Meet Eric Zemmour, France’s far-right presidential contender
Categories: FOREIGN COUNTRIES
Zemmour, 63, a former TV pundit and familiar face to French voters, is best known for his vocal anti-immigration views. These are just some of the reasons why he’s often compared to Trump, who also campaigned on an anti-immigration platform and was a well-known public figure. Zemmour, for his part, thinks he has more in common with U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who also started his career in the media. However, he also told French media that Trump “succeeded in uniting the working classes and the patriotic bourgeoisie. That’s what I’ve been dreaming about … for 20 years,” Politico reported. Eric Zemmour, often referred to as France’s version of former U.S. President Donald Trump, has joined the race for the French presidency.French voters will chose their next president in the April vote. Polls indicate that current President Emmanuel Macron will be reunited with far-right leader Marine Le Pen in the second round of the vote. ″[Zemmour] is the ideal candidate for Macron because he is splitting the vote with Le Pen,” said Tomasz Kamil Michalski, associate professor at H.E.C. Business School.Opinion polls project Zemmour getting 14% of the public vote in the first round of the French presidential vote due in April, and Marine Le Pen receiving 19%. However, there’s plenty of time for voting intentions to change in the coming months. Other political experts argue that Zemmour is in it for the long run and is unlikely to drop out of the race.“Their discourse is no longer unique: The entire electoral campaign has markedly shifted to the right, with all front-runners taking a tough line to varying degrees on immigration and Islamic radicalization, denying the far-right the opportunity to exclusively benefit from this sentiment,” Rosenberg told CNBC via email.