During the presidential campaign, do you increase your trips to the provinces?
Yes, every week, I make several trips. There I am having a meeting in Canet-en-Roussillon on Wednesday, then on Thursday I am meeting winegrowers in Aude, I will also see Gérard Larrat, the mayor of Carcassonne, Isabelle Chesa, activists and legislative candidates, before moving on to the Hérault sequence. With, there too, candidates for the legislative elections before the public meeting in La Grande-Motte.
Do you have the feeling that Les Républicains have come a long way?
If we remake the film for two years, we have achieved something that was not won. Two years ago, we lost two presidential elections in a row, two legislative elections in a row and a catastrophic score in the European elections. And since then, we have won all the territorial elections, the municipal, senatorial, departmental, regional ones.
Two years ago we had 60,000 militants, we are at 160,000 today. We had 1,600 young members of LR, we have between 12,000 and 15,000 today. And then we managed to get the whole family together, which was a big deal. With a party completely behind and in full support of Valérie Pécresse.
How do you judge the feedback on the ground vis-à-vis the Pécresse candidacy?
It’s going really well. While the LRs were not in the game since December, we can clearly see that a Macron-Pécresse match is emerging in the second round. She held on well, she is key-key with the FN. We are in a phase of stability. Fillon, in 2017, between the time he was appointed and before business, in six weeks, he lost six points in the polls. Valérie, she held her positions. Now she declines his proposals. And she is very attentive, while continuing to work a lot on the substance.
Doesn’t she have to straighten up to win in front of Marine Le Pen?
No, she has always been very firm on the sovereign, look in Ile-de-France. A campaign is a marathon, and there, she holds her position. And Valérie Pécresse is the ability to do, she says things and she does them. Moreover, En Marche is unable to attack it on its balance sheet in Ile-de-France. After a presidency of the verb, it will be a presidency of action.
Valérie Pécresse was minister of Nicolas Sarkozy, who remains silent. Are you looking forward to his support?
He will come in his time. I have no concerns or doubts about his support. Not a single second. He is a former President of the Republic, he is not going to enter the political arena. He will say what he has to say when the time comes.
>> Read the interview on L’Indépendant.fr
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