Thunderbolt in the French National Assembly. A coalition ranging from the far right to the far left voted on Monday a motion to reject the immigration law.
A further sign of the great weakness of the presidential camp in the National Assembly. By five votes, French deputies adopted (270 votes against 265) a motion to reject the immigration bill beforehand.with the voices of the left and the far left, the Republicans and the far right, inflicting a very heavy political defeat on the government.
“All I want is for the government to continue, because it can do so, in its desire to provide answers to the immigration problem”reacted for his part the president of the Horizons group (party of Edouard Philippe) Laurent Marcangeli, member of the majority.
The left and the National Rally (RN) welcomed the adoption of the rejection motion standing in the hemicycle, with left-wing deputies calling for the resignation of Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin.
This rejection is also a snub for the latter, who bet on finding a way, particularly with the right, to get his text passed to the National Assembly, after its adoption in the Senate in a strongly toughened version.
Gerald “Darmanin has tamed the small Macronist groups. But not the National Assembly. It feels like the end of the road for his law and therefore for him”, judged the rebellious leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon on X (ex-Twitter).
“We protected the French from a migratory draft”, said the president of the RN group Marine Le Pen to journalists. It is “an extremely powerful disavowal”said Marine Le Pen.
If the support of the left for the rejection motion was acquired, the LR and the RN kept the suspense high throughout the day.
“Your government allowed the Senate’s firm text to be trampled on in committee”told the minister the boss of the LR group Olivier Marleix.
At the Socialist Party, the first secretary Olivier Faure estimated that Gérald Darmanin was “disavowed” and had to “draw conclusions”.
The Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, immediately went to the Élysée on Monday evening, where he submitted his resignation to the President of the Republic, who refused it.
The motion to reject was defended by the environmental group. Its adoption by the Assembly leads to the interruption of examination of the text even before the substantive articles are discussed.
The government can now choose to let the text continue its legislative journey in the Senate or in a joint committee bringing together deputies and senators, or decide to abandon it.