Questioned by members of La France Insoumise, the Minister of the Economy strongly disputed the facts initially brandished by an LR deputy quoted by The Parisianbut since denied.
Sunday controversy between two political heavyweights, one from the government, the other from the left. This Sunday, Bruno Le Maire and Jean-Luc Mélenchon strongly opposed by media interposed around information published a few days ago in the columns of the Parisian. In an article published on March 13, a few days before Elisabeth Borne spoke in the National Assembly, a right-wing elected official returned to the executive’s urgent calls to convince the LRs to support her reform of the retreats.
Remaining anonymous, the MP first explained to our colleagues that she had received several phone calls in the days preceding the final vote, aimed at convincing her to support the government’s project. According to the parliamentarian, Bruno Le Maire himself would have taken his phone, slipping, in passing, that the executive could be “attentiveto his territory. An innuendo to evoke the release of funds for his constituency, in exchange for his support.
Shortly after the publication of the article, however, the MP returned to this information with our colleagues, explaining that she had “badly expressed“: contrary to what she said at first, if the boss of Bercy did try to join her, as confirmed by her cabinet at Parisian, he fell on the answering machine of the parliamentarian, without leaving a message. The two politicians therefore never discussed.
“Bribing MPs”
The fact remains that the information, false, has meanwhile been taken up on the left by certain elected officials, who have not failed to point the finger at the supposed desire of the minister to “to bribe» an elected official. “Did Minister Bruno Le Maire try to bribe deputies to vote for pension reform?“, Thus pretended to wonder the deputy Antoine Léaument, on March 16. “One of two things: either Le Parisien lied, or there is a corrupting minister in Bercy, who is also acting as an organized gang with the cabinet of Franck Riester“, he added, on Twitter. On the same day, the boss of the LFI group in the National Assembly, Mathilde Panot, wrote to the Attorney General of the Republic, François Molins, asking him to seize the Court of Justice of the Republic, accusing the minister of “facts that may constitute the offense of active corruption“.
The case does not end there, despite the denial of the deputy. This Sunday, guest of the Grand Jury LCI-RTL-Le Figaro, Jean-Luc Mélenchon also accused the minister “to call elected officials and tell them: “Hey, you’re going to vote like this, like that, and we can work it out“. “It’s called pressuring, it’s also condemned by law“, dropped the former deputy. He also shared an excerpt from his intervention on Twitter, writing that “pressuring elected officials to do something against their will is against the law. This is what Bruno Le Maire did, calling elected officials to tell them what to vote in the National Assembly, in exchange for a possible arrangement.“.
What arouse a strong reaction of the main interested party. Invited on France 3 at the same time as the intervention of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the Minister of the Economy strongly denied the information shared in particular by Mathilde Panot. “It’s wrong, it’s a lie, and it’s sad, not to say revoltingcommented Bruno Le Maire. “The deputy [citée dans l’article] corrected his remarks“, recalled the member of the government, indignant at the words of”deputies of La France insoumiseon this case. “Everyone falls on you […]because we are in a political time of immense confusion, where the lie is worth the truth, where we can say anything“, he was offended in Sunday in politics.
Then, after his time on set, the minister responded directly to the accusations of the left-wing tribune, on Twitter. “The MP went back on her remarks. Check your accusations before you say them. I ask you to immediately withdraw your slanderous and defamatory remarks. Otherwise, I would have to sue you for defamation.“, he wrote.
A call that has so far remained unanswered, while other elected members of the majority, such as MP (Renaissance) Xavier Roseren or MEP (Renew Europe) Stéphanie Yon-Courtin, have also demanded a mea culpa from the former presidential candidate, on the blue bird social network.