French
far right looks for Charlie Kirk moment after activist’s killing
Ahead of
local elections that serve as a bellwether for next year’s presidential
campaign, the National Rally says it is the victim of an increasingly radical
left wing.
February
20, 2026 4:00 am CET
By Marion
Solletty and Victor Goury-Laffont
PARIS —
France’s far right is framing the death of an activist associated with
far-right groups as a moment akin to the murder of Charlie Kirk in the United
States.
The
National Rally has in recent days started pointing to the killing of
23-year-old Quentin Deranque in Lyon as proof the poll-topping populist party
is the victim of an increasingly radical political left, much as the MAGA
movement in the United States did following Kirk’s assassination last year.
With key
municipal elections next month serving as a bellwether of the National Rally’s
electability heading into the 2027 presidential race, the incident has deepened
the fissures in France’s polarized politics and fueled fears of further
violence.
“What
happened to Quentin, it feels like it could have happened dozens of times to
our supporters in recent years,” said National Rally MEP Pierre-Romain
Thionnet.
“Of
course, those are not the same circumstances,” Thionnet said of the Kirk
comparison. “But there are similarities in the way it resonates.”
Deranque
was, unlike Kirk, unknown to the general public before he died Saturday after
taking several blows to the head during a fight that broke out near a
university where MEP Rima Hassan was attending an event.
The
events leading up to the fight that cost Deranque his life remain unclear. The
far-right feminist group Collectif Nemesis said Deranque was providing security
for them at their protest against Hassan and her anticapitalist party, France
Unbowed.
France
Unbowed and its firebrand leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon have been the focus of most
of the fury following revelations that police are investigating whether members
of the now-disbanded antifascist group Young Guard, cofounded by France Unbowed
lawmaker Raphaël Arnault, was involved in the fight.
A judge
on Thursday placed two people under formal investigation for voluntary
homicide, while one of Arnault’s parliamentary assistants was put under formal
investigation for aiding and abetting a crime.
Lyon’s
chief prosecutor told reporters earlier Thursday that he had requested seven
people, including the assistant, be put under formal investigation for
voluntary homicide. The prosecutor said three of the suspects told
investigators that they were or had been affiliated with “ultra-left” groups.
Some acknowledged that they took part in a fight but all denied their intent
was to kill Deranque, the prosecutor said.
Right-wing
shock
National
Rally President Jordan Bardella likened the incident to terrorism at a press
conference Wednesday, as U.S. President Donald Trump had done after Kirk’s
death.
“When an
organization uses terror to impose its ideology, it must be fought with the
same force as terrorist groups,” Bardella said.
France
Unbowed and its firebrand leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon have been the focus of most
of the fury following revelations that police are investigating whether members
of the now-disbanded antifascist group Young Guard was involved in the fight. |
Sameer Al-Doumy/AFP via Getty Images
Marion
Maréchal, Marine Le Pen’s niece and an MEP with Giorgia Meloni’s European
Conservatives and Reformists, is asking the European Parliament to hold a
debate “on the violence of the far left in Europe that threatens our
democracies.”
Meloni
herself weighed in, expressing her “shock” on X before blaming “left-wing
extremism” and “a climate of ideological hatred that is sweeping across several
nations” — sparking yet another feud with French President Emmanuel Macron.
Macron
and his prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu, said France Unbowed must “clean
house.”
France
Unbowed is invoking Kirk’s killing as well, but as a cautionary tale, concerned
about a Trump-like crackdown on universities.
French
Education Minister Philippe Baptiste announced Tuesday he would seek to prevent
political conferences at universities whenever authorities believed they could
lead to confrontation. Hassan, the MEP who had been taking part in a conference
in Lyon during the deadly confrontation, said she feared the government would
respond with “censorship” at universities.
And
French media reported Thursday that Lyon Mayor Grégory Doucet was opposed to
holding a march Saturday to honor Deranque over fears it could lead to more
violence.
Historical
violence
While the
political climate in France appears to have turned more aggressive,
historically most violence has been committed by extreme right-wing groups.
A 2021
study found that of the 43 homicides with ideological motives that occurred
between 1986 and 2014, just four were committed by far-left militants.
The
sociologist who oversaw that work, Isabelle Sommier, told French newspaper Le
Monde in an interview published Thursday that the number of politically
motivated assaults has doubled since 2017, most of them carried out by
ultra-right extremists. She said if authorities determine that Deranque was
killed by an antifascist group because of his political views, he’d be the
first victim of extreme-left violence since the 1980s.
France
Unbowed, for its part, has condemned the violent attack and said they played no
role in it, stressing that the party’s call for a “civic revolution” is
nonviolent. Arnault, the MP whose assistant is being investigated, expressed
“horror and disgust” at the news of Deranque’s death and said he was working
with parliamentary services to terminate the contract of an aide who reportedly
took part in the fight.
The
tragedy isn’t expected to affect France Unbowed’s prospects in the race to lead
Lyon, France’s third-largest city. The party was not expected to win there and
polling obtained exclusively by POLITICO following Deranque’s death shows no
significant change in France Unbowed’s prospects.
The
bigger test will be whether the incident affects the outlook for mayoral races
where France Unbowed candidates are expected to be competitive.
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