You turn to us for voices you won't hear anywhere else.

Sign up for Democracy Now!'s Daily Digest to get our latest headlines and stories delivered to your inbox every day.

France in Deepening Political Turmoil After No-Confidence Vote Collapses Gov’t

HeadlineDec 05, 2024

The French government has collapsed after leftist and far-right lawmakers united to oust Prime Minister Michel Barnier in a no-confidence vote Wednesday. The vote came amid intense opposition to Barnier’s budget proposal and its roughly $60 billion in spending cuts and tax increases. It’s the first time France’s government has fallen to a no-confidence vote since 1962.

French President Emmanuel Macron is addressing the nation later today. Macron could ask Barnier to stay on as caretaker prime minister until he names a successor. It’s the latest defeat for the embattled Macron, who faced fierce backlash after selecting the conservative Barnier as prime minister in September instead of a progressive politician, despite a leftist coalition winning the most votes in July’s snap parliamentary elections. Mathilde Panot of the progressive France Unbowed party called on Macron to step down following the vote.

Mathilde Panot: “We are ready to govern on a program of change. Emmanuel Macron must go. And we want to show any moment and we will demonstrate that another world is always possible and that the only sovereign in this country remains the people, and them alone.”

Topics:
The original content of this program is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please attribute legal copies of this work to democracynow.org. Some of the work(s) that this program incorporates, however, may be separately licensed. For further information or additional permissions, contact us.

Non-commercial news needs your support

We rely on contributions from our viewers and listeners to do our work.
Please do your part today.
Make a donation
Top