Marine Le Pen’s presidential economic strategy faces fiscal and political tension

PARIS — Marine Le Pen’s bid to broaden her appeal beyond the far right is running into a familiar challenge: The promises that energize her core voters are precisely the ones that worry fiscal conservatives.

At the first debate ahead of next spring’s presidential election, the far-right veteran promised French voters an ambitious cost-cutting package she says would bring the country’s budget deficit under control.

But she also doubled down on her promise to roll back a key element of French President Emmanuel Macron’s pension reform and make it possible for workers to retire at 62.

“I can already hear what people are going to say … ‘It’s an additional deficit’,” she told the event last week, which was organized by Medef, France’s main business lobby. “It’s a choice we have to make as a society,” she added. “And I stand by it.”

As her campaign kicks off in earnest, many wonder whether the candidate for the far-right National Rally will revisit her economic platform to broaden her appeal, especially among business leaders and traditional center-right voters.

Instead, she made clear that fiscal discipline wouldn’t come at the expense of the promises she has made to her core voters.

Politically, that choice could cut both ways: Sticking with her pension promises may shore up support among her core voters, but make it harder for her to win over the moderate electorate she will likely need if she is to enter the Elysée.

France’s public finances leave little room for maneuver. Public debt has climbed to 117.5 percent of GDP while the budget deficit remains well above EU limits and borrowing costs have risen sharply.

At the Medef debate, Le Pen said she was in favor of a “golden rule” to keep budget deficits below 3 percent of GDP, similar to Germany’s debt brake.

She also said she would soon present a plan to cut some €125 billion in spending, including on budget items associated with migration, “useless” public agencies, and France’s contribution to the EU. Le Pen will present her detailed platform in the fall, but Jean-Philippe Tanguy, a member of Parliament for the National Rally, told POLITICO this would be accomplished in “less than five years.”

But Le Pen has yet to explain in detail how those savings would be achieved, and rivals are already questioning whether the numbers add up. “Marine Le Pen will ruin France,” Bruno Retailleau, a conservative candidate from Les Républicains, told reporters shortly after the Medef event.

The tension has also surfaced inside her own camp. As Le Pen was outlining her economic agenda at the Medef event, news broke that François Durvye, one of her key economic advisers and a leading advocate of greater fiscal discipline, was leaving the campaign.

Internal cracks

Durvye, who has informally advised Le Pen for five years, has been credited with building bridges between her party and the business world. A former fund manager, he was a key voice in the party on economic issues.

But his push for more fiscal discipline and economically liberal policies ran against the instincts of the party’s old guard, which remained wedded to the party’s populist positions. He was also a special advisor to National Rally President Jordan Bardella, Le Pen’s protégé who was expected to take the campaign’s reins if Le Pen had been judged ineligible to run because of her guilty verdict for embezzlement of EU funds.

Bardella has been working to move the party toward the center on economic issues, including softening Le Pen’s pledge on the pension age — something that Durvye had been advocating for internally.

While Durvye declined to comment on the exact circumstances of his departure, he made clear privately and publicly that he did not feel able to defend the party’s latest positions to his business contacts.

“What was accomplished to break down the barriers between business representatives was quite significant,” Durvye told POLITICO, adding he had used his “freedom to leave.”

Le Pen, asked about his departure on French TV, said it was her “wish.”

Trust issues

With France among the countries hardest hit by a global surge in borrowing costs and under close watch from ratings agencies, fiscal issues are bound to play a major role in the campaign.

As the frontrunner, Le Pen’s proposals are coming under increasing scrutiny. Polls place her in first place at about 35 percent in the first round of France’s election, and well placed to beat her rivals in the runoff round.

In terms of her economic credentials, Le Pen has come a long way since 2017, when Macron crushed her during a debate performance, hammering her on a now-abandoned pledge to take France out of the eurozone.

In a poll by French research firm Odoxa published last week, 36 percent of respondents said they trusted Le Pen to implement sound economic policy if elected — the highest score among all presidential candidates tested.

But the results mask a more nuanced reality: The figure is largely driven up by support from National Rally voters, with centrists far less confident. Le Pen’s leading centrist rival, former Prime Minister Edouard Philippe, had a broader base of support on the issue. That could prove decisive in the runoff, where two finalists have to woo voters who didn’t opt for them in the first round.

Bruno Jeanbart, the vice-president of polling firm Opinionway, who surveyed business leaders ahead of last week’s debate, said business-minded voters were still skeptical that the National Rally was up for the task when it comes to fixing France’s economy.

Le Pen’s return as a presidential candidate fuels that dynamic. Bardella and his allies had made a point of reaching out to economically liberal voters and “gave the impression that they might be more attuned to the expectations and challenges of the business world,” the pollster said.

By contrast, Le Pen has long been seen as defiant towards the world of business, railing at the global elites that meet in places like Davos and expressing sympathy with voters hurt by the ripple effects of globalization in France’s industrial heartlands.

When she unveils her full platform, expected next month, Le Pen will need to show centrist voters that she can make the numbers work.