Sylvain Maillard, an “original macronist” elected to head the Renaissance group in the National Assembly

2023-07-26 13:12:42
Renaissance MP Sylvain Maillard and other elected members of the group applaud during the handover of Aurore Bergé, appointed Minister for Solidarity, at the Ministry of Health, in Paris, July 20, 2023. JULIEN MUGUET FOR “THE WORLD”

The 171 Renaissance deputies have chosen continuity. Five days after the appointment of Aurore Bergé as head of the Ministry of Solidarity and Families, the deputy for Paris Sylvain Maillard was elected without surprise, Wednesday July 26, at the head of the Renaissance group in the National Assembly, taking the estate of the elected representative of Yvelines. After a flash campaign and a first round opposing him to the deputy of Val-de-Marne Frédéric Descrozaille, Mr. Maillard, 49, obtained 80% votes in an electronic ballot, while the Palais-Bourbon interrupted its work for the summer break. “Sylvain is someone who has very strong leadership. He is a business leader, he knows how to manage, he has a sense of communication, he is very present in the Hemicycle and he knows how to respond to opposition “salutes the Renaissance chairman of the Economic Affairs Committee, Guillaume Kasbarian.

For the Macronist leaders, it was a question of ensuring the stability of the Renaissance group at the approach of an autumn which promises to be complicated for the presidential camp with the examination of the two finance bills, of that on the immigration and the programming law on energy and climate. So many texts where the presidential coalition is not certain to have a majority to have them adopted.

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A “less angular” personality

The choice to place the former vice-president of the group at the head of the macronist formation – a position which he already occupied temporarily during Ms. Bergé’s maternity leave in the fall of 2022 – had been anticipated by his predecessor and its supporters, also keen to preserve the authority acquired over the group after the debacle of the legislative elections. Positioning himself as a natural successor to Ms. Bergé, Sylvain Maillard had announced a few hours before the official appointment of the latter, Thursday, July 20, his candidacy for the head of Renaissance by a message from his team to journalists.

This former Chiraquian was successively inserted in the Union for French Democracy (UDF), the New Center and then the Union of Democrats and Independents (UDI) before joining Emmanuel Macron in 2016. Spokesperson for his first presidential campaign , Mr. Maillard then took advantage of the Macronist wave in the legislative elections by being elected in the first round in Paris with 50.80% of the vote. In the spring of 2022, he will have to wait for the second round to be re-elected against the “rebellious” candidate, Thomas Luquet, with 65.57% of the vote.

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