French President Emmanuel Macron addressed the French people on Tuesday, May 13th, in a long and eagerly awaited television interview. Politically weakened for months, he hoped to breathe new life into the end of his presidential term, but failed to convince, displaying his chronic impotence tinged with arrogance.
The Élysée Palace had managed to create a buzz by promising a strong and constructive speech from the head of state and the organisation of referendums to break the political deadlock that has gripped France since the dissolution of parliament in June 2024. The result, a televised broadcast that dragged on desperately without any concrete announcements, was a damp squib, according to a widely held view in French public opinion, on both the Left and the Right.
Macron faced several interlocutors from society and the political class tasked with asking him questions, such as TiboInShape, a French YouTuber very popular with young people; Sophie Binet, secretary general of the left-wing CGT trade union; and Robert Ménard, the conservative mayor of the city of Béziers, who recently made headlines for refusing to allow the marriage of an Algerian man with an OQTF (obligation to leave French territory) to a French woman in his city.
A deep sense of unease gripped the 3.9 million French people who subjected themselves to the torture of listening to him for hours on end.
Almost every hot topic was touched upon: the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Ukraine, education, pension reform, euthanasia, the veil in sport, public finances, immigration, screen time among young people, and so on.
Every topic, that is to say, none. The president skimmed over all the issues of the day, sketching out his thoughts without ever offering any clear or decisive solutions, repeating ad nauseam that he was “not opposed” to doing this or that. On the future of the social model, he proposed “‘opening a conference on its financing” in the coming months. On international security, he said he was “ready” to open a “discussion” on the deployment of aircraft armed with nuclear bombs. The same tired old recipes designed to give citizens the illusion of a false dialogue—from elites desperately lacking any political vision.
Regarding international affairs, from this lengthy, rambling mess, his condemnation of Netanyahu’s actions in Gaza as “a disgrace” stood out—although he categorically refused to describe them as genocide, much to the despair of the far Left. On the Ukrainian question, he explained that peace with Russia would probably not be possible without territorial concessions. Even the Ukrainians have the “lucidity to say” that they will not be able to regain all their territories at the end of the conflict with Russia, Macron explained.
On the domestic front, there were high expectations for the upcoming referendums—a mechanism normally favoured by the Constitution of the Fifth Republic to reconnect the people with the president, strengthen direct democracy, and overcome political crises. Macron has never used them since he was elected in 2017. He has been promising them for years, but we will have to wait a little longer as no decision has yet again been made. A consultation on euthanasia? “Maybe,” only “if” the bill currently under consideration fails in Parliament. On debt and public finances? “Why not?”
Macron, on the other hand, knows very clearly what he does not want to put to a referendum under any circumstances: the most divisive issues, such as pensions, and there will be no referendum on immigration either. To put it simply, Macron is refusing to consult the public on the issues that matter most to the French people. “Emmanuel Macron is flouting the French people’s desire to finally be heard on the most crucial issue for the future of the country,” said MEP Marion Maréchal on X, with some irritation.
In the discussion, the segment on immigration, centred around Ménard’s intervention, was particularly revealing of the president’s inability to energetically tackle an issue that has emerged as one of the main concerns of the French people.
In the aftermath of the presidential interview, criticism came thick and fast from across the whole political spectrum. “‘I didn’t miss anything. He said nothing, proposed nothing,” summarised Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the far-left La France Insoumise (LFI) party, on X. The first secretary of the Socialist Party echoed this sentiment: “Three hours to tell the French people that nothing is going to change,” said Olivier Faure.
Jordan Bardella, president of the Rassemblement National (RN), denounced “empty talk that no longer hides widespread impotence,” requiring immediate preparations for “the post-Macron era.” His ally Éric Ciotti of the Union of the Right for the Republic (UDR) condemned a “Jupiter” who is more than ever “out of touch.”
“The French will have understood that nothing can change before a snap presidential election,” concluded former presidential candidate Nicolas Dupont-Aignan bitterly.
