The leader of the National Rally meets her far-right and sovereigntist allies on Saturday, including the Hungarian Viktor Orban.
Marine Le Pen, far-right presidential candidate, meets her European allies in Madrid on Saturday January 29 to establish her credibility while the fire of the family saga smolders in Paris with her niece Marion Maréchal, tempted to join Éric Zemmour. Marine Le Pen (around 17%) is given in the polls in second place in the first round, neck and neck with the LR candidate Valérie Pécresse, ahead of Eric Zemmour (13%).
Read also“I want to return to politics”: the confidences of Marion Maréchal in Figaro
Far from this turmoil, Marine Le Pen meets her far-right and sovereigntist allies in Madrid on Saturday, including Hungarian Prime Ministers Viktor Orban and Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, almost two months after a similar meeting in Warsaw. Enough to consolidate her international stature and her credibility on her ability to gain power, while she obtained for her presidential campaign a loan of 10.6 million euros “from a European bank”. She stands out from Eric Zemmour who, in his pre-campaign, experienced heckled international trips to London and Geneva, after having outstripped his competitor in the fall at Viktor Orban’s in Budapest.
“Changing Europe from within”
Marine Le Pen does not exclude Madrid from “to discuss” with its Polish allies of the future of the two former MEPs who left for Eric Zemmour, Jérôme Rivière and Gilbert Collard. The two elected officials were excluded from the Identity and Democracy (ID) group in the European Parliament, where the RN sits, but could be tempted to join another group. The candidate took care to bring to Madrid the MEP Nicolas Bay, first vice-president of the ID group, who “in its place” she underlined on Wednesday, when he was cited among those tempted to join Eric Zemmour.
Marine Le Pen greeted Friday on her arrival her “friends” of the Spanish party Vox, host of the meeting in Madrid, which had established a partnership with the school of political science of Marion Maréchal. On the European level, it is for Marine Le Pen, who has given up on leaving the euro, to demonstrate that sovereigntists can “changing Europe from within”, even if nothing is expected from this summit, which the leader of the Italian League Matteo Salvini will not attend.
Read alsoMarine Le Pen obtained a loan of 10.6 million euros from a European bank
The officials present in Warsaw had discussed the possibility of common votes in the European Parliament but without managing to conclude a formal alliance. The French candidate has already expressed her support for Poland and Hungary in their showdown with the European Commission, advocating like them the primacy of national law over European law. But differences remain, as on the Ukrainian crisis. Marine Le Pen invokes NATO commitments so that she “cannot have forces on the Russian border”. While the countries of the East are worried about Russian military reinforcement.
Ultimately, these formations would like to form a common group in the European Parliament, where they are divided between the ID group (French RN, Italian League, German AfD) and the group of European Conservatives and Reformists (CRE), which includes the Polish Law and Justice, Spanish Vox and Fratelli d’Italia. Viktor Orban’s Fidesz, who divorced the European People’s Party (EPP) group in March, is looking for other partners.