French presidential election: Guillaume Peltier leaves Les Républicains for Zemmour

Guillaume Peltier, while he was LR deputy, in Romorantin-Lanthenay, in central France, January 20, 2020. AFP - GUILLAUME SOUVANT

Text by: RFI Follow

1 min

The deputy Guillaume Peltier, ex-number 2 of the LR party, announces that he is joining the campaign team of Eric Zemmour, of which he becomes the spokesperson.

This is the first significant rally for the former polemicist convicted of racial hatred.

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Back to square one for

Guillaume Peltier

.

Bottle-fed among the young people of the National Front, passed to the National Republican Movement of Bruno Mégret, then by the sovereignty of Philippe de Villiers, the current deputy of Loir-et-Cher had changed course in 2009, to join the traditional right.

He was even spokesperson for candidate Nicolas Sarkozy in 2012. 

But the former number 2 of the party

had not smelled of sanctity

for months at LR.

After several outings favorable to the extreme right, he was completely removed from the upper echelons in December.

Eric Zemmour is " 

the only one capable of bringing together all the right-wing voters

 ," says Guillaume Peltier to justify his umpteenth transfer.

And he believes he has no “

 guarantee

 ” that the

LR candidate

will not rally Emmanuel Macron in the second round.

The Zemmour camp welcomes this war prize and sees it as a

“turning point

 ”.

But will Peltier drag other parliamentarians and LR voters behind him?

On the right, we minimize

The tenors of the right, them, minimize and speak of a clarification without surprise.

LR boss Christian Jacob announced in a tweet the exclusion of Guillaume Peltier from the party, and deputy leader Damien Abad urged him to leave the LR group to sit with the non-members - which from now on he will. 

"

 He is isolated

 " and will only have "

 influence on radicalized militants 

", tempers a party executive.

Keeping the hard right, attempted by Eric Zemmour, in his pocket will, in any case, be a challenge for Valérie Pécresse. 

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  • Presidential France 2022

  • Eric Zemmour

  • France

  • French politics