Edouard Philippe is a man in a hurry. And in great demand during badly handled election campaigns. This Wednesday, June 15, the former prime minister was asked to help Clément Beaune. The Minister Delegate for Europe, candidate of the presidential party, La République en Marche (LRM), is in danger in the 7e constituency of Paris, where his opponent of the New Ecological and Solidarity Popular Union (Nupes), the lawyer Caroline Mecary, came first in the first round of the legislative elections, Sunday June 12.
Clément Beaune, historical macronist, close to the Head of State, has, in his words, a « ADN » left and « tripes » Parisians. But to win the legislative battle, a “buddy on the right”named after the documentary by Laurent Cibien devoted to the former tenant of Matignon, whose “tripe tastes like salt water”can help him make the difference in the second round, Sunday, June 19. “I don’t do arithmetic or tune devicesdefends the candidate. But it is a second round of rallying that is played out on shared values beyond my own history and my sensibility by people who vote for a European and republican right. I don’t flirt. I’m not meandering, I’m consistent from the start (…). Edouard Philippe has a different political history, but I have many more points of agreement with him than with a Jean-Luc Melenchon”, the leader of La France insoumise and craftsman of the Nupes, underlines the minister.
So go for the mayor of Le Havre, former member of the Les Républicains (LR) party, in the role of lethal weapon and right-wing surety which could allow Clément Beaune to win and, incidentally, to keep his post at the Quai d’Orsay . It is a little after 10 o’clock when the great silhouette of the long-awaited city councilor appears on the Place d’Aligre, in Paris. A neighborhood beloved of Klapisch’s films where people cycle and sort their waste. Ideal decor for a former Prime Minister described as a “right boho”. Rushing into the covered market, Edouard Philippe, in fact, is at his ease and talks coffee capsules with “Joseph”, the Irish roaster. And crosses the stalls with long strides as one would cross a hurdle race, saluting in turn the “best black pudding in France”the “best pork chop in France” and the “best primeur in Paris” where tomatoes trade for up to 18.90 euros per kilo. Smiles, selfies. The Norman savors and confides, when he is offered a raspberry, preferring apples: “I always eat apples”he slips, in an allusion to Jacques Chirac and his presidential destiny.
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