Macron Rules Out Resignation, Blames ‘Anti-Republican’ Front for Toppling Government

Can Emmanuel Macron smooth over the chaos in France that his months of political gambling unleashed? Will he appoint a new prime minister before President-elect Trump’s official visit to Paris this weekend? Given the whirlwind of events following a vote of no confidence on Wednesday that saw Prime Minister Michel Barnier hand in his papers on Thursday, Mr. Macron might be forgiven for saving a prayer for the reopening of Notre Dame cathedral.Prior to his televised address to the French on Thursday night, the Elysee Palace said in a statement that Mr. Macron had already asked ousted Prime Minister Michel Barnier and his government to stay on in a caretaker capacity until a new prime minister is nominated. The address itself was an animated blend of mea culpa for the turmoil that led to the government to fall on Wednesday and also an opportunity to blame just about everybody else for daring to torpedo it. The president allowed that he did recognize his decision to dissolve parliament last June “wasn’t understood,” and added that “I know many continue to criticize me for it. It’s a fact. And it’s my responsibility.”At the same time, Monsieur Macron pledged that would win passage of the unpopular state budget for 2025 that sealed Mr. Barnier’s fate when he tried to push it through the National Assembly without a vote. That assurance was likely meant to calm European markets already rattled by several days of French political turmoil.What he meant by announcing that he will also form “a government of general interest” was less clear, but it was seemingly an overture to those willing to not vote no confidence in him. How many such French lawmakers there still are that fit that description is also unclear, particularly after the far right and far left parties closed ranks to censure the government on Wednesday. That kind of double sided attack might have sounded the death knell for a meeker president, but Mr. Macron has a healthy ego and used the opportunity of this address to fire back at his detractors. The far right and the far left had united in what he called “an anti-Republican front,” he said, stressing that while “they chose disorder” he “won’t shoulder other people’s irresponsibility.”In concrete terms, that simply means Mr. Macron is not stepping down. He explicitly vowed to stay in office until his term expires in 2027. Monsieur Macron was elected in 2017, before being reelected in 2022 for another five-year term. He insisted in his address that the French elected him to do a job and that he would stick around to do it.At the same time, he noted that France’s constitution prevents a new round of legislative elections so soon after the previous ones, meaning the country is stuck not just with him but also with the current National Assembly until next July at the earliest. So, he said, that means lawmakers have a duty “to work together, at the service of France and the French.”That may be wishful thinking. The president is master of none in the National Assembly, where he still has no majority, and a growing list of adversaries. The French president, like an American one, is also the commander-in-chief of the country’s armed forces and wields extensive powers over foreign policy, but Mr. Macron’s lame-canard presidency is already taking on beaucoup d’eau.His previous prime minister, a young Gabriel Attal, resigned in July after Mr. Macron’s disastrous decision to dissolve parliament. As of today, December 5, Michel Barnier, a respected politician and former European Commissioner, becomes the shortest-serving French prime minister, though he lasted about twice as long as Liz Truss did in Britain. In terms of finding a replacement, Mr. Macron is at once short on time and in no particular hurry. He needs to find a fulcrum that will be less unloved by the right and left than was Mr. Barnier. The newspaper Le Parisien reported that the center-right François Bayrou, who is said to have lunched with Mr. Macron at the Elysée Palace on Thursday, may be his top choice. The other pieces on this movable chessboard are Marine Le Pen of the right-wing National Rally and Jean-Luc Mélenchon of the far left France Unbowed party. They the ones who made the censure motion happen. Without naming names, the president lashed out at them: “Why did lawmakers act this way? They’re not thinking of you, of your lives, your difficulties,” he said. “They’re thinking of just one thing: the presidential election — to prepare it, to provoke it, to precipitate it.”

Macron Rules Out Resignation, Blames ‘Anti-Republican’ Front for Toppling Government

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