New Accusation of Racism Against the Rassemblement National

In the vocabulary of the Left, who hate Western Civilisation and all it stands for, anyone who opposes the jihadi invasion is prima facie 'racist'.

From The European Conservative

By Hélène de Lauzun

According to mechanisms frequently used by left-wing thinking, political discourse hostile to uncontrolled immigration is labelled ‘racism’ to deprive it of any legitimacy.

The Rassemblement National deputy Grégoire de Fournas has found himself at the centre of a controversy in the National Assembly and will be subject to heavy sanctions. He is to be expelled from the Chamber for a period of two weeks, after having been accused of racism by the Left and the government party.

It all started with an exchange in the parliamentary chamber on Thursday, November 3rd. The rostrum was occupied by Carlos Martens Bilongo, the deputy of La France Insoumise, belonging to the left-wing coalition of NUPES. He was addressing the issue of illegal immigration, highlighting the rescue of 234 migrants stranded in international waters by the vessel Ocean Viking, belonging to an NGO specialising in sea rescue of migrants. Listening to his far-Left opponent, the MP Grégoire de Fournas loudly exclaimed: “Let them go back to Africa!”

This one sentence set off a storm that has not yet subsided; it is debated whether the outspoken de Fournas meant for the migrants or Bilongo to return to Africa. In French, it is virtually impossible to distinguish between the third-person singular and the third-person plural. The two sentences have exactly the same pronunciation. The Left and Emmanuel Macron’s party maintain that Grégoire de Fournas said “Qu’il retourne en Afrique” (Let him go back to Africa!), addressing the Congolese deputy Bilongo, while Grégoire de Fournas claims to have said “Qu’ils retournent en Afrique” (Let them go back to Africa!)—referring to the migrants rescued by Ocean Viking.

The press seized on Grégoire de Fournas’ interjection and a large number of journalists immediately described his few words as “racist.” The verbatim of the immigration debates has since been made public by the National Assembly. The clerks retained the singular—which is already a position and a judgement in itself, as there is nothing to allow them to decide decisively on what Grégoire de Fournas actually said. RN deputies Laure Lavallette and Caroline Parmentier came to their colleague’s rescue, explaining that the singular could well refer to the migrant boat, and that there was therefore nothing racist in Grégoire de Fournas’ remarks—whatever he indeed said.

Marine Le Pen also intervened to underline the roughness of the manoeuvre—while acknowledging the MP’s clumsiness. “The polemic created by our political opponents is rough and will not deceive the French,” she said on Twitter.

Marine Le Pen

@MLP_officiel

Grégoire de Fournas a évidemment parlé des migrants transportés en bateaux par les ONG qu’évoquait notre collègue dans sa question au gouvernement. La polémique créée par nos adversaires politiques est grossière et ne trompera pas les Français.

For the Rassemblement National, as Fournas explained on CNews, the cabal has entirely been created by La France Insoumise. It currently suffers from a popularity deficit in public opinion, following several cases of sexual and marital violence that have hit some of its members. These reputational problems are compounded by its failed operations around the latest motions of censure against the government. Criticising the Rassemblement National’s entrenched racism against a black MP is a convenient way for them to appear as victims and to gain sympathy from the French.

La France Insoumise activists have been digging up old tweets and Facebook posts by Fournas to fuel their accusations of racism; the media has gladly picked them up and circulated them widely in the mainstream press. There are posts in which he deplores an open-border policy toward Africa; a France distributing its benefits with outrageous abandon; local French elected officials sitting on regional councils in traditional African boubou. Through Fournas, according to mechanisms frequently used by left-wing thinking, political discourse hostile to uncontrolled immigration is labelled as ‘racism’ in order to deprive it of any legitimacy.

On Friday, November 4th, the RN MP received the heaviest possible sanction from the bureau of the National Assembly. He is deprived of half of his parliamentary allowance for two months and will not be able to return to the National Assembly for the next fifteen sitting days. These sanctions, which are extremely rare, were only imposed once before in 2011. Jean-Luc Mélenchon called for the resignation of the deputy, but Fournas refused categorically and denounced his “political justice” as false.

This controversy comes as the Rassemblement National is electing its new president, turning the page on the party’s leadership in the hands of the Le Pen family. It allows the opponents of the RN to reactivate an anti-fascist reflex, a ‘republican defense,’ against this political formation which has been trying—not without certain difficulties—to improve its image for several years.