For now, the National Rally continues to support the mayor of Fréjus David Rachline, close to Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella, severely questioned in a book for his management of the Var commune.
“I don’t believe a word of what is written,” Sébastien Chenu, vice-president of the RN, declared on BFMTV on Sunday, highlighting a mayor “very well judged” by voters. “The Fréjus justice system has never investigated” against David Rachline. “There is no reason to doubt (his) integrity,” MP Jean-Philippe Tanguy told France Info.
“An investigation into Marine Le Pen’s Var mafia”
The seaside town of 56,000 inhabitants was for years set up as a showcase for the Lepenist project, with the party often organizing its political returns there. But David Rachline, mayor since 2014, sees his image damaged in Raptors (Les Arènes edition), published at the beginning of November.
Envelopes of cash against a backdrop of rigged public markets: the book, which claims to be an “investigation into Marine Le Pen’s Var mafia”, denounces the city councilor’s lifestyle, unrelated according to journalist Camille Vigogne Le Coat with his elected official’s compensation. He also accuses him of arrangements with a powerful local construction contractor for the award of public contracts, far from the image of exemplarity conveyed by the party, and relays the mayor’s drunken evenings, where racist remarks and gestures were made. anti-Semitic.
A defamation complaint
“There is not a factual element which tends to demonstrate that the procedures are not respected” for public contracts, defended the person concerned on RTL. His lawyer, Alexandre Varaut, announced on Friday that he had filed a defamation complaint.
“The change of scenery seems to me something healthy, I decided to initiate the procedure in Paris,” he explained to AFP, specifying to attack “17 passages” of the book and promising “new complaints”. Asked about the possible opening of an investigation against the mayor, the Draguignan prosecutor’s office did not wish to comment.
Clientelism and embarrassment
The affair could in any case become embarrassing for the staff of the far-right party. David Rachline has always been close to his two leaders, Jordan Bardella and Marine Le Pen, who spent vacations with him on the Var coast. “The question is whether the RN will let go or not,” notes an influential former elected official of the party. “Marine is so afraid of being irradiated (…) If the boat continues to load,” anything is possible.
The unsuccessful presidential candidate has so far defended the mayor. At a minimum. “As a matter of principle, I place my trust in him, unless demonstrated otherwise,” she commented on November 8. “All of this interests absolutely no one,” said the president of the National Rally Jordan Bardella a few days later, denouncing the book by “a political activist.” “They say: ‘He engages in cronyism,’ but all mayors tend to do that. All, all, all,” says an RN executive.
Rising figure of the party
David Rachline, 35, climbed the party steps at high speed. Municipal councilor of his city at 20, he led the National Youth Front and was campaign director of Marine Le Pen for the 2017 presidential election. Five years later, the former senator, re-elected at the head of his city from the first round in 2020, is propelled second vice-president of the RN.
“He is a man who symbolizes youth, work, merit, loyalty and, it must be said, success,” praised Marine Le Pen in 2016. He was also close to the far-right essayist Alain Soral, convicted of provoking hatred, defamation and anti-Semitic insults, when the latter was still a member of the National Front (former name of the RN).
“Rachline is a rock star in her country,” notes an RN deputy. “Does (this affair) damage the image of the party? The future will tell, but for now, it’s a storm in a teacup.” The book Raptors also reports agreements between David Rachline and Var officials of the Republicans, notably Jean-Louis Masson LR president of the departmental council, the RN departmental councilors even going so far as to vote on the budget. “I have never voted for my opponents’ budget,” assures RN deputy for Var Laure Lavalette.