Despite their statements, Marine Le Pen and Eric Zemmour are not ready to talk to each other. Invited on the set of BFMTV and RMC, Robert Ménard tried to organize a meeting between the polemicist, potentially presidential candidate and the president of the National Gathering, officially declared in the race for the Elysee. They “are suicidal. They must stop shooting each other, ”said the mayor of Béziers. “Marine and Eric, I tell them: ‘come to Béziers, and we discuss’, because I am friends with both,” he added.
I invite @MLP_officiel and @ZemmourEric to come and discuss together at # Beziers. Let’s sit around a table. The future of France is worth it! # Presidentielle2022
– Robert Ménard (@RobertMenardFR) September 3, 2021
A proposal formalized in writing on Twitter by this close to the RN and to which Eric Zemmour replied that he “accepted the invitation” and “would gladly discuss with Marine Le Pen”. A few hours later, Robert Ménard reported that Marine Le Pen had “agreed to a dinner with Eric Zemmour in Béziers”, qualifying this engagement as “very good news”. But the chosen one may have got carried away a little too quickly.
Zemmour does not want “back kitchen shenanigans”
Indeed, the entourage of Marine Le Pen, indicated that the candidate “had never refused to discuss with anyone”, but specified that Robert Ménard’s proposal related to a “discussion around a table” not on A public “debate”. According to RN MEP Thierry Mariani, Marine Le Pen intends to “discuss”, which means “to discuss, see what we have in common” but “not at all to have a debate in front of the TVs”. “We are not there (…) to make a kind of show which would certainly please the media but (would not) advance our ideas”, had added on BFMTV the former minister Sarkozyste, who “dreams of a government with Éric Zemmour and Marine Le Pen together ”.
But the entourage of Eric Zemmour for whom Ms. Le Pen “will never win” in 2022, specified that the polemicist “agreed to a debate but not for back kitchen shenanigans”. “No to political cuisine, yes to democratic debate,” we added.
Robert Ménard behind Marine Le Pen
The mayor of Béziers called for a vote in 2022 for Marine Le Pen, despite her “entourage (who) is a real problem for her”. “I think she has changed. She evolved. Today, it is less doctrinaire, more open (…), more reasonable “, argued Robert Ménard, who published on September 13 a book of advice to the leader of the extreme right entitled” Dear Marine, what she must do to win ”(La Nouvelle Librairie editions, 54 p).
Robert Ménard, who had for a time pushed Éric Zemmour to present himself, now considers that the latter can “lose (his) camp”. “I think he is not capable of making a success of the passage between polemicist and head of state”, which is “not quite the same thing”, he repeated.