French conservative party chooses its first
female presidential candidate to take on Macron
Valérie Pécresse, a former minister under Sarkozy,
will run for Les Républicains.
BY CLEA
CAULCUTT
December 4,
2021 2:43 pm
PARIS –
Members of France’s conservative party Les Républicains have chosen the head of
the Paris region Valérie Pécresse as their candidate in April’s presidential
election.
The former
minister won the party’s primary with 61 percent of the vote Saturday, beating
hardliner Eric Ciotti to become the party’s first female presidential
candidate.
Pécresse
said she would give “her all, her force and her determination” to lead the
party to victory.
“I’ve got
good news,” she told a gathering of conservative supporters, “the Republican
right is back, the right [that stands up for] its beliefs is back and France
can wait no longer.”
A
pro-business moderate, Pécresse is widely seen as a bigger threat to President
Emmanuel Macron in next year’s election. She has greater appeal than Ciotti
among center-right voters who have drifted away from Les Républicains.
France has
never had a woman president. Currently, Pécresse is polling fourth at around 10
percent, behind Macron and a pair of far-right candidates, Marine Le Pen and
Eric Zemmour, according to POLITICO’s poll of polls.
On
Saturday, Pécresse described Macron as a politician without conviction.
“Between
the incumbent and myself, there is more than a difference of political line,
there is a difference of character,” she said. “He has only one ambition, to
please, whereas I have only one passion, to get things done.”
A career
politician, Pécresse served as budget minister and higher-education minister
under former president Nicolas Sarkozy. She is also head of the regional
government in Île-de-France, which includes Paris, allowing her to claim
first-hand executive experience, running a tight budget and confronting social
problems in impoverished Parisian suburbs.
Pécresse
has described herself as “one-third Thatcher, two-thirds Merkel.” She has
pledged to rise the retirement age to 65 and cut thousands of public-sector
jobs if she is elected president. She has also – like most candidates on the
right – become more hardline on immigration, reflecting the influence of the
far right on mainstream parties. She promises to “restore French pride” and
defend “family values.”
Pécresse
obtained the support of rivals who lost in the first round of the conservative
primary. “I know what difficult fights are, I know I can win them, I am a woman
who wins and achieves things,” she said on Thursday after the first-round
results were announced.
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