The French political scene has returned to the forefront of regional and international attention with the official announcement of the controversial right-wing journalist and thinker, Eric Zemmour, that he will run again in the presidential race.
This announcement came through a prominent media appearance on the evening news bulletin of the French channel TF1, bringing to mind the sharp division he caused in previous elections, based on his usual program that focuses on identity, state protection, and complete sovereignty.
This candidacy comes to strengthen his position as one of the most prominent intellectual and political figures who reshaped the map of the extreme right in the country, armed with a confrontational vision and media tools through which he built a solid public base. Zemmour's political phenomenon is characterized by mixing the cards and going beyond the traditional lines of the French political establishment. He does not present himself as just a passing candidate, but rather expresses an ideological trend that believes that France is experiencing an existential crisis that threatens its civilization.
This strict intellectual orientation shifted his career from the newsrooms of prestigious newspapers to the bustling political arenas, to chart the features of a new electoral battle that re-examines identity and borders in a country experiencing profound and accelerating societal transformations.
Roots and origins... Algerian immigration and the formulation of family identity
Eric Zemmour's story takes on a dramatic dimension when looking at his origins. He was born on August 31, 1958 in the suburb of Montreuil in Paris, to a family of Berber Jews who came from Algeria a few years before it gained independence.
Zemmour grew up in a humble environment in the Parisian suburbs, where his father worked as a paramedic, while his mother and grandmother raised him and taught him the values of strict integration and adherence to French culture.
This paradox between his family's immigrant origins from North Africa and his current extremist political stances against immigrants constitutes a fundamental pillar in understanding his personality. He believes that his family made strenuous efforts to fully assimilate into the French cultural model, which is the model that everyone demands to follow without ambiguity.
Zemmour received his initial education in private Jewish schools in Paris, where his early inclinations toward history, literature, and politics emerged, and he was influenced by the great historical novels that glorified the greatness of the French state and its founders.
This upbringing strengthened in him an early nationalist tendency that later crystallized in his writings, and made him adopt a fierce defense of his country’s cultural heritage, considering that integration was the only way to preserve the societal fabric, and denouncing any attempt to preserve the original cultural particularities of the newcomers.
Academic track... Graduate of “Political Sciences” and major administrative school complex
Zemmour’s study station was crucial in shaping his political awareness and ambition. He succeeded in enrolling in the prestigious Institute of Political Studies in Paris, known as “Sciences Po,” from which he graduated in 1977. This institute, which is considered a factory for the ruling elite in France, provided Zemmour with the opportunity to delve deeper into law and political science, and hone his controversial talent that later distinguished him in the media space.
However, his academic career collided with an obstacle that formed in him something like an intellectual and political complex towards the official institution in the country. Zemmour failed twice in a row, in 1980 and 1981, to pass the difficult entrance exams for the National School of Administration (ENA), the most prestigious institution from which France's top presidents and prime ministers graduated.
This academic failure, which deprived him of entering the diplomatic or high administrative corps through the royal door, turned into political fuel for him. He spent his subsequent career attacking the ruling administrative and political elites who graduated from this school, accusing them of disconnection from the reality of the French people and weakness in managing the country's major crises.
From the backstage of journalism to the screen... the making of a fierce intellectual attacker
Zemmour compensated for his administrative failure by heading towards the world of journalism, where he began his career as a writer and correspondent in the newspaper “Le Quotidien de Paris,” before moving in the mid-nineties to the most prestigious conservative newspaper, “Le Figaro,” where he established a prominent name for himself through opinion articles and sharp political analyses.
His journalistic career spanned three decades, during which he emerged as one of the most widely read and controversial columnists, using sober language and relying on extensive historical references to prove his theories about the decline of French power. The biggest transformation in his career came with his move to television screens, where he transformed from a journalist writing behind the scenes to the star of talk shows. Through his participation in popular programs such as “On Naba Koshe” and then his daily program on C News, Zammour succeeded in transforming complex intellectual debates into exciting public debates.
He employed his rhetorical abilities and his confrontational language to raise the issues of identity, immigrants, the “Great Replacement” theory, and the position on Islam at the heart of daily circulation, which gained him wide popularity among right-wing circles, in exchange for harsh criticism and repeated judicial convictions on charges of incitement to hatred and religious and ethnic discrimination.
The presidential bet again... the “Recovery” Party and its attempt to return to the forefront
Zemmour was not satisfied with the theoretical role. In late 2021, he founded his political party, “Reconquête,” and ran in the 2022 presidential elections, obtaining about 7 percent of the votes in the first round.
Today, the man is re-presenting himself for the next presidential race, armed with the same convictions, and targeting the segment of voters who are looking for radical solutions to security, economic, and sovereignty issues.
His new program is based on deporting foreign offenders, cutting government expenditures, and protecting what he describes as “French France” in the face of globalization and the European Union. In his new endeavor, Zemmour faces very complex challenges amidst fierce competition within the right-wing and far-right camps, especially with the presence of Marine Le Pen, who has a strong presence in the opinion polls.
Despite the decline in his current support rates compared to his previous peak, observers believe that his candidacy has the ability to impose the intellectual agenda of the right again, and force the rest of the candidates to discuss his favorite issues.
The Spanish government said on Tuesday that it had asked TikTok to suspend its operations in Spain until it removed material that included sexual assault on children, after a media report documented the presence of 1,183 obscene posts on the application that had received millions of views, according to Reuters.
The Ministry of Youth Affairs stated, in a statement, that Minister Serra Rego appealed to prosecutors and the Data Protection Agency to take action against the social networking site, in light of the ministry’s inability alone to ban the platform in Spain.
“Social media cannot be a lawless zone,” Rigo said.
This request comes months after the government of Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez called for an investigation into the platforms “X”, “Meta”, and “Tik Tok” against the backdrop of publishing material containing sexual assault against children that was produced using artificial intelligence, at a time when European regulatory bodies are intensifying their oversight of major technology companies regarding harmful and illegal content.
On Monday, the Spanish non-profit platform Maldeta ES, which specializes in fact-checking news, published an investigation that revealed that video clips containing explicit scenes of sexual assault against children had been viewed on the platform no less than 48 million times, with more than 26,000 accounts commenting on and sharing these materials.
The platform published a follow-up report this evening, in which it stated that TikTok had restricted two of the search terms identified by the Maldita ES investigation as paths leading to child sexual abuse content for users in Spain, but searches from other European countries still led to the same content.
