VIDEO. Michel Barnier: “Our national immigration policy is not working. No more than European politics”

As part of the Grand Tribune of the presidential election, we receive Michel Barnier, one of the candidates for the nomination of the right. At 70, the Savoyard of the Albertville Olympics, left at the end of August to conquer a new summit, the Presidency of the Republic. Deputy, senator, minister with important portfolios: European affairs, foreign affairs, environment, agriculture, he was twice European commissioner in charge of regional policies, then of the internal market. More recently, he was the French negotiator for Brexit, a long marathon strewn with pitfalls from which he drew a book: “La grande illusion. Secret Brexit Diary”. His project, a "reconciled France" wants to control immigration, put merit and work back at the center of society, lead the fight against climate change. In this battle, Michel Barnier is the third man, behind Xavier Bertrand and Valérie Pécresse, according to the polls, but is in the lead concerning who could best represent France abroad.

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LA TRIBUNE - You surprised everyone 15 days ago by announcing a referendum on immigration and distancing yourself from European immigration rules. Why run after this theme of the far right, from the RN to Eric Zemmour. Don't you have an interest in differentiating yourself from these presidential candidates? MICHEL BARNIER- I'm not running after anyone. Especially not after those you mentioned, who don't have the same values ​​or the same ideas as me. With whom there will never be any weakness or compromise. I look at the problems of my country, as people experience them. And among these problems which are serious, to the point of causing ruptures, great tensions, not only in the suburbs, there is this question of immigration which is no longer under control. Our national immigration policy is not working. Nor does European politics work.

If you are a presidential candidate, you must, if you are serious, look at the problems, understand them and propose answers. That's what I did and not only for 15 days. I announced my ideas, my projects on this question before the summer. I confirmed them in an article in Le Figaro in July. There are no surprises. We must put a stop to the laissez-faire, the laissez-passer. Overhaul the procedures so that they work correctly. That's not the case today. Dealing with these issues in a humane and rigorous manner. We also need to protect ourselves against an accumulation of case law, from the Constitutional Council, the Council of State, the European Court of Justice, the European Convention on Human Rights in order, in certain cases, to take measures under our own responsibility and within the framework of our sovereignty.

In which cases? You have been criticized by your European friends who find it curious to see the man behind the Brexit negotiations calling for a partial Frexit on immigration...

It's a real cartoon. I saw this agitation of the “Brussels bubble”. I was European before many of them and I will be after many of them. I have no lesson in European commitment to receive. It is precisely because I had the responsibility of managing Brexit that I said that lessons had to be learned. I wrote it in my book. There are things to change. Brexit is no small event. It is an extremely serious event that a country as important as the United Kingdom leaves the EU. Throughout the negotiations, I tried to understand why this happened. Why 52% of Britons voted against Brussels. Not all the reasons are to be found in Brussels, but part of it comes from Brussels, from this form of arrogance of people who think that they are always right, that nothing should change. The same people who have said for 30 years, we must deregulate, open doors and windows, when no one else, neither the Chinese nor the Americans, have done the same thing. That's how we disarmed financial regulation, which led to the 2007 crisis. I can talk about it very seriously, because I managed the post-crisis period. We left the bankers to do anything, with insane bonuses and toxic products. You have to be careful.

It is therefore because I am European in addition to being a patriot that I think that there is a discussion to be had with our partners on Schengen and the Dublin agreements. The time for a moratorium, to negotiate with the countries of Africa and set things straight at home, in a sovereign way. A few years ago Germany, for example, walked away from EU rules saying that for two years they were going to suspend family reunification rules. Nobody said anything.

A few weeks ago, Mr Macron's former prime minister, Edouard Philippe, said of a European Court of Justice ruling on military working time that it was unacceptable. It is outrageous, it challenges our national values. We must not accept it and no one said anything.

I say things calmly and simply. There are a lot of abuses on migration issues, of diverted or abused procedures. We must put in place a constitutional shield that protects us. We will see during the period of the moratorium, the laws or directives that we will have to correct and through a referendum organized in September and whose terms will be known as of May, during the legislative elections, in order to be able to consult Parliament every the years so that it decides on the quota of people that we wish to welcome to our home. To take the time to rebuild a national consensus, but also to better welcome the people we welcome into our homes.

You present yourself as the candidate for reconciliation. You talk about brotherhood. How do you address the center right, people who may be disappointed with the action of the current president? Regarding immigration, the measure is taken by everyone. In France, people on the right and on the left find that this does not work. I want it to work, we have to provide asylum, it's our honor. As long as it's not hijacked. We have to take the time to better welcome the people we welcome and for this policy to work. I received messages from people on the left to tell me: you are in the right direction, by saying things. I propose these measures because I am European and I do not want another Brexit. Arrogance, the certainty that we always do everything right, is the best way for there to be other Brexits and I don't want that. On the subject of immigration, the extreme right is agitating the theme of the “great replacement”, we speak of a great migratory invasion. How to talk about reconciliation to French people who have these fears?

Precisely by dealing with these issues and showing that the new President of the Republic, whom I hope to be with their confidence, will deal with these issues and do what he says. I thought a lot before making these proposals, which will be implemented methodically, the day after the presidential elections, so that the French people realize that there is a halt to movements, flows that are no longer mastered today. We must also maintain control of immigration in France and at European level.

With 150,000 unfilled jobs in the hotel and restaurant industry, for example, many companies are very happy to see immigrants arriving!

We must be able to say that we need people who come to us, whom we welcome properly, with decent salaries. But we have to choose those we want to welcome. When it comes to immigration today, everything is negative. People are unwelcome and there is no national consensus. I would like to rebuild one.

How to respond to mistrust vis-à-vis Europe?

I think, as de Gaulle said, that Europe is a bit like Archimedes' lever of our influence. Tony Blair said the same for the UK. It is important to say why we are Europeans and must remain so. The European project must remain a French ambition, in addition to our defense patriotism and our national sovereignty. There are a number of challenges, everyone can understand that, that we can no longer face alone. Migration flows are caused by extreme poverty in Africa: how to restore hope to a continent whose youth is the main asset? We cannot do it alone. The European budget is much larger than the French budget alone for co-development in Africa.

How to deal with climate change, which has been a long-standing commitment for me and which I will not leave to environmentalists? How to face the fight against terrorism, the jihadism that strikes us here, at home, as everywhere in the world? How to deal with the mastery of global finance? The movements of derivative financial products, which we use in the industry to protect ourselves from certain risks, but which we also use a lot on the side of speculators, is 600,000 billion dollars above our heads. How do you control that, do you enforce it, if you don't have the European Union.

Do you define yourself as a regulator?

I am liberal. Not an ultra-liberal. We have not finished paying for the ravages of ultra-liberalism wrought by left and right governments and by many civil servants in Brussels. Adam Smith, who was the pope of liberalism, was also for a form of ethics, governance, morality. I tried while I was in charge of European services, through 41 regulatory laws, a word that does not scare me, to rebuild an architecture, to put back a little responsibility, a morality of ethics, there where they had disappeared.

What were the brakes in Brussels, when you were at the helm in relation to your vision?

When I returned to European affairs, thanks to the confidence of Nicolas Sarkozy, in 2010, in a position that no Frenchman had ever had, the internal market, the current position of Thierry Breton, I told the President to the Commission Mr Barroso: I am coming back to change the line. We must learn the lessons of the 2007/2008 crisis which was violent, which destroyed millions of jobs, we must learn from it. This is one of the reasons for Brexit. We must also learn lessons from Brexit. It is a failure of the EU. Those who say about Brexit that we have to go back to "business as usual", that it has been properly handled, thank you Michel Barnier, those are wrong. Finally, we must learn the lessons of the deindustrialisation of Europe. We lost part of our industry, the British too. But not the Germans, not the Italians, not the Swedes. We must not always say that it is Brussels' fault, it is also sometimes our responsibility.

The French know you little on the domestic political scene. Could you introduce yourself and tell us which president you want to be?

I am a politician, proud to have committed myself when I was 15 years old behind General de Gaulle. He was an exceptional, incomparable man, the opposite of a politician. I was in the movement of the Gaullists of progress, social. This remains my commitment. I am someone who, throughout his life, long enough now to have proof of what I say, paid attention to what he said and then did what he said. I have always preferred to do rather than argue. From Savoie, which I managed for 17 years, I led from start to finish the project for the last Olympic Games in Albertville and it would be symbolic if I were elected president, to have the honor of opening those of Paris 2024 as I concluded those of Albertville.

Until Brexit, I always tried to make and bring people together. Our country needs more collective management. Of course, a president who directs, who represents, who unites, who unites, and a parliament who governs, in social dialogue, local communities that are partners in national projects, such as local progress. All that, we haven't seen it for 4 years. We have not seen this collective game that our country needs. The President of the Republic does not have infused science. It must have values: I do. Beliefs, I have them. Energy. I got it.

Gaullist, are you for an evolution of the presidentialization of the Fifth Republic?

Nothing obliges the President of the Republic to act in a solitary and sometimes peremptory manner. In the institutions of the Fifth Republic, nothing obliges him to do so. I want to be a president who presides, with a government that governs. Each has its place. The issues are significant. There are a lot of tensions in this country. People are back to back, rather than side to side. The president cannot do everything alone. I regret a solitary management of power. This is not the right way to run this country. There are too many problems for everything to come from above. Look at how the outgoing power handled the health crisis. For more than a year, in the management of the Covid, it was the administration of the State only. We did not trust the liberal doctors, the regions which nevertheless found the masks, organized the vaccination centers. I think our country has too many problems, too many tensions to be managed in this solitary way.

You tell in your book a dialogue with the British Nigel Farage who asked you what de Gaulle would say today about Europe and you answer him that he would put more emphasis on the independence of Europe.

I did not adopt the version of Europe of Mr. Farage who is a right-wing extremist and a patent nationalist. I believe in the capacity of Europe as a power. And what makes a power today is an economy, a currency, a foreign policy and a defence. We are not there. We must go in this direction, while respecting nations. This is an important point for me, I am a Gaullist, not a nationalist. I believe that we need nations to fight nationalism. Mitterrand once said, “nationalism is war”. To fight it, we need nations. We must respect what each nation represents, with its language, its culture, its traditions. De Gaulle said that Europe should not "grind the peoples like a mashed chestnut".

The peoples do not want to be crushed. They want to keep their roots. That's why it's complicated with Brussels. We want a united Europe, not a uniform one. My conception of Europe is there. I got involved for a specific reason: the handshake between German Chancellor Adenauer and General de Gaulle. I have this photo in my office. We see the infinitely respectful gaze of these two giants towards each other. They said to themselves that day, we must reconcile after three wars. To reconcile for the future, to build the Europe of tomorrow. De Gaulle has always been the bearer of the European project, even if he had reservations about Brussels, about a supranational culture, he was wary of it. He implemented common policies, the single market. I think that today what would preoccupy him, beyond the national interest, is the independence of our continent. That he is not vassalized, that he is not the subcontractor of the Chinese and the Americans.

On the affair of the Australian submarines, how do you judge the reaction of French anger? What lesson do you draw from this episode. Should we still count on NATO or provide ourselves with the means so that Europe has this power in terms of defence?

The breach of this contract is an industrial and diplomatic disaster for France, in a game played behind our backs by allies, Americans, British and Australians. These are things that should not be done between allies. It is also a form of weakening for those who behave in this way. The alliance is not allegiance and the alliance cannot be made with mistrust. In the very short term, we will see what will become of the contract, how these submarines will be built, whether they will be nuclear-powered or not...

More seriously, for the Americans, and this must have been the meaning of the recent conversation between President Macron and President Biden, for the Americans and the English, there is a breach of trust. It's not good for them either. This contract was a good contract on the technological and industrial level, but I think that it was followed with a certain lightness on the political level. There had been negative signals for several months. On the side of the Parliament of Canberra, concerns, questions. This is analyzed, observed and requires reactions, a work of conviction and persuasion. My opinion is that it was a good industrial contract, which did not have the political support it warranted given its size.

Europe must learn from this, but you spoke of French anger, it was not European anger. Let us beware of anger, agitation, incantations in general, to rebuild collective work at European level. When I was their minister in 2004, I told the French ambassadors that France is not great when it is arrogant, it is not strong if it is solitary. France for a few years, it does not date from the current president, has been arrogant, sometimes in spite of itself and often solitary. We must rebuild joint action through a European policy, with the means, in terms of intelligence, to analyze better, to put strategists and analysts together. Establish regional priorities. What surrounds us on the European level: Russia, the Mediterranean region, Africa. What role can we play in a region, the Pacific, where we must maintain a French and European ambition? Europe is the leading contributor to development in the Indo-Pacific zone, the 1st or 2nd trading partner of all the countries in this zone and where France has reason to be present. We are present in the Indo-Pacific zone, in the Indian Ocean, with Reunion, Mayotte, and beyond in the Pacific, with territories that we hold dear. This is an opportunity for me to reaffirm, a few weeks before a referendum, our attachment to New Caledonia and the wish that it be clearly said that we want the inhabitants of New Caledonia to vote for the maintenance of its attachment. to the French Republic.

The Americans say they do not want a new cold war, but that is how China has interpreted the affair of the submarines which will nuclearize the area. Do you fear a military escalation, a logic of confrontation between the United States and China over the next few years?

It is already there, technological, commercial. I hope it won't be anything else, especially around Taiwan. It is necessary to avoid that these two superpowers are left alone, because if they are alone, the risk of frontal confrontation is stronger. Europe must, with its own values, its own ambitions, its own interests, which are numerous in this region, assert itself and serve for dialogue and intermediation. Allegiance is not my definition of alliance. It is not topical to leave the integrated command, but rather that we have a discussion at NATO to learn lessons and restore the balance.

Macron had spoken of "brain death" of NATO... Does the history of submarines confirm his thesis? It was a somewhat incantatory observation. Quite misunderstood by a number of our partners. There are many European countries which are very attached to NATO, which see their protection and their defense more ensured by the great American ally. You have to be careful about that. Any aggressiveness towards NATO is counter-productive from my point of view when we want to build the Europe of defence.

Has there been any commotion from France in recent years on these international issues?

There were many postures, incantations. This dates back to before, both in Libya and in Lebanon. I have been very involved for a long time on the question of European defence. What is written in the current EU treaty comes from a group that I chaired at the time of the 2005 Constitution. We had developed the tools for this European defence, the role of the representative, structured cooperation, the solidarity clause. I worked a lot alongside President Juncker on the European Defense Fund, which for the first time is mobilizing the European budget for strategic and military issues. I'm very committed, but let's be careful with words. There will be no European army. But there will be joint external operations. You have to do it step by step. And also be careful, there are partner countries, in Central and Eastern Europe, in Poland or elsewhere, which have a slightly different vision from ours. French influence cannot be decreed, it does not fall from the sky. I handled Brexit with a lot of time, a lot of respect. It has to be rebuilt. This will take time and method. This will be one of the axes of my presidency.

Can we imagine a European defense without the British?

The English are no longer in Europe. We didn't kick them out, they left. There are still links, industrial in particular. I negotiated Brexit, according to a mandate set by Parliament, bearing in mind this requirement to maintain cooperation with the United Kingdom. But they are no longer in it. We are not going to ask them for permission to do European cooperation, fighter planes, a tank, boats in common. There are plenty of things to do together from the point of view of research, of industry. And external military operations. Step by step. One day, it will be necessary to negotiate a cooperation agreement between the United Kingdom and the EU. There are external operations which may interest the British. They played a major role in Operation Atalanta, to fight against acts of piracy in the Horn of Africa, they even had command of this operation. It may happen, I do not wish, that for our own continental security, we have a mission to carry out in common. But for that you have to build a framework.

Where is the Franco-German couple at the time of the departure of Angela Merkel. Germany and France sometimes have significant differences, on gas, nuclear, energy transition...

Let's not have a bucolic view of Franco-German cooperation. It was never spontaneous, even in the time of de Gaulle and Adenauer. The only moment of very close proximity was with Valéry Giscard d'Estaing and Helmut Schmidt, because there was a personal and friendly complicity between them. But during all other mandates, Franco-German cooperation has experienced tensions, the need for dialogue and confrontation, so that at the end of the road, it is considered that the interest of the two countries depends on a common position. For ten years, the German influence has dominated in Brussels and the French influence has diminished almost everywhere. In Brussels, concerning the taxonomy which will classify green energies, there is no reason for us to accept that nuclear, a low-carbon energy, be excluded from this nomenclature, even if the Germans do not want it. We will have to say, I will say if I am president, that it does not work like that.

You President, are you building new EPRs.

I know the positions of certain ecologists, there is a diversity between the most extremist and other more realistic. The French, you have to talk to them seriously. We cannot meet our country's climate challenge without nuclear power. The truth must be said. I'm not a nuclear fan at all. I even launched the first major national debate on energy and an energy mix was gradually built. But we cannot achieve the climate objectives of the Paris Agreement and the European objectives of carbon neutrality in 2050 without nuclear energy. So yes, I will launch the construction of these 6 EPR reactors as soon as possible. This will not prevent me from supporting research on renewable energies. I am, for example, very committed to photovoltaics. I launched the first solar institute in my department of Savoie, with 500 researchers. What they are doing is great and the development of photovoltaics is considerable. If we covered only 5% of the surface of the desert, we would produce all the electrical energy that the whole world needs. It is theoretical, because it is necessary to transport this energy and to store it, which is not easy. Hydrogen, biomass and photovoltaics must be developed in parallel. But I also remind you that in a country that depends far too much on oil and imports, the kilowatt that pollutes the least is the one that we don't produce. There are still considerable reserves of energy savings.

What are your avenues for reviving French industry in this context of ecological transition?

There is no presidential project that is not based on the requirements linked to the climate challenge. That we experience 2 degrees more everywhere in 25 years from now, that the desert climate reaches the south of France, that we experience very long heat waves all summer in 20 years, that changes everything. Our habits of cultivating, building, transporting, producing. I was president of a department for 20 years, in a region where 20% of the economy depends on snow. I was Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries. We know that the harvest has been accelerated. I have met fishermen in Boulogne who tell me that they are catching fish they have never caught before and that others are disappearing. Climate change will change everything. Any presidential project must have as a project the anticipation of this climate change through research, not only photovoltaics, the circular economy, the clean vehicle, the building. But my big difference with some leftist ideologues or the Greens is that you won't succeed in this climate challenge against people, with punishments and taxes. You have to raise the level of the horizon with the people. Let them participate. I'm sure it's possible.

The Yellow Vests crisis started with soaring fuel prices and the carbon tax. How to reconcile climate action with rising energy prices and social action to offset the effects of the transition on consumers? It is very expensive.

The European Union has very big objectives, but the brutal methods which consist in asking to change all the boilers and the cars in a few years, it is not realistic. Or you have to find simple systems to help do it, you have to give time, help people effectively, so that people don't feel like at the start of the Yellow Vests crisis, that they are being pressured. A crisis for which there were other reasons, the feeling that they were not respected, that the President was too arrogant. I want to be the President who respects people and the French and who makes France respected. This will be the blue line, or the blue white red line of my tenure. To make respect the French and France.

When it comes to energy, we have to be careful, we may have a crisis ahead of us, but when we talk about energy, about fuel, we are talking about daily life, about people having to use their cars in rural areas that there will be no trains or public transport.

Are you in favor of “whatever it costs for the ecological transition?

I am wary of catastrophic speeches. It takes time, budget measures, to help people insulate their homes, but also see the return on investment. Take thermal insulation, a project that I want to amplify and simplify: we can make more use of the partnership with banks that are close to people. I want things to be done in a simple way so that they really get done. With thermal renovation, the country will have less need to import energy, it will save money and it will contribute to increasing purchasing power and will give work to thousands of companies. It's win-win. This is a project where there is a real return on investment.

Will you take tax measures to help change cars to switch to electric?

We must support the transition of the automotive sector and the hydrogen sector, because it is the only way to store energy. We have to do it with Germany, because there are things, challenges that we cannot meet alone. Germany is going all out. We should go there together. We are right to cooperate with Germany, but also with Italy or other European countries.

Is there not a lack of a ministry for industry and research?

The answer is yes. In the organization of the government, I have some fairly specific ideas to give political signals and remobilize certain sectors. Il y aura dans le gouvernement que j'aurais à mettre en place comme Président de la République, un ministre chargé de la sécurité publique, un autre chargé du dialogue et du partenariat avec les collectivités locales et probablement en effet un ministre de la recherche et de l'industrie.

Il y a un vrai déclin de l'Europe dans le domaine des technologies. Les Gafam, c'est 10.000 milliards de capitalisation. L'Europe n'a pas cette puissance de faire émerger des leaders européens ?

Il n'y a pas de bataille perdue, sauf celles que l'on ne mène pas. Pas de fatalité, sauf quand s'il y a du fatalisme. Un homme politique, quand il est candidat à la présidence, n'a pas le droit d'être fataliste. Les industriels n'ont pas été fatalistes quand ils ont fait Airbus, Ariane, Galileo... On a montré un volontarisme européen et on a gagné une forme d'indépendance. Aujourd'hui, les dix premières entreprises technologiques du monde sont chinoises ou américaines. But this is not inevitable. Il y a des secteurs où on pourra reconstruire cette autonomie européenne et cette liberté européenne.

L'Europe et la France n'ont-elle pas perdu leur souveraineté technologique ? Pendant la crise sanitaire, on a vu des ruptures d'approvisionnement. C'est le cas des semi-conducteurs... Avant tout cela, il y a de la recherche. A Grenoble, j'ai visité le Cyclotron et le CEA et on voit bien que sur les semi-conducteurs, nous avons une bonne recherche qui est en avance. Mais il faut produire plus chez nous, en France et en Europe. On a la capacité de le faire. Y compris de conserver des filières qui sont en voie de disparaître. J'ai eu l'occasion de discuter avec les ouvriers de l'usine électro-métallurgique de Château-Feuillet, en Savoie, qui a fermé, mais qui pourrait rouvrir et se spécialiser sur la filière du silicium. Allons-nous conserver chez nous une filière du silicium en France et en Europe ou être condamnés à acheter des matériaux chinois ?

Que pensez-vous du budget 2022, un budget avec 6% de croissance cette année et 4% l'an prochain, mais aussi des déficits très élevés. On est dans une phase de campagne présidentielle, mais on ne parle pas de la réforme de l'Etat. Que ferez-vous alors que la crise Covid a rendu notre dette peu soutenable ?

J'ai vu le budget qui a été présenté avec des trous. Ce n'est pas un budget sincère, comme cela a été dit par des observateurs impartiaux. On a le sentiment que l'on prépare la réélection du président « quoi qu'il en coûte ». Mais ce sont des dépenses qui sont faites en tirant des chèques sur les générations futures. Il faut faire attention, après une crise sanitaire qui a demandé des dépenses exceptionnelles, il ne faut pas donner le sentiment qu'on distribue à tout va. Le président sortant fait des promesses partout, à Marseille, à Roubaix, comme s'il était au tout début de son mandat. J'ai bien compris qu'il aille à Marseille, mais j'aurais aimé qu'il le fasse dès 2017 pour en évaluer aujourd'hui les résultats.

Concernant la dette, personne ne peut sérieusement faire campagne en disant qu'on ne la remboursera pas. On peut la rembourser dans la durée. Mais je veux mettre en garde. Il y a des évènements extérieurs qui peuvent venir tout bousculer, une autre pandémie, une crise financière, de l'inflation. Il faut faire attention et réformer l'Etat. Il y a des moyens de le faire et d'assurer le même service public. Je suis partisan d'un bon service public, en rémunérant mieux les gens qui y travaillent, les infirmières et les enseignants. Je l'ai dit et nous le ferons. Il y a des moyens en France, comme l'ont fait Laurent Wauquiez ou Valérie Pécresse dans leurs régions, en Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes ou en Ile-de-France, de faire des réformes en offrant un bon service public et en dépensant moins d'argent.

Est-ce que Laurent Wauquiez, qui a renoncé à se présenter à la présidentielle, vous apporte son soutien ?

Ne personnalisons pas les choses. C'est lui qui le dira le moment venu. Nous travaillons ensemble, en confiance sur le fond. Il a fait dans sa grande région, qui est aussi la mienne, des choses qu'il avait dites, pour mieux gérer le budget régional. Pour mieux gérer l'Etat et réduire cette dette, il faut de la croissance, une réforme du partenariat avec les collectivités locales, réformer les retraites, lutter contre la fraude fiscale et sociale, retrouver de l'argent public qui n'est pas utilisé correctement.

Etes-vous confiant sur le fait d'apparaître comme l'homme du recours à droite ?

J'ai mes méthodes. Je pense que je suis capable de gagner la confiance dans ma famille politique que je n'ai jamais quittée où j'ai toujours été libre et loyal. Les militants, qui comptent beaucoup et qui décideront, sont au coeur du choix des candidats et moi j'ai besoin de ma famille politique.

Le centre de gravité de l'échiquier politique de la France est très à droite, mais la droite ne semble pas être en capacité de se qualifier au second tour.

C'est un paradoxe, parce qu'il n'y a pas pour le moment d'incarnation, dans une seule personne pour porter notre projet. Nous avons un projet politique qui correspond à l'attente des Français, nous avons gagné les dernières élections locales, départementales, régionales, gagné des militants, des jeunes, on l'a vu à Vincennes, qui sont enthousiastes. Nous avons des personnalités capables de constituer l'équipe de France pour gagner cette présidentielle.

La campagne de Sarkozy de 2007 était un modèle ?

Je me sens capable de recréer cette ambiance-là. Comme il n'y a pas d'homme providentiel, il faut un processus. Nous y sommes, il faut être patient. Je fais confiance aux militants de ma famille politique.

Vous aviez écrit en 2014 un livre intitulé : « se reposer ou être libre ». C'est une forme de perspective...

C'est une phrase de Périclès qui parle aux Athéniens, je l'ai choisie comme titre d'un livre pour parler de sujets où la liberté et l'indépendance des Européens est en cause. Les sujets de la démographie, de l'industrie, du marché unique, où nous devons être ensemble. Pour être libre, il ne faut pas se reposer sur ses lauriers et il faut être ensemble. Pour notre pays. Ce qu'on ne fera pas pour la France, personne ne viendra le faire à notre place. C'est pareil pour le continent européen.