Macron’s camp fears new threat from left-wing star

PARIS — Emmanuel Macron has a new problem.

Ever since winning reelection in 2022, his main threat has come from Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally, which is surging ahead in the polls.

But now a new challenger on the left of French politics is gaining steam.

Ahead of June’s European Parliament election, center-left MEP Raphaël Glucksmann is posing a potentially serious danger to the French president’s tribe.

Now some are asking whether Macron’s tilt to the right to counter the National Rally, on issues such as immigration and pension reform, has cost him vital support on the left.

Glucksmann, 44, is a member of the Socialists and Democrats group in the EU Parliament known for his campaigning on human rights issues. A film director and the son of a prominent philosopher, he has already launched his election bid under his mini-party Place Publique’s colors.

Before joining the European Parliament, Glucksmann worked as an adviser to Georgia’s former pro-Europe president Mikheil Saakashvili, currently serving a prison term and hospitalized, and took part in the 2013 Maidan uprising in Kyiv.

A senior official for the Renaissance party shared with POLITICO concerns that some voters who supported Macron in the past could see the “serious and friendly” Glucksmann as a satisfying alternative, after a succession of crises hit the president’s camp.

Last year’s pension reform, which raised the minimum retirement age, and an immigration bill which the far-right dubbed an “ideological victory,” triggered dissent within Macron’s team and weakened his left-wing credentials.

The government gave in to hardline conservatives on key points including limiting access to social benefits for new immigrants and the end of automatic birthright citizenship, which prompted public criticism from left-leaning cabinet members.

A disappointment

Now some of Macron’s past backers are calling for change.

Former Green MEP Daniel Cohn-Bendit, an early supporter of Macron, called him a “disappointment” in an interview with Le Monde. Cohn-Bendit, who led the French Greens EU election list to a record 20.9 percent in 2009, is pushing for the Greens and Socialists to unite behind Glucksmann. Such an alliance, he told the newspaper, “can attract everyone to the left of Macron.”

Glucksmann shares many values with Macron, including support for greater EU integration and aid for Ukraine.

A political strategist close to the French Green party, who was granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive issue, underlined that the Greens’ past success in France at European elections was also a result of attracting voters who backed centrists during presidential elections.

Glucksmann is currently best-positioned to attract these voters, as the Greens’ campaign is seen as “too focused on societal issues and wokeism” to gain much traction, the strategist said. “If Glucksmann starts rising in the polls and competing with the Renaissance list, left-wing voters could be tempted to unite behind his list to sanction Macron,” he added.

In 2019, he obtained a disappointing 6.2 percent of the vote in the EU Parliament election, finishing sixth overall and third amongst left-wing parties, despite being backed by the French socialists.

Glucksmann’s Place Publique is currently polling in third and projected to receive around 10% of the vote, far behind the far-right and pro-Macron lists. But his party’s momentum has nonetheless caught pollsters’ attention.

“If Glucksmann finishes with a high percentage, it’ll likely mean the Greens will have dropped. If he finishes above 13 or 14 percent, it’ll also be at Renaissance’s expense,” Jean-Yves Dormagen, head of the Cluster17 polling institute said. A further drop in the polls for the presidential camp could see the far-right finishing more than 10 points ahead on the night of the election.

The pension reform, immigration debate and Macron’s recent defense of rape-accused film star Gérard Depardieu will have done nothing to help the president keep left-leaning voters on his side.

Could it be enough to see Glucksmann overtake the pro-Macron list? “It’s a long-shot,” Dormagen said. “But it would only take a 3 or 4-points shift from one camp to the other.”