Alexandre Chauveau / Photo credits: XOSE BOUZAS / HANS LUCAS / HANS LUCAS VIA AFP
After five days and four nights of sometimes heated debate, the Senate on Friday finished examining the articles of the immigration bill, put to the vote on Tuesday. A text clearly toughened by the right-wing senatorial majority which does not convince all Republican deputies.
After the retirements, will the Republicans be torn apart again over immigration? “The text that comes out of the Senate is not that of the Republicans but of the Centrists” denounces the deputy for Lot, Aurélien Pradié, reproaching his fellow senators for having included in the law the Valls circular, which allows prefects to regularize undocumented under conditions.
Difference between senators and LR deputies
Bruno Retailleau, the president of the LR group in the Senate, claims to have considerably toughened the government’s bill. And this once again illustrates the gap between LR senators and deputies. Unthinkable for the former not to provide an enriched version of the text, even if it means making compromises in a house where we claim a sense of the general interest and the virtues of dialogue. It is precisely for these reasons that Gérald Darmanin first presented his bill.
A text that is too lax?
On the other hand, among Republican deputies, the relationship with the government is more tense. Many people had a hard time with the treatment suffered during the first five-year term by the macronie, then in a position of absolute majority. Hence the desire not to give any gifts to the executive and even less on a sovereign text, presented by LR as being Emmanuel Macron’s blind spot.
At the Palais-Bourbon, many people secretly hope to see the text be defeated by the left wing of the majority. This would then offer them the opportunity not to vote for the government’s project and thus avoid any division within the group. For once, the idea of opposing a text deemed too lax brings together both the deputies and the Republican senators.