PARIS — It’s exactly a year since France’s snap elections that convulsed European politics by almost bringing the far right to power — which means President Emmanuel Macron now has the constitutional power to go for it again. With his centrist government, led by Prime Minister François Bayrou, hanging on by its fingernails, does he fancy another throw of the dice? In April, he roundly rejected suggestions he would dissolve parliament again. But it’s not so black-and-white. According to several people, including friends of the first couple as well as former and current government officials, all of whom were granted anonymity to discuss Macron’s future candidly, the frustrated president seems tempted. Last December, his wife, Brigitte, appeared to be still helping her husband gauge whether he had blundered by calling the elections in June. Walking an old friend down the steps of the Elysée Palace, she slipped in a final question before her guest left. “You too, you think it was a dumb move?” she asked. Plenty of people did think so. Macron’s announcement of an election was the seismic event of the night of the European elections on June 9. Given the surging wave of support for Marine Le Pen’s National Rally at the EU level, France’s president reckoned he could stem the far right’s advance at home. It was a big gamble, and it backfired spectacularly. Macron’s party lost its already razor-thin legislative majority, and the far right obtained a record number of seats in the National Assembly. The answer to the French first lady’s question on that cold winter’s day seemed obvious. France’s hapless prime ministers and their paralyzed governments are now at the mercy of the National Rally in the National Assembly, which is stressing it can oust Bayrou when it wants. Indeed, at the time Brigitte popped her question to her friend, France had just lost prime minister Michel Barnier less than 100 days into his premiership. thanks to the impossible political landscape created by the election. It was becoming apparent the country would head into the new year without a proper budget for the first time in its modern history. Last December, his wife, Brigitte, appeared to be still helping her husband gauge whether he had blundered by calling the elections in June. | Mohammed Badra/EFE via EPA ‘I TAKE FULL RESPONSIBILITY’ In his annual New Year speech, Macron offered something close to a mea culpa for calling the election. “I decided on the dissolution to give you back your voice,” Macron read off a teleprompter in the slightly stilted tone he is known for when he is not improvising. “This decision has brought more instability than serenity, and I take full responsibility for that.” Some of Macron’s closest advisers had been pushing for a public apology, but that phrase “full responsibility” didn’t sound too contrite. To several of his loyal followers listening carefully, Macron was not really acknowledging a mistake. Alexis Kohler, the president’s longtime chief of staff often described as his “second brain”, and Philippe Grangeon, a former special adviser with whom Macron still talks regularly, both often describe Macron as a gambler who leaves the casino with his pockets nearly empty but convinced he’ll beat the house on the next try, a former colleague of the aides recounted to POLITICO. While the president seemed to kill off the speculation about another election during his trip to Madagascar in April, some of his allies were, at the time, privately advising him against ruling anything out, if only so that he could wield the threat of elections again for political leverage. POLITICO reported at the time about speculation among members of the National Assembly over whether another vote would be in the offing. Among all the people that POLITICO spoke to, the most widely shared sentiment was best captured by former president François Hollande — who named Macron as his economy minister in 2014 — even though he and Macron are no longer close. In private discussions with contacts in Paris, Hollande makes clear he is unconvinced by Macron’s public statements on not holding an election, and says he is “of course” still thinking about it. He describes an election as Macron’s “last power.” ALL ON INSTINCT Several of the political calculations that Macron used to justify the dissolution in a now-infamous meeting with his shell-shocked government on the evening of the European elections ended up being very wide of the mark. The president told his interlocutors glibly: “Good luck to the left in uniting in three weeks.” Then, just before the meeting concluded, he added that “it’s better to have [National Rally President Jordan] Bardella at Matignon [the prime minister’s residence] than Le Pen at the Elysée in 2027.” In the end, the only thing that obliged Macron to call the elections was instinct. | Pool photo by Mohammed Badra/EFE via EPA By a whisker, Bardella didn’t get the job as premier because the left did, in fact, come together, defying Macron’s predictions. That hastily formed alliance ended up victorious in the snap elections, though it failed to win an outright majority. One year on, Macron’s most loyal lieutenants are still trying to put a positive spin on the decision that, according to a poll last month, most people still overwhelmingly disapprove of. The president’s supporters say the high turnout — 66 percent in the first round, 67 percent in the second — proves Macron’s initial judgment correct. Crucially, though, despite the final configuration of seats, the elections showed big wins in the popular vote for the far right in both rounds — an important signal ahead of all-important presidential elections in 2027. In the end, the only thing that obliged Macron to call the elections was instinct. Several people close to the president said he believed the government would have collapsed that autumn when lawmakers voted on a new budget, forcing him to call new elections. The president was convinced it was better to call the election at the time rather than have it forced upon him later — to “provoke” his fate “rather than suffer it,” a former minister who opposed the decision explained. ‘MACRON IS BOILING OVER. IT’S DRIVING HIM CRAZY’ The irony of Macron’s big gamble is that he ended up with a prime minister averse to risk-taking. And, according to those close to the president, he’s infuriated. “Macron is boiling over. It’s driving him crazy,” a close friend of Macron said. The two men are, in many ways, polar opposites. Macron is a young investment banker-turned-politician who crashed the scene and blew up a system that Bayrou has been part of for decades, in large part due to his notorious propensity to equivocate. A close friend of Macron said the president’s frustration is spilling over into other aspects of his life, too. “He’s irritated. He gets annoyed about everything,” the friend said. Some people close to Macron believe the president is secretly counting on lawmakers to boot out the prime minister, whether during budget talks or over a child abuse scandal dating back to Bayrou’s days as education minister in the 1990s. With the prime minister seen as a dead man walking, possible snap elections in the fall are no longer a whispered rumor but a genuine possibility some are starting to prepare for. If the government collapses, Macron could simply choose to nominate a new premier — Armed Forces Minister Sébastien Lecornu’s name has been floated as a possibility — to try where both Bayrou and Barnier failed. For now, there is no sign that plans are being drawn up. But that’s the problem with Macron, who is notorious for taking decisions at the very last minute. After all, that’s exactly what he did last summer. Joshua Berlinger contributed reporting.

The history of the Hôtel de la Côte d’Or is, in many ways, the history of French cuisine.  For almost a century, the restaurant in the inconspicuous Burgundian market town of Saulieu pioneered French gastronomy, serving as a watering hole for the rich, famous and infamous, and as a center of political intrigue. Marshal Philippe Pétain dined there during World War II as he fled from Vichy to Germany. Former President François Mitterrand often visited.  At the height of its success, in the 1990s, under its chef Bernard Loiseau, the Côte d’Or commanded three stars in the illustrious Michelin Guide, with Loiseau one of only 25 chefs in France to win the foodie bible’s top rating: “Worthy of a special journey.”  Then came a darker period: Loiseau’s suicide, the stripping of one of its stars, the restaurant’s sale by his widow, the nearly fatal blow dealt by the coronavirus. Three decades ago, I wrote a book called “Burgundy Stars: A Year in the Life of a Great French Restaurant” about Loiseau’s rise and I later wrote a magazine article about his suicide and its aftermath. And so when I heard about a new chapter in the restaurant’s history, I was eager to visit and see what was in store.  At a moment in which the far right is in ascendance in France, with the anti-immigrant National Rally the country’s single-largest political party, a new chef has taken over the Côte d’Or’s famed kitchen — 40-year-old Louis-Philippe Vigilant. He’s a native of the Caribbean island of Martinique and he’s Black. What I wondered was what do the people of this predominantly white bastion of the rising right wing make of him? As chef in the 1990s, Loiseau had embodied a particular type of Frenchness, straddling the modern and the traditional. He worked with local artisans: Colette, the goat cheesemaker; Daniel, the honey man; Jacques, the jam genius; and Jean-François, the snail producer. At the same time, he updated French haute cuisine, reducing cream and butter in his recipes for an increasingly urban population. Loiseau displayed showbiz promotion and global ambition, making frequent appearances on TV and opening bistros in Paris and even a restaurant in Japan. He produced frozen foods for supermarkets. And he took his company public on the Paris stock exchange. After Bernard Loiseau’s death, his widow, Dominique, took over. | Olivier Chassignole/AFP via Getty Images But a dark cloud hovered above this beautiful blend of traditional and modern: Loiseau suffered from manic depression. France considered the disease shameful, to be hidden, and Loiseau failed to confront his self-destructive demons. When Spanish and Danish chefs reinvented fine dining with molecular cuisine and festive foraging, Loiseau feared being toppled from the pinnacle. In 2003, he committed suicide. After his death, his widow, Dominique, took over. Haute cuisine is not friendly to women and one of my book’s secondary storylines describes Dominique’s struggle to fit in. In a just-published memoir, “A Woman’s Revenge,” she recounts how she felt “no choice except to continue.” Her husband’s legacy counted on it. Saulieu needed it — the restaurant is the town’s largest employer, with a payroll of 80. Although the Côte d’Or stayed in business, it struggled. As business stagnated and its stars started to fade away, Dominique sold off the profitable Parisian branches and retrenched in Burgundy. The bistro in Japan had been destroyed by an earthquake. Alongside its star attraction. Saulieu slumped. The town’s population fell from 3,000 at the turn of the century to about 2,300, with almost a third over 65.  Three decades ago, the city counted five doctors, four dentists and three architects. Today, it counts three doctors, one dentist and one architect. Three decades ago, 12 restaurants crowded the main Nationale 6 road, and crucially for any French town, five bakeries. Today, only six restaurants and three bakeries remain in business. “We’re an aging, dying town,” said Hubert Couilloud, the retired maître d’hôtel and Bernard’s longtime confidant. Anger fills the air. Local farmers protesting high prices, heavy regulation and foreign competition have turned signs upside down, unscrewing, flipping, then screwing them back on, transforming Saulieu into ueiluaS.  During last year’s election, a protest vote turned to the extremes, allowed the far right to win the first round of voting. Like elsewhere in France, a last-minute surprise vote in the final round allowed the moderate right to hang onto power. Until Vigilant arrived in this rural backwater, the kitchen staff included Japanese, British or even American members, but almost no dark-skinned faces. Yet the new chef’s rise to preeminence in the town’s biggest business has been smooth. “In Martinique, we have no great gastronomy,” Vigilant said in a quiet yet determined voice, standing like a general in front of his white-toqued kitchen brigade.“If you want to be a chef, it’s here.” With its parent under a new CEO — Loiseau’s daughter, Bérangère (R) — the Côte d’Or is ambitious once again. | Olivier Chassignole/AFP via Getty Images With its parent under a new CEO — Loiseau’s daughter, Bérangère — the Côte d’Or is ambitious once again. A Parisian business school graduate, Bérangère has opened a new “Loiseau du Temps” in the regional city Besançon, the first of four planned new regional bistros. A new Loiseau bistro in Tokyo is thriving. In Saulieu, Bérangère bought a 17th-century edifice across the street from the headquarters’ gastronomic temple and turned it into a keenly priced, comfortable traditional hostelry and restaurant, a casual alternative to its fine dining parent establishment. She took the flagship Côte d’Or upscale, building a stunning spa and spiffing up its spacious rooms. “We want to make this a luxury resort for people to stay several days,” Bérangère said. In March 2024, the company reported sales of €8.78 million and eked out a €134,000 profit, compared to a €823,000 loss the previous year. The key to the future is Vigilant. Determined to become a chef, he left Martinique at 17 to attend hotel school — none existed on the island. “I saw a face from the Caribbean trudging up the street — it was a surprise,” recalls Jean Berteau, the retired former owner of La Borne Impériale, another Saulieu restaurant.  “We soon became friends because I loved the islands and vacationed there during winters.” At the Côte d’Or, Vigilant met his future wife, pastry chef Lucile Darosey. They have two children and have bought a house in town. “I love it here — it’s a great place to raise a family,” he said.  The restaurant’s new menu includes Loiseau classics, including the famed sautéed frog’s legs, served with a puree of garlic and parsley. He has added his own touches, including foie gras bathed in black cardamom, sweetbreads soaked in chestnuts and turbot grilled in citrus combawa leaves. The portions are robust, generous and filling. Darosey’s dessert, an ethereal rhubarb tart, is topflight. Overall, the techniques and tastes are traditional, not revolutionary or avant-garde.  When I asked around whether his race had ever been an issue in the conservative town, I was answered by laughing denials. Despite the country’s lurch to the far right, Saulieu accepts and admires his talents. Not race, but economics and how the country’s broken politics imperil business confidence was what was on people’s minds.  The key to the future is Vigilant. Determined to become a chef, he left Martinique at 17 to attend hotel school. | Olivier Chassignole/AFP via Getty Images An election last year produced a split parliament, dominated by the far left and far right. A minority centrist government failed to pass a budget to bring the country’s spiraling debt under control. This recovery remains fragile — like France’s economic fortunes. After several years of moderate growth, the economy is expected to stagnate this year.  At the Côte d’Or, reservations before a recent holiday were down. The lunchtime dining room remained almost empty. “The clock is ticking,” says Bérangère. “People worry, they don’t know what is coming next.”

PARIS — French Prime Minister François Bayrou on Sunday said he opposed the idea of bringing France’s legal retirement age back to 62. Asked in an interview with France Inter whether he would consider returning the retirement age to the level it was before the pensions reform pushed by French President Emmanuel Macron, Bayrou said “no.” “I don’t think that [debating on the age] is the only way forward,” he added in the interview. In 2023, Macron passed a controversial pensions reform that raised the legal retirement age from 62 to 64 and was aimed at making France’s pensions system economically sustainable. The reform has been strongly opposed by both left-wing and right-wing opposition groups. In a bid to convince left-wing lawmakers not to bring down his government, Bayrou earlier this year promised to review the controversial reform, and didn’t rule out changing the retirement age. “It is my conviction that we can seek a new reform path, without totems or taboos, even on the age of retirement,”  Bayrou said back in January. His opponents were quick to attack him on Sunday for what they see as a volte-face. “Bayrou has just lied and betrayed his commitment on pensions. Exactly as we predicted,” MP Mathilde Panot, who chairs the parliamentary group of the radical-left France Unbowed party, wrote on X. In February, Bayrou launched a so-called “conclave” — a weekly meeting during which representatives of trade unions and business groups discuss with the government how to improve the pensions system.

PARIS — The first signs of how the next French government could be formed started to emerge on Friday when the Socialist leader said he was prepared to discuss a compromise with President Emmanuel Macron. The move, by Olivier Faure, could potentially see the Socialists support a government with Macron’s centrists and the conservatives. Faure is “ready to discuss all the topics and see what is possible on a short-term basis,” he said on French radio. “We need to find a solution because we can’t let the country grind to a halt for months.” France was plunged into political crisis this week when the government was toppled barely three months after being formed, raising fears that the instability could trigger financial instability across the eurozone. Outgoing Prime Minister Michel Barnier, who was supported by the centrists and the conservatives, was ousted over his attempts to push through an austere budget for 2025, with the aim of reducing France’s eye-watering deficits. Faure is expected to join other opposition leaders in heading to the Elysée Palace on Friday for talks with Macron. The president said on Thursday that he would appoint a new prime minister “in the coming days” who would represent “all the political forces that will join [government], or at least won’t topple it.” The move from the Socialist party leader is a sign of growing rifts in the pan-left coalition the New Popular Front, only days after they voted against the government with the support of Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Front. Disagreements between center-left Socialists and their coalition partner the far-left France Unbowed party are an open secret and both have been accused of only sticking together for electoral reasons. Faure’s comments immediately drew fire from another left-wing coalition partner, the Greens, whose leader, Marine Tondelier, warned the Socialists to “be careful” in talking to Macron. “Emmanuel Macron is leading the Socialist Party into a trap where they will be stuck with those who neglect the working-class,” she said. Unlike the Socialists, the Greens were not invited to the Elysée by the French president. “We’ve seen this sort of reneging from the Socialist party and it comes at a strong cost which is paid over a long period of time,” she added. But any talks between Macron and the Socialists won’t by any means be easy. Faure said Friday he wants concessions on the French president’s flagship pensions reform and a mediator to lead discussions between political parties before a new prime minister is nominated. Victor Goury-Laffont contributed reporting.

Welcome to Declassified, a weekly humor column. I say we’ve waited long enough. Those among us who are passionate about the topic have followed every twist and turn of this epic drama — all the names whispered in the corridors, the not-so-secret backdoor deals leaked by insiders and the bold public statements.  Is the moment here, at last? Will we finally get the answer we’ve been looking for, whether we like it or not? It might not be the sequel that Brussels deserves, but it is the sequel it needs right now, despite long delays and accusations of ignoring factual truths … Gladiator II hit the cinemas last week. It only took director Ridley Scott a little over 20 years to release his second historical(-ish) drama set in ancient Rome, complete with gladiators riding rhinos and sharks swimming in the Coliseum. And if you — like some historians — doubt the film’s accuracy, the Oscar-nominated director has explained his logical approach to writing the script: “‘Excuse me, mate, were you there?’ No? Well, shut the f**k up then.” If Scott can so eloquently convince Hollywood to make Gladiator 2.0 happen, surely Ursula von der Leyen can get the European Parliament to approve her new class of commissioners. After yet another closed-door meeting where the leaders of the European Parliament’s political groups discussed the fate of the six executive vice president nominees (plus Hungary’s candidate), we know … roughly as much as we did before. The real journalists — as opposed to yours truly, filling in this column temporarily and undeservingly — at POLITICO Towers are hopeful that next week’s Parliament vote will be the last. Cooler heads seem to be prevailing: If that’s true, we could soon go home with a glass of mulled wine and be done with it already. If it isn’t and those cooler heads get heated, they might decide to send VDL back to the drawing board and force her to start from scratch. 26 live blogs covering each commissioner’s grilling and all. Christmas ruined for the Brussels bubble! Whether my esteemed colleagues’ hopes of a peaceful approval of commissioners on Nov. 27 by the European Parliament will be met or not, we can all agree the last six months have been quite a ride: from the European election, followed by a surprise French parliamentary election, to incumbent commissioners dropped unceremoniously and nominees with an athletic mindset ushered in. Brussels, are you not entertained? CAPTION COMPETITION “Welcome to our TED talk, today we’re gonna talk about our favorite craft beers.” Can you do better? Email us at gpoloni@politico.eu or get in touch on X @POLITICOEurope. Last week we gave you this photo: Thanks for all the entries. Here’s the best from our postbag — there’s no prize except for the gift of laughter, which I think we can all agree is far more valuable than cash or booze. “Snog, Marry, Avoid.” by Anonymous

PARIS — Emmanuel Macron’s embattled party Renaissance has lost enough battles this year that it will be glad to avoid an internecine one. Former French Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne, who was the only candidate officially running to lead the party with current head Stéphane Séjourné tapped to serve as France’s European commissioner, stepped down from the race to make way for her successor to the premiership: Gabriel Attal. While Attal had not previously announced his candidacy for Renaissance secretary-general, he was widely expected to run — setting up possible and likely uncomfortable showdown between France’s last two prime ministers. However, the candidates reached an agreement granting Borne control of Renaissance’s national council — the party’s internal parliament — while Attal assumes the nominally top role of secretary-general. Seeking to save face, Borne emphasized that she had “not withdrawn [her] candidacy.” In an interview with radio station RTL on Wednesday, Borne said that she had “reached an agreement with Gabriel Attal” to establish a “balanced distribution of responsibilities.” In a letter sent to party members, Attal pledged that his goal as secretary-general would be to rebuild Renaissance as a “party of ideas, focused on groundwork and victories.” Renaissance suffered a crushing defeat to the far right during the European election in June and subsequently lost a third of its seats in the French lower house in the snap election that followed. In conversations with POLITICO, Borne’s supporters within Renaissance, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal party issues, stressed that their candidate had negotiated effectively to prevent Attal from having uncontested control over the party. One close ally described Borne’s new role as politically dense, while another said Borne “doesn’t care … in the grand scheme of things,” about the nomenclature of her new position as head of the national council. She is simply excited at the opportunity to connect directly with Renaissance’s local leadership and elected officials, the second ally said. Borne served as prime minister following President Emmanuel Macron’s reelection in 2022 until January, becoming the first prime minister since the 1990s to govern without an absolute majority — and the second-ever woman to hold the post. Her tenure was marred by her consistent use of a controversial constitutional mechanism to bypass parliament, using the tool to push through two consecutive budgets and a contentious pension reform, a key priority for Macron. Borne, an austere, plainspoken leader known for surreptitiously smoking her vape pen in the National Assembly, registered the lowest approval ratings of any heads of government under Macron, according to polling firm Odoxa. In a new book, Borne attributes some of the criticism she faced to sexism in politics. Attal took over shortly after, becoming the youngest prime minister in the history of France’s Fifth Republic. He was forced out after the poor showing by Renaissance in the summer snap election, but emerged from his eight-month tenure largely unscathed in the public eye. Attal is currently the second most popular politician in France, per Odoxa. The 35-year-old is frequently mentioned in discussions on who should lead the center-right camp in the next presidential election, which Macron is barred from contesting. “Gabriel Attal has legitimacy and can speak with everyone,” said one of Attal’s senior supporters, who sees the former prime minister as a credible future presidential candidate.

PARIS — The French government wants to reform the country’s immigration law — again. “There will need to be a new immigration law,” Maud Bregeon, spokesperson for Prime Minister Michel Barnier’s government, said on Sunday. Bregeon’s announcement comes less than a year after the previous immigration bill, adopted last December, fractured the unity of the former government and was labeled an “ideological victory” by far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen. The new bill should be introduced early next year, Bregeon said, and would include provisions destined to increase scrutiny on people living in France without legal permission, for example by upping the period of time during which individuals can be held in administrative centers while awaiting deportation. Since Barnier’s appointment last month, the new French prime minister and his hard-right Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau have pledged to crack down on immigration, both legal and illegal, by pushing for reforms domestically and at the European level. The new interior minister’s hard-line stances have led to discomfort and outrage among centrist MPs who have backed French President Emmanuel Macron since his 2017 election. France has joined a chorus of countries across Europe that are pushing for a clampdown on migration as populist parties notch up election victories, such as the Russia-friendly Freedom Party in Austria last month. The pressure is coming from far-right forces, but also from more liberal parties, such as the social democrats in Denmark and Germany.  Migration is expected to feature prominently at a gathering of leaders at the European Council on Oct. 17 in Brussels.  Retailleau is pushing to speed up the implementation of the EU’s hard-earned “Migration and Asylum Pact” reform of the bloc’s migration rules, which was passed only a couple of months ago and had been in the making for more than a decade. Advocates of tougher migration policies, Retailleau included, want to go further, urging strengthening control of the EU’s external border, speeding up deportations and boosting cooperation with transit countries. Barnier’s minority government, supported by a narrow base of centrist and right-wing lawmakers, would need to seek support from beyond its own ranks. The French left will very likely fight the bill, which means the government will need some support from the far-right National Rally and its allies. Still wounded by the aftermath of the previous immigration reform, which led to the resignation of the former health minister, centrist lawmakers voiced their skepticism after Bregeon’s announcement. “Voting a bill for the sake of voting a bill … doesn’t seem like a priority,” said former Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, who now presides over the pro-Macron Renaissance group in the National Assembly. A new immigration debate could lead Attal’s group to “explode,” Renaissance parliamentarian Ludovic Mendes told POLITICO’s Playbook Paris. The far right, meanwhile, is taking a victory lap. National Rally President Jordan Bardella proudly claimed that plans for a new immigration bill showed that “now, nothing in parliament can be done without us,” in an interview Monday. Anthony Lattier contributed to this report.

PARIS — When Emmanuel Macron came to power in 2017, he was hailed as the business-friendly former Rothschild banker who would turn France into a world-beating investment destination by slashing public spending and lowering taxes. Seven years later, the French president’s economic credentials are in the dock. Thursday’s eye-watering budget adjustment — €19.4 billion in tax increases and €41.3 billion in spending cuts — is a stark sign that France’s money management has veered off the rails on Macron’s watch. The president’s political opponents are relishing his sudden fall from grace on fiscal helmsmanship — and are sharpening their knives. Traditionally, Macron always sought to score political points by styling himself as the adult in the room on economic files. In this year’s parliamentary election campaign, he slammed both far-left firebrand Jean-Luc Mélenchon and far-right leader Marine Le Pen as irresponsible profligates who would topple France into the financial abyss.  Now the president is getting a taste of his own medicine as opponents and allies alike — remember that potential successors are now seeking to show their mettle — attack his track record. France’s public deficit is expected to hit a jaw-dropping 6.1 percent of the country’s gross domestic product this year, compared with 2.6 percent in 2017. “They have ruined France and lied to the French,” far-right leader Le Pen said last week, slamming “the financial incompetence of the ‘Mozart of finance’” a barbed reference to Macron’s earlier career as an investment banker at Rothschild. Perhaps more strikingly, Édouard Philippe, who served as prime minister during Macron’s first term and is in the running to succeed him, also accused the outgoing government of hiding the truth from the public and from the EU on the massive level of France’s debt.  “Nobody believes it!” he said, referring to the promise to bring deficit in line with EU rules by 2027. Economists and independent authorities such as France’s central bank and court of auditors are now also questioning Macron’s economic recipe, which was characterized by a mix of tax reductions for companies and wealthy individuals combined with generous subsidies to companies. CLEARING UP THE MESS The new government appointed after the defeat of Macron’s centrists in July’s snap legislative election and led by Prime Minister Michel Barnier is now facing a severe budget crisis. Barnier is accusing his predecessors of failing to tell the the French the whole truth about the country’s parlous budget. He said he found “a very degraded situation, much more degraded than has been said.” France’s deficit — the difference between how much the country spends and how much it receives in taxes — has taken a nosedive over the past few months and will be around 6 percent of the country’s GDP this year, well above the official forecast of the previous government of 5.1 percent and the 3 percent deficit limit fixed by EU rules. France is already facing a so-called excessive deficit procedure in Brussels for breaching EU spending rules last year. The new government appointed after the defeat of Emmanuel Macron’s centrists in July’s snap legislative election and led by Prime Minister Michel Barnier is now facing a severe budget crisis. | Dimitar Dilkoff/AFP via Getty Images Thursday’s big clawback in the budget includes a new tax on share buybacks, a tax on electricity production and a hike on corporate taxes, especially for large groups, and taxes on the wealthiest households, which partially reverse Macron’s past tax cuts. Macron’s economic game plan seemed to pay dividends before the coronavirus pandemic. At the beginning of his first term, the government managed to keep France’s deficit below the EU mandated 3 percent of GDP limit in 2018 and France extricated itself from a previous EU excessive deficit procedure. At the same time, the country’s unemployment rate fell to 7.5 percent this year from 7.9 percent in 2017, and the country became Europe’s most attractive destination for foreign investors, according to an EY survey.  Macron’s economic honeymoon ended when public spending skyrocketed to contend with the economic crisis triggered by the pandemic. Like other EU countries, France made massive state interventions to keep its economy afloat, becoming Europe’s second biggest spender in subsidies to business after Germany.  During the energy crisis fuelled by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, France and other EU countries kept spending to help impacted businesses and cap the prices of gas and electricity. HANGING ON TOO LONG When the crisis eased, the government struggled to put its public finances back in order. It balked at the sort of major spending cuts or tax hikes that could have made Macron more unpopular in EU and national elections this summer.  “The president feared a debate on the budget two months before the EU election,” said a former ministerial staffer, who was granted anonymity to speak candidly on the matter. “The president got cold feet. He has been traumatized by the yellow vests,” said a former Macronist lawmaker, referring to the violent protests against Macron’s plans for higher taxes on fuel that erupted in 2018. Over the past few months, in the corridors of France’s powerful economy ministry known as “Bercy,” officials warned that France’s deficit was spiraling out of control. But in public, the ministry kept publishing overly optimistic deficit forecasts. This spring, when the situation looked gloomy, then Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire proposed introducing a so-called corrective budget bill for 2024 to implement extra spending cuts and new taxes — an option publicly ruled out by Macron back then. Macron and his Prime Minister Gabriel Attal opposed spending cuts and tax hikes as they feared a backlash ahead of last summer’s EU election, according to the same ministerial staffer. The same reasoning applied after Macron called a surprise snap election, and the budget situation “progressively got out of hand,” the official added. “The president got cold feet. He has been traumatized by the yellow vests,” said a former Macronist lawmaker, referring to the violent protests against Emmanuel Macron’s plans for higher taxes on fuel that erupted in 2018. | Thibaud Moritz/AFP via Getty Images Until Thursday’s budget, raising taxes had been a taboo for a president who made his name by lowering them. Macron made major tax cuts for businesses, bringing the corporate tax rate down from 33 percent to 25 percent of profits, lowering compulsory contributions that companies have to pay regardless of their profits, and ending a wealth tax.  France’s court of auditors said those tax reductions were part of the problem. “These tax reductions, which have not been compensated by spending cuts, have deepened the state’s deficit and increased its debt,” France’s court of auditors wrote in a report published this year, saying Macron’s tax reduction cost €62 billion between 2018 and 2023. Macron’s rationale was that lower taxes on companies would increase economic activity and, in return, generate a bigger tax income in the state coffers. “In principle, it wasn’t a bad strategy,” economist Jean-Pisany Ferry, the mastermind behind Macron’s economic program, said in a recent interview with Le Nouvel Obs. “But it didn’t work.”

Heavyweight MEP Pascal Canfin is abandoning his leadership role in Emmanuel Macron’s political party over the way the French president handled this summer’s domestic political turmoil. In a fiery letter published on X, Canfin said he was in “profound disagreement” with Macron and his party, Renaissance, over Macron’s political choices following the results of this summer’s snap election. He said the current political situation is proof of the “toxic consequences of this strategy.” Canfin went on to accuse Macron of emboldening the National Rally by naming former Brexit negotiator and conservative grandee Michel Barnier prime minister, as he needs the far-right party’s tacit support to keep his government from collapsing. “Renaissance is supporting a largely right-wing government whose survival depends on good will of National Rally,” Canfin said. He said he would remain as part of the party’s group in the European Parliament. Canfin was one of the few Renaissance officials who publicly urged Macron to work with the pan-left New Popular Front coalition to try to form a government after it won the most seats of any group during France’s summer snap election. Macron called the unexpected vote after the National Rally’s dominant performance in European election in June. The French president, however, refused to appoint a left-wing prime minister, arguing that because the New Popular Front did not have an absolute majority, a leftist would not be able to survive a no-confidence vote. It didn’t help their case that left had also vowed to undo some of Macron’s most important legacy achievements, including his decision to raise the retirement age. Weeks before Barnier’s appointment was announced, Canfin warned in an interview with Le Monde that if Macron tapped a prime minister from the right, he or she would “owe their survival” to the National Rally.

OTTAWA — Montreal’s Laura Palestini and northern France’s Violette Spillebout may live thousands of kilometers apart in very different countries, but when they ran for higher office in recent months, they pursued similar strategies. Each deemed the leader of their country so politically toxic that they deliberately chose not to feature them on their campaign materials, even though they are members of the same party and officially support them. Once seen as emblematic of a new generation of liberals, both Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and French President Emmanuel Macron have seen their political legacies bruised after years in power, with right-wing movements posing a growing threat to their leadership. As Trudeau prepares to host Macron for a two-day visit, both leaders share a common concern: the Obama effect. Each could be succeeded by someone who is their polar opposite and threatens to tarnish their legacy, as former President Donald Trump did to Barack Obama following the 2016 U.S. presidential election. NEW FACES OF LIBERALISM Trudeau and Macron first met at a G7 summit in Sicily in 2017, just a week after the French president took office. The Canadian prime minister was already in the second year of his first term at the time. “The French-Canadian friendship has a new face. Justin Trudeau, it’s up to us to meet the challenges of our generation!” Macron posted on social media at the time. Early comparisons between Macron and Trudeau were frequent — especially when contrasted with Trump, who had also just been elected. French political scientist Dominique Moïsi noted in 2018 that the two were the same age and exuded a similar empathy and charisma. “They are both positioned at the center of the political spectrum and share a similar vision of the world,” Moïsi said. Macron, a former investment banker and economy minister, ran outside France’s traditional left- and right-wing parties and upended the political status quo when he became the youngest president in the country’s modern history. As head of state, he promised to open up the French economy and rally the country around a “progressive” agenda. Trudeau contrasted himself as a young and dynamic new kind of politician against then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper, whose Conservative government had become known for its secrecy and constant fights with the media. Trudeau’s Liberals aggressively took notes from the positive messaging and social media strategy that sprang out of Obama’s presidential campaigning. They carefully constructed a narrative arc that positioned Trudeau as an underdog — despite being heir to Canada’s most famous political dynasty. Trudeau and Macron first met at a G7 summit in Sicily in 2017, just a week after the French president took office. | Stephane de Sakutin/AFP via Getty Images After winning power, he branded the new Liberal era as “sunny ways” for Canadians, with his new government focusing on equity and shunning balanced budgets. FALLING SHORT ON A PROMISE OF CHANGE Christopher Weissberg, a former lawmaker from Macron’s Renaissance party who represented French citizens living in North America and lived in Canada at the time of Trudeau’s 2015 election, saw both leaders as people who “represented a new world, at odds with what even their own political currents represented.” In the end, however, both found themselves hamstrung by what Weissberg called “traditional politics” and failed to live up to their lofty promises of change. “Trudeau managed to embody a new way of doing politics to a certain extent, with at least some real progress in defending minorities, whereas we [in France] didn’t have a clear message by trying to be a little on the right and a little on the left,” Weissberg said. After nearly a decade in power, recent biographies of Trudeau have painted his government as being more reactive than pitching a grand vision for the country. That’s cut both ways, though. His government is credited for its successful full-court press against the trade threats posed by the Trump administration that would have upended the Canadian economy, and its relatively quick response to the Covid-19 pandemic, pumping out funds to bolster financially struggling Canadians at breakneck speed.  But now, Trudeau is pitching continuity in a country that’s hungry for change — almost a mirror image of former U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s situation just before his fall from power. Macron’s tenure has faced a series of roadblocks and seen moments of extreme tension in French society, including the monthslong Yellow Jackets movement. | Sebastien Dupuy/AFP via Getty Images Like many incumbent leaders struggling with a post-pandemic economy plagued by a high cost of living and a national housing crisis, polls show Canadians are eager for a replacement to a tired-looking Liberal government, which is starting to lose key players. French voters also appear ready for something different. While Macron has victories he can hang his hat on — France’s unemployment rate has dropped to around 7 percent after stagnating at 10 percent during François Hollande’s presidency and the country has emerged as a European leader in foreign direct investment  — his tenure has faced a series of roadblocks and seen moments of extreme tension in French society, including the monthslong Yellow Jackets movement and mass protests last year in opposition to the government’s unpopular decision to raise the minimum retirement age to 64 from 62 for most workers without a vote. Constitutionally barred from running for a third term and with a weakened grasp on power after losing control of parliament, Macron now runs the risk of seeing these instances of deep division and anger in French society stick as the most visible symbols of his presidency. A THREAT ON THE RIGHT, CRITICISM ON THE LEFT Despite growing discontent among their populations, the French and Canadian leaders have managed to maintain unusually long tenures in office. Macron was reelected in 2022, becoming the first French president to win a second term in two decades. Trudeau, meanwhile, kept his post as prime minister following elections in 2019 and 2021 and will have spent a decade in power if he makes it to the next national contest. Macron and Trudeau’s electoral fortunes, however, seem to have taken an irreversible turn for the worse. In June, after Macron’s party suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of the far-right National Rally during the European elections — a result widely seen as a rejection of his presidency —the French president took the political class aback by deciding to dissolve parliament and hold snap elections. Macron refused to appoint the NFP’s choice for prime minister, arguing the coalition held too few seats to govern with stability. | Pat Batard/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images The gamble backfired. His coalition went on to lose a third of its seats in the French lower house and its status as the main force in parliament. They were replaced by the pan-left New Popular Front (NFP) coalition, which came out of the elections with the most seats in parliament but short of an absolute majority. Macron, however, refused to appoint the NFP’s choice for prime minister, arguing the coalition held too few seats to govern with stability. The left had also promised to unravel some of Macron’s landmark pieces of legislation, including his controversial pensions reform. Macron instead entered into a coalition with the weakened conservative party Les Républicains, forming a government that needs the tacit backing of the far right to survive. Across the Atlantic, the left-wing New Democratic Party (NDP) recently pulled out of a confidence-and-supply agreement with Trudeau’s minority government, putting it at risk of falling to a motion of no confidence which would bring about an early election. That could spell trouble for Trudeau’s Liberal Party, which recently suffered two stunning by-election losses in urban Montreal and Toronto districts which were considered its strongholds. Trudeau can’t shake the question of when he will step down and who his successor will be, but the knives still haven’t come out. Liberal lawmakers all owe their careers to his name, and the Canadian prime minister has managed to keep support within his troops, who would have little to gain by breaking with their leader despite knowing he’s unpopular. So there’s no clear successor waiting in the wings. LEGACIES THROWN INTO QUESTION During his visit to Canada, Macron will attend a private dinner with Trudeau to discuss global affairs, meet with representatives of Francophone communities across Canada and meet Quebec’s Premier François Legault. But both leaders are likely to have domestic affairs front of mind, haunted by the possibility that their successors may be politicians who represent the antithesis of the progressive promises on which they were elected. A recent poll showed that if a presidential election were to be held today, the National Rally would receive around 40 percent of the vote. | Ludovic Marin/AFP via Getty Images At large, societies remain supportive of the progressive ideals of tolerance and support for minority rights championed by liberal leaders. Yet a hard-right wave is sweeping much of the Western world, with Canada and France potentially in its path. The far-right National Rally secured a landslide win in June’s EU election in France, making it the favorite in Macron’s subsequent snap vote. Though the party ended up finishing in third place, well below expectations, it still gained seats and remains broadly popular. A recent poll showed that if a presidential election were to be held today, the National Rally would receive around 40 percent of the vote. Trudeau, Canada’s positive-vibes-only prime minister, now finds himself similarly threatened, facing a firebrand populist leader who is successfully marshaling the country’s anger and frustration against its leader. Conservative Pierre Poilievre is rocketing ahead of Trudeau in the polls, decisively winning political ground on inflation, drug “safe supply” policies and by campaigning against the PM’s capstone environmental policy of carbon pricing. Poilievre has seen success in dropping incendiary apocalyptic slogans and streamlining his rhetoric — “axe the tax,” or else the economy will enter a “nuclear winter.” On the defensive, Trudeau has argued Poilievre is attacking the country’s institutions with a “flamethrower” — and that in Canada’s next election, voters will face a stark choice that cuts to the very heart of their democracy, echoing the never-Trump strategy employed by U.S. President Joe Biden’s now-abandoned reelection campaign. Trudeau will remain in office at least until October 2025, unless an early election is called. He insists he will not resign. Conservative Pierre Poilievre is rocketing ahead of Trudeau in the polls, decisively winning political ground on inflation, drug “safe supply” policies and by campaigning against the PM’s capstone environmental policy of carbon pricing. | Dave Chan/AFP via Getty Images Macron’s term is scheduled to end in 2027, but it remains unclear to what extent he will govern amid France’s increasingly fragmented political landscape. “Macron and Trudeau are both individuals who came into politics with no strong or sincere ideology other than wanting to represent political modernity, espousing a broadly liberal-progressive platform,” said Fréderic Mérand, a political science professor at the Université de Montréal. “The paradox is that they will leave power at a time when these ideas have never been stronger, with an increasingly progressive society.” Victor Goury-Laffont reported from Paris. Kyle Duggan reported from Ottawa.