PARIS — Marine Le Pen’s bid to broaden her appeal beyond the far right is running into a familiar challenge: The promises that energize her core voters are precisely the ones that worry fiscal conservatives. At the first debate ahead of next spring’s presidential election, the far-right veteran promised French voters an ambitious cost-cutting package she says would bring the country’s budget deficit under control. But she also doubled down on her promise to roll back a key element of French President Emmanuel Macron’s pension reform and make it possible for workers to retire at 62.
Instead, she made clear that fiscal discipline wouldn’t come at the expense of the promises she has made to her core voters. Politically, that choice could cut both ways: Sticking with her pension promises may shore up support among her core voters, but make it harder for her to win over the moderate electorate she will likely need if she is to enter the Elysée. France’s public finances leave little room for maneuver.
Public debt has climbed to 117.5 percent of GDP while the budget deficit remains well above EU limits and borrowing costs have risen sharply. At the Medef debate, Le Pen said she was in favor of a “golden rule” to keep budget deficits below 3 percent of GDP, similar to Germany’s debt brake. She also said she would soon present a plan to cut some €125 billion in spending, including on budget items associated with migration, “useless” public agencies, and France’s contribution to the EU.
Le Pen will present her detailed platform in the fall, but Jean-Philippe Tanguy, a member of Parliament for the National Rally, told POLITICO this would be accomplished in “less than five years.” But Le Pen has yet to explain in detail how those savings would be achieved, and rivals are already questioning whether the numbers add up. The tension has also surfaced inside her own camp. As Le Pen was outlining her economic agenda at the Medef event, news broke that François Durvye, one of her key economic advisers and a leading advocate of greater fiscal discipline, was leaving the campaign.
Durvye, who has informally advised Le Pen for five years, has been credited with building bridges between her party and the business world. A former fund manager, he was a key voice in the party on economic issues. But his push for more fiscal discipline and economically liberal policies ran against the instincts of the party’s old guard, which remained wedded to the party’s populist positions.
He was also a special advisor to National Rally President Jordan Bardella, Le Pen’s protégé who was expected to take the campaign’s reins if Le Pen had been judged ineligible to run because of her guilty verdict for embezzlement of EU funds. Bardella has been working to move the party toward the center on economic issues, including softening Le Pen’s pledge on the pension age — something that Durvye had been advocating for internally. While Durvye declined to comment on the exact circumstances of his departure, he made clear privately and publicly that he did not feel able to defend the party’s latest positions to his business contacts.
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