On the right, he vampires the countryside. Eric Zemmour, still not declared presidential candidate in 2022, is the surprise of recent weeks in the polls. The former CNews columnist achieved a strong breakthrough (around 17%) by seducing part of the right-wing electorate. Young activists The Republicans are already working to bring the polemicist’s campaign to life, while the party must nominate its own candidate during a vote in congress in early December.
“We attend like a mass to his media passages”
“I discovered it more than ten years ago, with Laurent Ruquier on France 2. Then I watched it quite a bit during confinement on CNews. I find myself in his speech, he breathes new life into a right that has become conformist. Despite the media and political attacks, he remains straight in his thinking, ”assures Rudy, 34, LR activist from the 5th arrondissement in Paris.
Eric Zemmour became known to the general public as a columnist in We are not in bed on France 2, from 2006 to 2011. It then bounces back on Paris Première, and especially in Facing the Info, on Cnews, from October 2019, where its daily passages are a hit with audiences. “We attend like a mass to his media passages. We grew up with these cult phrases, until we knew them by heart. We even recently had a bingo of his punchlines. That’s what we like about him, his real talk, that we don’t find in other politicians, ”adds David Attia, 28, candidate for the 2020 municipal elections on the LR list.
in the 9th arrondissement of Paris.
His clear-cut speech, his historical and literary references, his provocations seduce a part of this right-wing youth in need of a leader since the departure of Nicolas Sarkozy, and this despite certain approximations and his
judicial conviction. “Today, we are deprived of high-level politicians. As Sarkozy says,
Eric Zemmour is the symptom of this void, and he fills it. All the young right-wingers read it, listened to it, supports Baptiste Laroche, a 24-year-old Parisian LR activist, who works in the organizational team of the quasi-candidate. Some may be embarrassed by his excesses, his provocations, okay, but generally speaking, young right-wingers share his ideas. He is the intellectual of our generation. “
“Young LR are more to the right, that’s how it is”
At the end of August, one hundred LR activists and sympathizers sign a platform to support him, believing that he is “the natural candidate of the right”. But in the leadership of the party, that does not pass. Some signatories are thanked for their local responsibilities, while the movement dismisses the polemicist from the internal primary. “There is a lot of hypocrisy. Many executives appreciated Zemmour before, but today there is a form of fear about his dynamics. Since the departure of Laurent Wauquiez, the gap has widened between the base of activists and the center-right direction, ”blows Matthieu Louves, 26, former head of the Young LR of Gironde, dismissed in early September.
Within the Republicans, we are embarrassed about the emergence of Eric Zemmour, whom we reject “To the extreme right”, but some recognize the attraction of the polemicist. “He speaks to young people, it’s a real subject,” blows a tenor of the party. “He is radical, it pleases. But young LR are always more to the right [que le reste du parti], that’s how it is, ”sweeps an elected official close to Xavier Bertrand.
“About thirty supporters, it is residual on 11,000 Young Republicans”
Guilhem Carayon, the president of the Young Republicans, recognized Tuesday on LCI “That at least 6 to 7,000” members of his movement – out of 11,000 – had “sympathy for Eric Zemmour”. “Many began to follow politics with him and he had the merit of expressing courageous beliefs about identity or immigration in the media in the face of right-wing left-wing ideologues,” he told 20 minutes, while relativizing its weight in the coming campaign.
“A good polemicist does not necessarily make a good politician. It is not by rehabilitating Pétain or by taking
outrageous remarks about Muslims that we can reconcile the French. In the forum at the end of August, there were actually only 30 members. And even if tomorrow, they make a blow with 100 or 200 young militants, that will remain residual on the 11,000 young republicans, adds the official of 22 years.
Among the supporters of Eric Zemmour, we hope that after the LR congress, a large-scale movement will materialize. “Many young people are not enthusiastic about the Macron-compatible profile of the LR candidates. When we know who the candidate nominated by the congress is, we will see for whom the young people will stand up to campaign, ”says Baptiste Laroche. At the national level, Eric Zemmour is still struggling to seduce the young electorate. In the last Harris Interactive survey, published Wednesday, only 7% of 18-24 year olds and 12% of 25-34 year olds say they are ready to vote for him. Far from the 21% collected among those over 65.