Since the drawing of article 49-3 to pass the pension reform, the place of Elisabeth Borne at the head of the government seems to be constantly questioned. Recently, it was his position on the National Rally that created a disagreement with the head of state.
Questioned on Radio J on May 28, 2023, the Prime Minister had instructed the far-right party by designating him as “heir to Pétain”. “I do not believe at all in the normalization of the National Rally. I think that one should not trivialize its ideas, its ideas are always the same. So now, the National Rally is putting the forms in it, but I continue to think that it’s a dangerous ideology,” she explained.
A statement that was not to the taste of Emmanuel Macron, who did not prevent himself from reframing Elisabeth Borne in the Council of Ministers. “We have to fight the far right, but we don’t fight it with the words of the 90s and moral arguments, it doesn’t work anymore,” he said, not failing to make the left and some of the people react. supports of the Prime Minister.
After the rumors concerning a possible ousting of the latter, the President of the Republic decided to publicly reaffirm “all his confidence” in Elisabeth Borne during her trip to Slovakia on May 31.
Despite everything, the hypotheses on an early departure of the tenant of Matignon still hover in the minds. Some major ministers even seem to be leering from her chair and one of them does not hesitate to publicly express his disagreements with the principal concerned.
Since the start of the Borne era of government, the differences between the Prime Minister and Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin have been on display for all to see. She, trained in politics by the socialist Lionel Jospin. Him, from the popular right and the RPR. The two political personalities have fundamentally different strategies.
“Everything opposes them. He tries to show that he is popular, where she is perceived as distant; that he is rooted in rurality, where she is technocratic”, exposes a confidant of Emmanuel Macron to our colleagues from Parisian .
Since the start of the storm of pension reform, Gérald Darmanin seems to be eyeing the post of Prime Minister. However, he had told RTL that he was “not a candidate for any other post than that of Minister of the Interior” in March 2023.
However, behind the scenes, the minister allows himself to take certain liberties.
As an important figure in the government, Gérald Darmanin deals directly with the President of the Republic on a regular basis. “He arrogates a form of freedom,” says a minister.
In May 2023, the Canard enchaîné had notably revealed that the Minister of the Interior had directly asked Matignon to exempt his ministry from an instruction which had just passed to all the government, to reduce their expenditure by 5%. He had defended himself by arguing that Beauvau was then the subject of a programming law for the period 2023-2027, an excuse which had not convinced Elisabeth Borne. “It was hot”, blows a minister to our colleagues.
Despite their disagreements, the two political figures are obliged to work hand in hand. And if Gérald Darmanin probably envies the status of his superior, he has no interest in bringing her down. “Neither one nor the other has an interest in playing it, gauge another. The over-weakening of Matignon would harm them all. Everyone is well aware of it”, explains a Renaissance deputy in the columns of the Ile-de-France daily.
