“I have decided to leave public life. This is how the press release sent this Tuesday noon by Jean Rottner’s team begins. For a small clap of thunder at the local level: the president of the Grand-Est region will leave his post at the end of the year.
Why such a choice on the part of the elected Les Républicains (55 years old)? “Family imperatives drive this heavy decision”, which is “Maturely thought out”, writes the emergency doctor by training, who had acquired a national audience during the health crisis. Mr Rottner had been in charge of the Grand Est since 2017.
The first vice-president of the Grand-Est region, Franck Leroy, will act as interim manager for this new region, which since 2015 has brought together Alsace, Lorraine and Champagne-Ardenne.
By leaving “all of (his) mandates by the end of the year”, Jean Rottner also renounces his mandate as first deputy to the mayor of Mulhouse (Haut-Rhin), Michèle Lutz, who had succeeded him to this function when he became president of the Grand-Est region. “Jean Rottner was driven by a strong sense of the general interest, by the imperative to constantly ensure the cohesion of the territories and by a strong capacity to anticipate”, reacted Carole Delga, president of the Occitanie region and president of “Regions of France”.
She expressed “her gratitude for her constant commitment to the collective and her respect for this decision, which once again illustrates her high moral stature and the deep sincerity of her public commitment”.
Jacobelli announces his candidacy
On Monday, Jean Rottner had again accompanied the general manager of the car manufacturer Stellantis, Carlos Tavares, to the Moselle plant in Trémery, highlighting on Twitter, where he was very active, the place of the Grand-Est in national car production. Before announcing, the next day, his withdrawal.
Greatly beaten in the last regional, where he was in the second round with Jean Rottner, Laurent Jacobelli was quick to react. The elected member of the National Rally (RN) announced his candidacy for the presidency less than two hours later. “I say to those who want to boost purchasing power, who believe in the value of work, who want to act for the safety of our fellow citizens, who want to put an end to the chaos in transport and who prefer to open high schools rather than close: let’s meet again. Together, let’s create a new majority, coherent and determined, to give new impetus to our Region,” he wrote in a press release.