• The pension reform could end its difficult journey in Parliament this week.
  • Since the beginning of the debates, the elected representatives of the National Rally have stood back in the hemicycle.
  • In the majority as in the opposition, several elected representatives fear that Marine Le Pen will emerge victorious from the sequence.

She watched her opponents scarf each other in the Chamber with a detached look. Marine Le Pen has kept away from the battle between the majority and the elected representatives of the Nupes on the pension reform. Calm, arms crossed, wearing a slight smile, the former president of the National Rally may have already imagined reaping the fruits of these chaotic exchanges. While the government's bill should end its difficult journey in Parliament this week, a fear is shared by the majority and opposition elected officials: to see the RN emerge victorious from the sequence. A step targeted by the party in its strategy to conquer power.

Since the opening of the debates, the National Rally has been rather timid in the National Assembly, as in the media, to oppose the government's bill. Its 88 elected representatives tabled only two hundred amendments (half as many as the presidential party) to try to modify the text, far from the thousands defended by the Nupes. Despite this erasure in the hemicycle, Marine Le Pen drank whey last Thursday, during an interview on France Inter.

"Even if this pension reform is passed – which I really do not want and what I am not convinced of – it will be defeated when I am elected," she said. The former boss of the RN is already projecting herself towards the 2027 presidential election, with one more argument in her bag. "It's an ultra-divisive subject. A large majority of French people are against the reform. Retirement at 64 will be a strong argument for the future, especially for the battle of 2027, "confirms Thomas Ménagé, RN deputy of Loiret.

"Marine Le Pen plays the good mother"

A prospect that despairs several elected representatives of the majority. "We are all wondering how to ensure that it is not Le Pen at the next move. Our democracy is sick! ", chokes a Macronist deputy, disappointed by the holding of debates in the Assembly. "We are on a slippery slope, and every year, the RN grows a little more. But what accelerates it? We who want to save the pay-as-you-go system or the guys from the Nupes who call us monsters and bastards in the Chamber? »

The members of the presidential majority prefer of course to target the parliamentary obstruction of La France insoumise and the heated debates of the two weeks of examination, rather than the broad opposition of the French to the text. "Every day, we felt like we were touching the bottom of the pool, but in fact no, we went even further, sighs an elected representative of the MoDem. This is blessed bread for Marine Le Pen, who meanwhile, garners in the opinion by playing the good mother ... »

"The popular categories will not forget"

This continuation of the RN's strategy of "normalization", sometimes pushed to the point of caricature, seems to have paid off, according to several polls. Marine Le Pen would be the political personality who best embodies the opposition to the reform, according to an Ifop survey published at the end of February. And this, despite the absence of the RN in the demonstrations and the ideological mistakes of the party on retirement at 60 in recent years. "They are not opponents, they have done nothing in the Assembly, they have not demonstrated, they oppose the blockade of the country, annoys Antoine Léaument, LFI deputy of Essonne. We are the only ones who embody anger in the country. The only thing that benefits the RN is the attitude of the Macronists, who put forward, once again, their devil of comfort. »



The prospect of a "passage in force" in the National Assembly, this Thursday, through a 49.3, is all the more feared by parliamentarians. "Pension reform is the ultimate tension. If we add a 49.3, it will leave a very strong trace... ", confirms an elected Horizons, close to Edouard Philippe. "The government's strategic choices, the brothel of La Nupes, all this benefits Marine Le Pen. The popular categories will not forget this reform if it is adopted. And this anger will ultimately benefit the National Rally, "adds a deputy Republicans opposed to the text. A Renaissance elected official, in the front line on the text, adds, weary: "We are on the edge of the abyss, and everyone passes the responsibility to each other, but in the end, if Marine Le Pen wins, we will only have our eyes to cry ... »

  • Pension reform 2023
  • Retirement
  • Marine Le Pen
  • National Rally (RN)