On November 30, the journalist welcomed Éric Zemmour for the first time on TF1 to discuss the presidential election. The presidential candidate then denounced a “prosecutor’s interview”.
“I have known it all in political interviews.” From the Sunday Journal (JDD), this January 9, Gilles Bouleau returned to a striking sequence broadcast on TF1 on November 30. The journalist had invited Eric Zemmour during the 20 hours of TF1 since the former columnist of Facing the info on CNews had recently declared itself a candidate for the presidential election, which will take place next April. An interview that had ended coldly. Eric Zemmour then insulted Gilles Bouleau off-air reproaching him for not having questioned him about his presidential program.
“This is the life of this profession”
An act that did not raise eyebrows on the presenter. “It’s not so bad”, he confirmed to the JDD, before recalling other tensions that he may have known on the sidelines of interviews: “Bernard Tapie who smashes the studio door, François Fillon who leaves him very unhappy in January 2017, like Marine Le Pen or Jean-Luc Mélenchon.” For him, it would simply be “the life of this profession”. “It takes composure, hindsight and a healthy distance. “ Gilles Bouleau has also assured that he did not attend “Hardly ever” political figures “outside of (s) on plateau”. “And when I have lunch with them, which is rare, it is with the journalists of the political service of the editorial staff”, he insists.
A “intellectual swindle” ?
As for the questions put to Éric Zemmour, Gilles Bouleau recalled that he had “long worked upstream” on this meeting. “I did not forbid him at any time to develop” its program. He also denied any inquisitive act against the far-right candidate: “It was the first time that I had met him. So I had no affect towards him and no particular reason, if there was one, to take him in dislike. I believe I asked the questions that evening that any other journalist would have asked. And I don’t think that Eric Zemmour, who had done a middle finger two days earlier, could be surprised that I broached the subject “, he asserted. The day after this interview, Eric Zemmour pointed out “a prosecutor’s interview” from Gilles Bouleau who would not have treated him like the other candidates, according to him. “With all the other candidates, he stepped aside politely, humbly. With me, he turned out to be a pugnacious prosecutor in bad faith.”, pointing in passing a “intellectual swindle”.