First step validated, time for the next one. The procedure for the impeachment of Emmanuel Macron was deemed admissible on Tuesday by the office of the National Assembly. Initiated by La France insoumise (LFI), it could have stopped there but the New Popular Front (NFP) stood united. Result: 12 votes against 10 and now before the Law Commission, then possibly in the Chamber and finally in the High Court.
In short, the road is still very long for this French-style “impeachment”… especially since today’s allies will not necessarily be tomorrow’s. Within the NFP, the Socialist Party (PS) has already indicated that it would not vote in favor of this text.
“We said from the outset that we did not support this approach,” he confirmed to 20 Minutes PS MP for Bas-Rhin Thierry Sother. “It is even a shame that LFI did not take the time to debate it with its allies before launching,” he adds, as a new witness to the disagreements that reign in the coalition.
Do not “re-legitimize” Macron
But then, why not have stopped this initiative as soon as possible? “Because there is a question of form and substance,” replies his colleague at the Palais Bourbon Sébastien Saint-Pasteur. “We debated collectively on Monday in order to determine the position of our members at the bureau of the National Assembly. This approach seemed acceptable to us in form because it deserves to be debated by the deputies. But in substance, we will vote against it. Because Emmanuel Macron is certainly at fault with his political procrastination, his choice of Michel Barnier, etc. but he has not committed any serious error.”
“By choosing to let the procedure continue, we are allowing Parliament to express itself,” continues the PS MP from Gironde. “At a time when we want to give it back power, we did not want to deprive the MPs of their expression.”
Even if this debate does not lead to much… since the text has very little or no chance of being adopted. “This procedure which requires two thirds of the votes in both assemblies will not succeed, everyone knows that”, Olivier Faure even wrote on X, evoking, in the end, a “re-legitimization” of the President of the Republic “which he does not deserve.”
“The only instrument we have”
“But there is never too much debate and democracy,” argues Benjamin Lucas, NFP MP for Yvelines and member of the Ecologist and Social group. “In any adult democracy in the world, what Emmanuel Macron did would have led to impeachment proceedings. In France, this article 68 of the Constitution is the only instrument we have to challenge him. So we are using it. We were also elected to stand up to him.”
“More than 70 deputies considered that this text was important, so the initiative must be heard. But if the impeachment does not succeed, I hope that we will quickly move on to something else because there are many other subjects to deal with,” continues Sébastien Saint-Pasteur, rather focused on the upcoming announcements of the new Prime Minister. “The debate must be on Michel Barnier, we do not want to replay a match with Emmanuel Macron,” concludes Thierry Sother.