On the evening of his election as head of the Rural Coordination, last November in Auch, Bertrand Venteau announced to applause that environmentalists wanted to "kill" the farmers and that it was necessary to "take their skin off". The breeder returns to be judged, this Thursday, September 3, for public provocation without effect to commit a crime or misdemeanor.
His audience applauded him. On November 19, 2025, at the 32nd congress of Rural Coordination in Auch, Bertrand Venteau was elected president of the union, by a short margin, against the outgoing Véronique Le Floc'h. The Limousin cow breeder, supported by the hard wing of the union, speaks and says, pointing to his adversaries: "The ecologists, the degrowth want to kill us, we must kill them." He continues: “We must fight them on a daily basis, in the departments, the regions, up to the ministry.”
Ten months later, it was again in Auch that he returned to explain himself, before the judicial court. He appears this Thursday, September 3 for public provocation without effect to commit a crime or misdemeanor.
From the conference hall to the criminal court
In the days following these invectives against environmentalists, the Auch public prosecutor's office received numerous complaints from elected officials and associations, as well as reports from parliamentarians under article 40 of the code of criminal procedure, the provision which obliges any constituted authority to denounce a crime or misdemeanor of which it is aware. The Minister of Agriculture, Annie Genevard, also condemned “the violence” of this declaration, described as “deeply shocking and unacceptable”.
The offense of which he is accused falls under the law of July 29, 1881 on freedom of the press. Article 24 punishes with five years' imprisonment and a fine of 45,000 euros anyone who directly provokes, publicly, to commit intentional attacks on the life or integrity of the person, even when this provocation has no effect.
Questioned at the end of August by the newspaper Sud-Ouest, Bertrand Venteau maintained the comments made during his election and for which he is being prosecuted: "It's never fun to go to court. But after everything that happened this summer [fires and drought, editor's note], my words were full of meaning." Speaking to the Vert media, in 2025, the breeder also said he doubted the human origin of global warming.
“A political and ideological adversary”, pleads the Rural Coordination
But what will be the agricultural union's line of defense? In a press release, the Rural Coordination explains that its president designated "a political and ideological adversary: a punitive and decreasing ecology whose ideas and consequences for French agriculture we are fighting." And adds: “There was obviously no question of calling for physical attacks on anyone.”
The union goes further and reverses the accusation: “Behind the trial of a man there now arises a question: do we want to gag an agricultural union because it refuses to submit to the dominant discourse?”
Opposite, the Confédération paysanne union, which defends agriculture “respectful of the balance of life” through agro-ecological practices, does not see it that way. “Targeting environmental activists is obscurantism and populist convenience, pointing out scapegoats to relieve oneself of responsibility,” she believes. Among the plaintiffs are Friends of the Earth and France Nature Environnement.
Two gatherings a few meters apart
The hearing will therefore in all likelihood be held in a tense climate. The Rural Coordination is calling for a rally in support of its president Thursday morning in Auch, before the opening of the debates. The Peasant Confederation must participate in another rally, only a few meters from the first, to show its support for the complainants.
The Allées d'Étigny car park was closed from Wednesday September 2 at 8 p.m., and will remain closed until Thursday 7 p.m., vehicles already parked being able to leave at any time. Severe traffic disruptions are expected in the city center between 9 a.m. and 7 p.m.
