Rule of law: Marine Le Pen has “a major divergence” with Bruno Retailleau

During a meeting in Nice, Marine Le Pen expressed a “major disagreement” with Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau on the role and nature of the rule of law. This verbal confrontation comes after Bruno Retailleau questioned “the notion of intangibility of the rule of law”, which provoked numerous reactions in the French political landscape.

The controversial remarks of Bruno Retailleau

In an interview with the Journal du Dimanche (JDD), Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau declared that “the rule of law is not intangible or sacred”, specifying that its source is “democracy, it is the sovereign people.” This position aroused strong criticism, particularly on the left and in the presidential camp, where some saw it as a challenge to one of the fundamental principles of modern democracies.
Retailleau, faced with the reactions, regretted that his remarks had been “instrumentalized by false debates”, thus trying to qualify his statements. However, this outing opened a broader debate on the nature of the rule of law and its relationship to democracy.

Marine Le Pen defends a traditional vision of the rule of law

Marine Le Pen, head of deputies of the National Rally (RN) and recurring candidate in the presidential election, took a position against this questioning of the principle of the rule of law. For her, the latter is a fundamental pillar of European civilization and must not be contested. “It is not the rule of law as such that must be contested, it is quite the opposite. We are its guarantors, in the sense given to it by the most brilliant European philosophers of past centuries,” he said. -she said in front of her supporters in Nice.

She thus underlined the importance of everyone submitting to democratically established rules. However, Le Pen has also criticized what she sees as a “distortion” of this notion in contemporary usage. She accused certain elites of using the rule of law as an instrument to restrict popular sovereignty, by preventing any democratic evolution of the legislative framework. “We will never accept this,” she insisted.

A debate on popular sovereignty and the evolution of law

The heart of the disagreement between Marine Le Pen and Bruno Retailleau seems to lie in the question of whether the rule of law can or must evolve according to democratic will. For Bruno Retailleau, popular sovereignty must “be able to take precedence over a fixed legal framework”, a point of view which reflects a certain distrust towards a bureaucracy or judges perceived as limiting the freedom of action of elected governments.

Marine Le Pen, while defending the rule of law, rejects a form of “rigidity” imposed by international institutions or treaties which, according to her, would prevent people from regaining control of their own legislation. It thus illustrates a classic tension between national sovereignty and supranational legal framework, a recurring theme in his speeches and his political program.