, the LFI deputy from Val-de-Marne continues to encourage them to take part in the mobilization. The one who refused to be brought back to his age, at the start of his mandate, is now making it a political argument to bring young people to mobilize in politics.
“Young people have never been so politicized, because they are connected and have access to a lot of information, he says to 20 minutes, sitting on the terrace of the Café Bourbon last week. But they remain disconnected from political institutions. And Louis Boyard intends to conquer them. “They are the key to winning, and making Macron bend” on the pension reform, he confides, keeping his eyes glued to his phone screen between each answer. Like a caricature of the youth he embodies.
A few weeks after his clash with Cyril Hanouna on TPMP, and a few days after his personal data was disclosed, leading to threats against him, the deputy is unshakeable. Coming to “break the codes, and do politics differently”, he says he is ready to “take blows in passing”. His last stunt still earned him a reframe by the President of the National Assembly, who recalled on Twitter that “politics is not a TikTok challenge”. In charge of high schools, in her capacity as president of the Ile-de-France region, Valérie Pécresse even filed a complaint for “incitement to the offense of obstruction and incitement to violence”.
“At this rate, we will retire at 98”
From the start of the academic year, the former president of the National Union of High School students undertook to stay close to students by launching his “university tour”. Initiated to listen to them, and inform them of the autonomy allowance project, this tour has become an opportunity to talk politics to young people. In six months, he visited twenty universities across France, filling lecture halls with 500 to 600 seats. Quickly joined by other deputies, recently by François Ruffin, he challenges young people on their purchasing power, global warming or even the subject of pensions.
“At this rate, we will retire at 98,” he assured them during the last conferences. “Block everything”, “you are legitimate to say no”, he also repeats to them, with his usual outspokenness. As a way of encouraging them to follow in his footsteps. At 16, Louis Boyard waged his first political fight by “brilliantly leading the blockade in his high school”, according to a former official of the Union Nationale Lycée (UNL). A blockage that lasted six months, until the Ile-de-France region agreed to rebuild the establishment in which asbestos had been discovered.
“We did that with our friends,” he comments as if nothing had happened. Yet it is thanks to this victory that Louis Boyard began to make a name for himself. A UNL official noticed it, then contacted him. “High school students who are mobilizing, there are not that many, explains the latter. When we see a profile like Louis’s stand out, we give him responsibilities. The deputy says that he [lui] talked about the reform of Parcoursup, the inequalities that this would entail. And he said to me, “Fight.” It all starts from there. »
It is now as a deputy, and certainly with a touch of nostalgia, that the former president of the UNL accompanies high school students in their blockade. This Tuesday, for the mobilization against the pension reform, he “expects that all high schools and all universities will be blocked […]. That is why [il] launches the hashtag #BlocusChallenge: post your best high school and university blockade photos, ”he said on Twitter this Sunday. Among the photos posted, one of them will be drawn by lot and its authors will be invited to visit the National Assembly in its company.
“A media sounding board” on the networks
“When I go to meet young people, in high schools or in universities, some tell me that they know me from TikTok, or from Twitter”, laughs the deputy. Louis Boyard not only makes noise in the hemicycle and on TV sets, his interventions are also particularly viral on social networks. “Before the start of his campaign for the legislative elections, he already had 40,000 subscribers and a lot of visibility,” recalls his best friend Lilian. Six months after his election, he has ten times more subscribers on TikTok, the most popular network among young people. Some of his videos have accumulated several million views.
“Young people do not come to politics. So politics must come to them, by adopting their codes, ”assures the deputy. Especially since “Louis has this facility to be right in this generation that politicians seek to reach”, according to his parliamentary attaché, Ismaël. Describing him as a “media sounding board”, his entourage recognizes his propensity to give visibility to the causes he defends. “He makes a good spokesperson for union mobilizations, and manages to bring a massive counter-discourse on the networks”, estimates his former comrade from the UNL.
But his methods do not have consensus, even within the Nupes. “He is a deputy, not a union leader, nuance an elected socialist. You have to see what he offers concretely, behind the rants. The latter considers him a “mechanical roller”, who delights in making people talk about him. His friend Lilian would rather say that “it’s a bit of a little Mélenchon”, version 2.0. The two men were together on the stand last Friday, for a final warm-up meeting before the big day, and JLM did not fail to caress the ego of its latest heir: “I greatly admire the campaign he conducted”. To see where the one that could start on the campuses of the country will lead.