Bruno Retailleau in the Var this Thursday: "We must rebuild this war machine, which has broken down"

Without a president since June 2024 and Eric Ciotti's decision to form an alliance with the RN in the legislative elections, the 121,617 members of Les Républicains are called to the polls to elect their new leader, this Saturday, May 17 and Sunday, May 18.

In this context, candidate against Laurent Wauquiez, the Minister of the Interior, Bruno Retailleau, held a public meeting this Thursday evening in Saint-Raphaël.

The candidate was warmly introduced by the host, Mayor Frédéric Masquelier, by Senator Françoise Dumont and by the President of the Departmental Council Jean-Louis Masson, "a long-time close friend of Laurent Wauquiez" , whose presence was also intended to symbolize "a party where the debate is of high quality, calm, and which will remain united after this internal election" .

"The strength of the sense of belonging"

The Interior Minister wanted to quickly erase the specter of a divisive party. "We are still too fragile to have the luxury of being divided among ourselves. Let's run a campaign by speaking generously. And let's save our blows for our real adversaries: the Insoumis!"

In front of 600 people, according to the organizers, recalling his Vendée roots, rural, agricultural, he also praised "the strength of the feeling of belonging. It was at Puy-du-Fou that I first touched this feeling of belonging to a history, a collective feeling, a link between beings in a given territory. The deconstructors and apostles of repentance will not get the better of what we are. They want to dissolve what we are in the acid of the great memorial bath. But no, they will not succeed in doing it!"

"We don't make ourselves, it's others who make us: for me, it's my family, and also you, my political family," confided Bruno Retailleau, emphasizing his "gratitude. Which also means: I am indebted to you."

"We've gone from 42,000 to 122,000 activists. I'm proud of that."

The candidate also had "a confession to make: I am right-wing!" That is to say , "a right that takes responsibility for itself, a moral right, but also an electoral force, otherwise it's useless. We must rebuild this war machine, which has broken down."

The machine, in fact, is doing better: "We went from 42,000 to 122,000 activists. I'm proud of that because I ran for that in particular: to bring back to us those who had left. Today we are the leading party in France in terms of the number of activists, we must now become the leading party in France too, for the voters."

While his participation in the government is sometimes criticized even within his own camp, he recalls: "It was a unanimous decision in the party, and without it, the Mélenchonized left would be in government, and you would have Rima Hassan in Foreign Affairs and Sandrine Rousseau in Agriculture!"

The controversies that his actions or his positions can sometimes provoke do not move him, on the contrary: "I think I am the Minister of the Interior of the entire Fifth Republic whose speech is the freest. With each new controversy, I was able to speak directly to the French people, beyond the media-political microcosm. For example, on Algeria, I was right. And we must go even further, we must attack the Algerian nomenclature! The same goes for the veil in sports competitions: I simply expressed the opinion of a majority of French people!"

"Let's not be the right of the void"

Provocatively, he asked: "How many years has it been since we had any new ideas on the right?"

In his eyes, reforms, and even "breaks" are necessary.

"Promote work, reduce welfare, reduce the bloated state, regain control of immigration... Face the major challenges too: no one is talking about demographics! We must revive the pro-natalist policy destroyed by François Hollande."

"Let us not be the right of emptiness, the right of nothing," declared the minister, who wishes to "give meaning back to politics" and "serve a French ideal."

So many reasons that push the man to run for the presidency of "a party that must be popular, modern and patriotic, the most important thing for me. Being French is an affection, it is an ambition, and it is a compassion."