Presidential election 2027: Richard Ferrand sweeps away Marine Le Pen's promise of a revision of the Constitution by referendum

The National Rally is angry with Richard Ferrand, the president of the Constitutional Council. “He should maintain a minimum of neutrality in his function and not engage in political paths,” criticized Louis Aliot, vice-president of the far-right party, Tuesday October 13, on CNews. At the origin of this anger, an interview in which the former close friend of Emmanuel Macron brushes aside Marine Le Pen's proposal to revise the Constitution by using its article 11 to implement national preference. “Today, wanting to reform the Constitution through article 11 does not exist,” says Richard Ferrand, interviewed in a podcast in partnership with BFMTV.

The four-time presidential candidate affirms, as in 2022, that, if she is elected, she will convene a national consultation to modify the Constitution and implement certain points of her program, such as the end of land rights and family reunification, national preference in access to social assistance and to toughen the right to asylum. To do this, article 89 of the Constitution provides that a draft constitutional revision must be voted on in "identical terms" by the Assembly and the Senate before approval by referendum or by a three-fifths majority of Parliament meeting in Congress. “Article 89 is the only way to reform the Constitution. All my predecessors have affirmed and reaffirmed it – Laurent Fabius before me, Jean-Louis Debré as well – there is no debate,” asserts Richard Ferrand in this interview.

“He tramples on his own word.”

However, if the RN hopes to obtain a majority in the Assembly in the event of victory in the presidential election, the task would be more complicated in the Senate, dominated by the right and the center, which would block its ambitions for constitutional revision. To get around this obstacle, the far-right party says it would use article 11 of the Constitution, which allows referendums “on the organization of public powers”. The RN relies in particular on the precedent of 1962 when General de Gaulle organized one on the election of the president by universal suffrage.

An argument rejected by Richard Ferrand. “The Constitutional Council – he was barely 4 years old, he was a growing baby – had issued what was said at the time an unofficial opinion, to tell General de Gaulle that it was not in accordance with the Constitution,” he argued. “It’s not de Gaulle who wants,” adds the former president of the National Assembly, appointed head of the body by Emmanuel Macron in 2025, with the approval of parliamentarians, including the RN. The head of the Sages also recalls that the Constitutional Council, which he has since chaired, declared itself competent, in 2000, to control the legality of the decree calling a referendum and the constitutionality of the attached text, which was not the case in 1962.