“I will not be a candidate for my re-election”, announced Coralie Dubost on Twitter, this Sunday, May 1. In a long message, the deputy and deputy president of the LREM group in the National Assembly gives the reasons for this withdrawal from political life, saying in particular that she is the victim of a “phantasmagoric lynching on social networks”.
“For the past few days, my person has been targeted by unjust attacks which are a disservice to my political group, the electoral deadlines, and more generally, democracy, she writes. I refuse to be the instrument of an antiparliamentary cabal, in the same way that I refuse to lend myself to a ping-pong of justifications […]”.
— Coralie Dubost (@CoDubost) May 1, 2022
Coralie Dubost, elected from the third constituency of Hérault, refers here to the survey published about her by Mediapart on April 29. The media revealed the content of a report produced by a human resources firm and submitted to the ethics officer of the National Assembly in the spring of 2021.
It is about former collaborators of the MP, who accuse him of having imposed on them “tasks relating to the personal sphere” as well as “demeaning” remarks and behavior. Mention is made of personal purchases for the elected official, the supervision of household staff or even the performance of domestic tasks. Charges that the main interested party refutes.
The plaintiffs also evoke a “conflict of values” or “ethics” concerning the use of the advances of expenses of mandates of Coralie Dubost. As a reminder, this envelope, amounting to €5,373, is paid each month to all MEPs and is added to the remuneration of elected officials. It is supposed to be used only for expenses exclusively related to the function of deputy.
Significant “clothing expenses”
But, according to the Mediapart investigation, the report concerning Coralie Dubost mentioned “monthly clothing expenses within a range of 1,500 to 2,000 euros” or “very high restaurant costs”. The deputy president of the LREM group would have spent up to €3,300 on clothing and accessories in October 2018.
Claiming to have been “poorly advised”, the deputy indicated that she had reimbursed the costs deemed unrelated to the exercise of her mandate, after a control by the ethics officer of the National Assembly for the years 2018 and 2019.
But today, the fallout from this affair is pushing Coralie Dubost to give up a candidacy for the June legislative elections. Retracing “five years in the service of the French” during which she claims to have “counted neither the hours nor the personal sacrifices”, she writes: “So the time has come for me to withdraw from political life and to dedicate myself to my family.
“Staying true to my values today means protecting the child I am carrying from all the vicissitudes of exposure and political life,” she continues. […] Two months ago, I lost my father, a great and honest man, I would have liked to devote more time to his last breaths, I want to devote peaceful ones to those of my newborn baby”.
Recalling her “pride” to have worked on files such as “the Avia law fighting against cyberbullying” as well as “PMA for all and the law on adoption”, Cécile Dubost concludes her remarks with thanks. One of them is addressed to Emmanuel Macron “for his confidence” and for having “introduced civil society into political life”.