Pradié affair: the LR party retains the endowments of its senators

A relief and good news. Éric Ciotti can breathe: the senators who had expressed their anger this week against the “attacks” of deputy Aurélien Pradié (Lot) by threatening not to financially attach themselves to the Republicans have finally decided to keep their public allocation in favor of the party.

Thursday evening, the deadline for declaring its attachment to a political group, the LR party was able to note that the situation remained stable. Of the 133 senators sitting within the group, 127 agreed to direct their state allocation to LR, i.e. the modest sum of around 37,000 euros per year per elected official. Only 6 senators did not wish to modify their agreement with LR for reasons of autonomy linked to their mandate (French people abroad and overseas).

This epilogue favorable to the right seems to indicate that the senators especially wanted to press the LR party to take action against MP Pradié. Who occupied the position of secretary general before assuming a short-lived vice-presidency of the Republicans because at the time of the debate on pensions, President Ciotti had judged that his positions were no longer compatible with his executive functions.

More recently, as part of the new parliamentary debate on the immigration bill, Aurélien Pradié was critical of the work of the senatorial right, which in his eyes was not sufficiently effective. “Small steps and small legislative adjustments will be of no use,” he lambasted, saying he was ready to vote for a motion of censure. But many LR senators did not appreciate being suspected of playing “short-term at the end of the macronie”.

In reality, these tensions date back to the last internal Republican elections. These ended with the victory of Éric Ciotti and a good score from Bruno Retailleau in second position, while Aurélien Pradié took a third place. The campaign had sometimes been rough between the rivals' stables and since the tumultuous episode of retirements, the deputy for Lot is regularly perceived by his colleagues as a source of divisions, when he himself defends his right to debate and to be different.

This week Bruno Retailleau, president of the LR group in the Senate, criticized him for wanting to “exist” to the detriment of his “political family”. “Aurélien Pradié is often a little existential cry in the void of reflection,” he attacked. It was just after the invitation of Éric Ciotti to the Luxembourg Palace this week where the president of the Republicans could hear the anger of the senators, some having gone so far as to demand Pradié's head. And out of around ten elected officials who had not yet registered their attachment to the group, three or four had raised this hypothesis with the risk of depriving the LR party of a significant annual resource. Finally, everything was back to normal on Thursday evening.

On the Assembly side, the Republicans were also able to rejoice in the financial attachment of Véronique Besse, MP for Vendée. The one who until then sat among the non-registered without being registered with LR still prefers to retain her “freedom” but she has agreed to negotiate with LR her annual financial contribution in exchange for certain technical advantages. “It’s an exchange of good practices,” she explains to Le Figaro. It should be remembered that an attachment offers some advantages in terms of speaking time and access to legislative advice, notes and other decryptions.

Alexandre Vincendet, deputy for Rhône, also joined the LR at the last minute, “for agenda reasons”. “We should not see it as malice,” confides to Le Figaro the parliamentarian, often described by his colleagues as “the most macronized” of the elected representatives of the LR group. Friday morning, Alexandre Vincendet took note of a notification from the Constitutional Council asking him to choose between his mandates as municipal councilor of Rillieux-la-Pape and metropolitan councilor. The elected official has always praised the importance of local roots but he has thirty days to make his decision and he will reveal it “in due time”. “Until now the law allowed me to do it. I take note of the new interpretation of the Constitutional Council. And I am going to bring together my municipal team, knowing that there are political issues,” the parliamentarian explained to Le Figaro on Friday.