National Rally (RN) presidential candidate Marine Le Pen has accused Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s La France Insoumise (LFI) of putting forward a plan to dismantle France rather than to restore it.
Le Pen made the remarks on X on November 7, after LFI released an updated version of its programme for the 2027 presidential election. She said the platform would carry to its conclusion the deconstruction of France that President Emmanuel Macron had begun on taking office.
She listed what she called dangerous measures, among them restoring full birthright citizenship, including in the French Indian Ocean territory of Mayotte, and giving foreigners the vote in local elections. She also pointed to plans to dismantle the police anti-crime brigades (BAC), disarm municipal police forces, weaken juvenile justice and roll back action against squatters.
On the economy, Le Pen attacked LFI’s degrowth agenda and its proposal to gradually close France’s nuclear power plants. She argued that under Mélenchon the country would give up controlling its borders, enforcing its authority, protecting its citizens and guaranteeing its energy sovereignty.
Le Pen described LFI as a threat to national cohesion, security, prosperity and the foundations of French sovereignty. She said it was her duty to fight it with the greatest determination.
Mélenchon replied on X the same day that Le Pen’s attacks focused mainly on immigration and the police, according to AFP. He was due to present the programme at a rally in Le Bourget, north of Paris, on November 14.
Former prime minister Édouard Philippe, of the centre-right Horizons party, also targeted both camps at a meeting in La Ciotat, southern France. He claimed RN and LFI shared a hostility to European integration and a wish to take France out of NATO.
In recent weeks, RN has hardened its law-and-order message and accused LFI of seeking to profit electorally from the cost-of-living protests that have shaken France. A national day of action on October 17 drew about 550,000 people, according to the French Interior Ministry, and was marred by rioting and looting in several cities.
The latest Ipsos bva-CESI survey for Le Parisien, conducted on October 21-22, put Le Pen first in all four first-round scenarios tested, on between 32 and 33.5 per cent. Mélenchon came second in each on 17 per cent, setting up a run-off between the pair.
Le Pen’s own candidacy still hangs on the courts. A Paris appeals court upheld her conviction over the misuse of European Parliament funds on July 7 but shortened her ban from office, allowing her to enter the presidential race.
The Court of Cassation has said it could rule on her final appeal by early April 2027, ahead of the first round on April 18.
