Lecornu, threatened with a vote of no confidence the day after being appointed Prime Minister

ParisPresident Emmanuel Macron surprised everyone on Friday evening by reappointing Sébastien Lecornu as prime minister. Four days earlier, Lecornu had resigned in the face of the threat of a vote of no confidence and an attempt to leave the executive of one of the governing partners, the Les Republicans (LR). He had appointed his government just 14 hours earlier. The president's reappointment of him to head the government has not been well received by the opposition parties: the day after his appointment, his position was already in jeopardy.

"We will immediately censure" the new prime minister, warned Jordan Bardella, president of the National Regroupment party, Marine Le Pen's far-right party. Bardella called Lecornu's appointment a "democratic disgrace" and "a humiliation of the French people." On the other side of the parliamentary aisle, France Insoumise, led by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, also took less than five minutes this Friday night to announce that they will attempt to overthrow the future government with an "immediate" vote of no confidence.

With the far right and the radical left ready for anything, the key to whether the vote of no confidence succeeds or not lies with the Socialists. They are Macron and Lecornu's only hope for the government—which is yet to be named—to remain in power at least until the 2026 budget is approved. For now, the Socialists would also join the vote of no confidence, but have left the door open to negotiation. Their condition for not imposing a vote of no confidence is the suspension of Macron's pension reform, approved in 2023 and which extended the retirement age to 64 with a progressive schedule.

Suspension of the pension reform

"In the absence of an immediate and complete suspension of the pension reform," we will vote for no confidence, warned the Secretary General of the Socialist Party, Pierre Jouvet, this Saturday. Both the Socialists and the Greens are deeply angered by the president's refusal to appoint a left-wing prime minister and by Macron's rigidity, whom they accuse of being inflexible in his positions. However, Jouvet's words suggest that they are willing to negotiate to prevent the government from collapsing and, above all, to approve the budget. The suspension of the pension reform is at the heart of their demands and will, in all likelihood, be the crux of the negotiations.

It won't be easy because if Macron and Lecornu accept the suspension of the pension reform, they could lose the support of the right. The Republicans, until now the Macronists' governing partner, have announced that they will not participate in the new government, but are open to supporting the budget. Now, for them, pension reform is a red line, and they threaten to bring down the government if the reform is touched. The positions of the right and left seem irreconcilable, and that's what could end up making the motion of no confidence succeed. If one or the other votes for it, the no-confidence vote will be approved.

Sausage to the French

Macron's determination to keep Lecornu as prime minister against all odds has raised eyebrows. Even within Macron's own ranks, but especially on the fringes. "It's a new French sausage," the president asserted.unsubmissive Manuel Bompard. The Prime Minister, a very close and loyal figure to the President of the Republic, justified Macron's decision to reappoint him on Saturday because "there weren't many other candidates."

Sébastien Lecornu must appoint a government in the next few hours and is casting against the clock. Monday is the deadline for submitting the draft budget to the Council of Ministers, and logically, he should have appointed the ministers earlier, at least the Minister of Economy. This time, he is determined to choose the members of the executive more carefully so as not to repeat the mistake of last Sunday, when he appointed a government that included a large part of the ministers who were part of the previous executive, which had been overthrown by the National Assembly a few days earlier. Lecornu has now promised "new faces" and a "free" government "not subject to political parties."