widthThe hen Valérie Pécresse travels through the countryside France This summer, in order to get rid of her so-called grotesque and unfair image of the “blonde bourgeoisie” in Versailles, she visited farms and villages and promised to smash the glass ceiling of the French Republic. “I will be the first female president of France,” she said amidst cheers at the meeting.
Since Emmanuel Macron won the presidency in 2017 as a shocked outsider with no electoral experience and a party formed within a few months, French politics has flourished with novelty. Supporters of Pecres say that her female identity is refreshing, which makes her Macron’s worst nightmare.
The 54-year-old Pekeres hopes to prevent the most popular Macron from being re-elected next spring. As the first woman in history to run for president for a traditional right-wing party composed of male-dominated de Gaulle, Jacques Chirac and Nicolas Sarkozy, she was seen as a new hope after more than 20 years of front-line political career. Other female candidates campaigned on the left and the far right, but Pecrese was the first candidate for the Republican Party.
she Be elected as presidential candidate After fighting for the firm right-wing ticket to “restore the pride of France and protect the French”. She wants to “restore authority” for the country. She promised to strengthen justice and police, crack down on immigration and reduce the size of the public sector. “I feel the anger of those who feel powerless when violence and Islamic separatism are on the rise. They feel that their values and lifestyles are threatened by uncontrolled immigration,” she said in her winning speech.
Her proposal includes halving the number of residence permits for non-EU immigrants. She wants to hold a referendum to amend the constitution and introduce immigration quotas. She promised to end the 35-hour work week, raise the retirement age to 65, cut 200,000 public sector jobs, and build more nuclear reactors.
Pecres is traditionally considered a moderate of the center-right, but in the area of Paris Île-de-France where she operates, including the high-rise suburbs around the capital, she has always promised to take a hard line against “laws” and order.” She is forbidden to be outdoors Wearing a “burkini” or full-body swimsuit in the leisure area, before the introduction of same-sex marriage in France in 2013, during the tense political period of conservative street protests, she said that she preferred the form of civil unions rather than complete marriage rights. She later changed Stance, and said she will not return to same-sex marriage.
Pecres compares herself to Margaret Thatcher’s brave and “firm hand”, but her goal is to lead more like Angela Merkel, she said Merkel is good at reaching consensus to make Germany “richer, stronger, and more united.”
Her supporters say that her strength against Macron is her experience as a finance-trained budget minister. According to her former boss Sarkozy, she was “fascinated” by the details of her profile, and her background was the center-right background already occupied by the current president. Although Macron is committed to improving gender equality, he is still surrounded by mainly male consultants and has appointed men to the highest positions in the government. Pécresse’s team wants her to make him look outdated.
Her task is very difficult. Her party was traditionally the government’s right-wing party, but lost the presidency in 2012. It faces increasing competition from the far-right opposition-not only Marina Le Pen, but also TV expert Eric Zemur. Many voters and politicians from the Party Central Committee have already moved to Macron.
But Pécresse is a former senior civil servant. Her political career began as an adviser to Jacques Chirac at the Elysée Palace and enjoys the nickname “Bulldozer”. She is known for the difficult and epic election battle.
In her first parliamentary election in Evelyn, a suburb of Paris, as a young and unknown outsider, she defeated a famous military general. In 2015, she led the right wing to victory in the traditional left-wing Ile-de-France, which includes Paris and surrounding areas, which is the most populous and wealthy region in France.
Under Sarkozy’s leadership, Pecres held difficult cabinet positions, including as minister of higher education, and faced the worst street protests in years, when students locked themselves in lecture halls. “I stayed on the street for nine months,” she said. “I accepted the most dangerous reform of Sarkozy’s presidency, which no one else wants to do.” Sarkozy later appointed her budget minister to deal with the consequences of the sovereign debt crisis.
Pequeres was born in Valérie Roux in the small town of Neuilly-sur-Seine, west of Paris, and came from a family of Charles de Gaulle intellectuals. Her father was an economics professor, and her maternal grandfather was a well-known psychiatrist who had treated Chirac’s daughter for anorexia. The grandparents next to her mother were active in the French Resistance and hid paratroopers during World War II.
Pecres said that she was a “social Gaullist” since she was a child and grew up on the basis of “the merits of the Republican Party.” Her father told her that women can do as well as men. She skipped two grades in a private school, received a bachelor’s degree at the age of 16, entered the most prestigious business school in France, and later became a top student in the French senior civil service training school.
She became an advisor to the Elysée Palace in 1998 and turned to politics in part because she wanted to counter the rise of the far-right Jean-Marie Le Pen. She is married to Jérôme Pécresse, an engineer who continues to work in business. They have three children between 18 and 25. She protects them from media photographers.
She knows that she must win voters in the center and the far right, and is already adjusting her language. In response to Macron’s 2017 campaign, she promised to “change the system.”
