French Nationalist TV Host Eric Zemmour, Inspired by Trump, Surges in Polls

[question everything]

Last edited Mon Oct 25, 2021, 12:00 AM - Edit history (1)

PARIS—As a television talk-show host and pundit, Éric Zemmour built a devoted following on France’s far right with years of barbed criticism of immigrants, Muslims and leftist politicians. Now Mr. Zemmour, who says he has drawn inspiration from former President Donald Trump, is harnessing his celebrity to explore a run for president, an effort that is shaking up French politics. Polls show he has inched ahead of the far right’s longtime standard-bearer, Marine Le Pen, to become the leading challenger to President Emmanuel Macron in next year’s election.

The 63-year-old is assembling a new electoral coalition, siphoning off support from both Ms. Le Pen and voters he calls “bourgeois patriots” who previously backed France’s center-right party, Les Républicains. Mr. Zemmour’s rise is a setback for Ms. Le Pen, who has softened some of her positions in an attempt to become a more viable candidate against Mr. Macron since he defeated her in 2017.

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Mr. Zemmour has yet to declare himself a candidate or give a timetable on his decision. Several recent polls have him running slightly ahead of Ms. Le Pen and behind only Mr. Macron in the first round of the presidential election, which is scheduled for April. A Harris Poll this month has Mr. Macron defeating him 57% to 43% in the second round. Mr. Zemmour has stepped onto the French political stage at a time when traditional parties on the left and right have withered. Mr. Macron won the presidency by starting his own party, in an election that saw record numbers of French refusing to endorse him or Ms. Le Pen. That group of abstainers became a core part of the antiestablishment yellow vests movement that massed in the streets to fight Mr. Macron’s agenda starting in 2018.

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On Friday in Rouen, near the beaches of the D-Day landing in 1944, Mr. Zemmour called for France to leave the military command of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and attacked the European Union and the U.S., which he said have undermined France’s national interests for decades. “The landing was at once a liberation of the national territory and at the same time an occupation and colonization by the Americans,” Mr. Zemmour said. In Mr. Zemmour’s latest book, he recounts how Rosine Ghawji, a Franco-American who founded a group called Working Mothers for Trump, showed up to meet him unannounced in December 2016. Ms. Ghawji said her group was looking for someone who could replicate the Trump victory in France, Mr. Zemmour wrote, and told him: “The French Trump, it’s you.”

More..

https://www.wsj.com/articles/french-nationalist-tv-host-eric-zemmour-inspired-by-trump-surges-in-polls-11635088315 (subscription)

Edited for missing letter in the name..

[ZZenith]

1. Yeah, the French would have really thrived under the Nazis.

We had breakfast with a French couple in Bayeux in October of 2016 and they were incredulous that the former guy had any kind of chance to win the election. They had no idea how backward parts of our country still are and couldn’t believe we were susceptible to falling for the fascist creep. I tried to give them hope that Americans are much smarter than that but I wasn’t fully convinced myself.

Now I hope they will prove smarter than we are.

[Grokenstein]

2. JFC, France

Were the US and the UK not example enough for you?

[malletgirl02]

4. Exactly not only were

they warn they were warn twice. Most people don't get such an advantage. Actually the French have been warn three times if you include their own country's history.

[MustLoveBeagles]

3. Has the entire world taken stupid pills?

[IcyPeas]

5. Are people blinded by celebrity?

[vercetti2021]

6. All of a sudden the whole world wants to take a hard right turn

Right into fascism for some fucking stupid reason. History is doomed to repeat itself as they say

[dalton99a]

7. A Jewish immigrant who wants to out-Nazi the Nazis

Mr. Zemmour, the son of Jewish immigrants from Algeria, has outflanked her on the right by adopting tough rhetoric on immigration and French national identity. He has embraced a view held by white nationalists called the “Great Replacement,” which contends that global elites are conspiring to bring non-European immigrants to the West to replace white citizens demographically and culturally. Ms. Le Pen doesn’t endorse the idea.

“She is afraid of being demonized,” Mr. Zemmour said in an interview. “I am not afraid.”

In recent weeks, Mr. Zemmour, who is promoting a new book, has addressed packed auditoriums across France, with the crowds chanting “Zemmour, President!” His speeches lay out a nationalist agenda for France that includes sharp limits on immigration and a large increase in defense spending.

Mr. Zemmour has been fined twice under French antiracism laws for inciting racial hatred against Muslims. The comments included saying that France was facing “an invasion for the last 30 years”—something Mr. Zemmour has said repeatedly in recent weeks at his rallies.

[moondust]

8. Another one in Slovenia.

Saw a France24 story on Slovenia earlier.

Slovenia's PM Janša channels Orbán with attacks on media and migrants

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Janša has picked up on some of Trump’s talking points around the coronavirus, including calling for the resignation of the WHO director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. Like Trump, he has also made vitriolic attacks on critical journalists, accusing public television of “spreading lies”. When in opposition, in 2016, he accused two female journalists of being “washed-up prostitutes”.
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