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French President Emmanuel Macron was slapped in the face on Tuesday by a man during a visit to a small town in southeastern France, an incident that led to broad support for the head of state from politicians from across the ideological spectrum.
The French president was greeting a crowd waiting for him behind barricades in the town of Taine-L’Hermitage after visiting a high school that trains students to work in hotels and restaurants. A video of the incident was posted on Twitter.
#Macron gets slapped live by #Tain pic.twitter.com/tsXdByo22U
– ⚜️ (AlexpLille) June 8, 2021
Macron described the incident as a “single act” in an interview with local newspaper Le Dauphine Libere.
“Everything is going well,” he said. “We must not allow isolated actions and excessively violent individuals, as happened in the (street) protests as well, to dominate the public debate: they do not deserve it.”
French President Emmanuel Macron is slapped by a member of the public during a visit in Tain-L’Hermitage, France, in this still image taken from a video on June 8, 2021. BFMTV / ReutersTV
Macron said he had no specific concerns after the attack.
He said, “I greeted the people who were next to the man and took pictures with them. I continued and I will continue. Nothing will stop me.”
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A bodyguard, who was standing directly behind Macron, raised his hand to defend the president, but was a millisecond behind in stopping the slap. Then the bodyguard put his arm around the president to protect him.
Macron had just managed to turn his face away with the aggressor’s right-hand contact, making it appear that the president had received more of a lightning blow than a direct slap.
A bodyguard protects French President Emmanuel Macron after he was slapped by a member of the public during a visit in Tain-L’Hermitage, France, in this still image taken from a video on June 8, 2021. BFMTV / ReutersTV
It seemed that the man wearing a mask shouted “Montjoy! Saint-Denis!” A centuries-old royal war cry before ending with “A bas la Macronie” or “Down with Macron.”
Another video showed Macron returning immediately after the incident, apparently to confront his attacker, and then to greet other members of the crowd.
French news channel BFMTV said police had arrested two people suspected of slapping Macron and another man who filmed a video.
A few hours later, Macron walked 25 minutes in the narrow streets of the nearby city of Valence, taking selfies with a small crowd and chatting with several people in a warm and relaxed atmosphere. Some could be heard saying to Macron, “Thank you” and “Good luck.”
In 2018, the movie “Montjoie! Saint Denis!” Yelled by someone who threw a cream pie at French left-wing MP Eric Cockrell. At the time, the far-right royalist group Action Francaise took over. On Tuesday, Cockrell expressed solidarity with Macron.
Speaking before the National Assembly, the lower house of the French parliament, Prime Minister Jean Castix said “through the head of state, democracy has been targeted”. Lawmakers from across the political spectrum got to their feet and applauded loudly in a show of support.
“Democracy is about debate, dialogue, confronting ideas and expressing legitimate disagreements, of course, but it can never be violence, verbal abuse, and even less physical aggression,” Castix said.
Far-right leader Marine Le Pen strongly condemned on Twitter the “unbearable physical attack against the President of the Republic.”
She later said she was apparently angry that, while Macron is her biggest political opponent, the assault was “extremely reprehensible”.
Former President François Hollande of the Socialist Party tweeted that the slap was an “unbearable and intolerable blow against our institutions…The whole nation must show solidarity with the Head of State.”
Less than a year before France’s next presidential election, centrist Macron last week embarked on a political “Tour of France”, saying he plans to visit French regions in the coming months to “feel the country’s pulse” as the government works to revive life. The nation’s economy affected by the pandemic.
Macron said in an interview that he wanted to reach out to people in a group consultation with the French public with the aim of “turning the page” on the pandemic – and preparing for his possible campaign for a second term.
Growing concerns about violence against elected officials and police have been raised in France, especially after unruly members of the economic protest movement known as the “yellow vests” repeatedly clashed with riot police in 2019.
Mayors and lawmakers have also been targeted with physical assaults, death threats, and harassment.
But the well-protected French head of state survived, compounding the shock waves that have engulfed French politics in the wake of Tuesday’s attack.
Macron, like his predecessors, enjoys spending time in meetings and greetings with the public. Called “mass baths” in French, they have long been a staple of French politics and rarely produce displays of disrespect for the president.
However, Macron has been verbally attacked in previous initiatives to meet and greet, according to Agence France-Presse.
The 2018 tour to celebrate the centenary of the end of World War I saw scenes of angry citizens booing and harassing him. And in July last year, Macron and his wife Brigitte were insulted by a group of protesters during an impromptu stroll through the Tuileries Gardens in central Paris on Bastille Day.
A bystander grabbed then-President Nicolas Sarkozy’s suit during a mass bath in 2011. His successor, Hollande, was washed with flour the following year, months before he won the presidential election.
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