October 25, 2023 - 3:45pm
There are several ways of looking at French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin’s (very) public announcement that he would start “systematically” deporting non-resident foreigners deemed “dangerous” to French security. “Our firmness is extremely clear. We will identify across the national territory all the dangerous types; we will withdraw any foreigners’ residence permit and will expel from [France] any foreigner considered dangerous by the intelligence services,” he hammered at a press conference.
The minister announced that proceedings would be conducted fast enough that the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) would not have time to hear, let alone rule on their appeals. Should their expulsion from French soil be ruled a violation of the European Convention, to which France is a signatory, “we will pay the fine”, Darmanin said breezily. “They will not be let back in again.”
Any legalistic minds objecting to this should be reminded that France, despite having reshaped more than 80% of her laws to conform with EU law, has regularly violated the latter when it felt it was in the higher interest of the country. Even without going into barely-disguised agricultural subsidies, European fines for — among other misdemeanours — violation of competition law have regularly hit large French industrial behemoths which had received a nod and a wink from the State (the names Alcatel, Areva, Schneider, Alstom immediately come to mind). The joke from French negotiators during the long slog of Brexit was to tell their British counterparts that they just needed “not to apply the Brussels decisions [they didn’t] like, like we do” — yet this held a fairly significant kernel of truth.
Mostly, though, Darmanin is on manoeuvres. He knows, because both his Département and Regional Préfets, as well as his pollsters, regularly tell him that the country at large is outraged by rising criminality and a terrorism threat that is the highest in Europe (the two sometimes overlap). He begged for the Home Office job because this has traditionally been a launching pad to greater things: it provides one with a granular overview of the country, so useful when your job includes overseeing elections.
His latest bombshell decision may alarm activist NGOs, Paris liberal opinion writers and Jean-Luc Mélenchon, but it will be popular more broadly. Even if it peters out into few actual deportations (as is perfectly possible, and on past form even likely), it will be remembered. The two individual cases that triggered Darmanin’s policy statement concern two Chechen Russian passport-holders, the latest having filmed himself in videos of allegiance to the Islamist State. The ECHR believes sending him back to Russia would “put his life in danger”, which is believable. Essentially, Darmanin is saying here: “See if I care.”
An added bonus is that Gérald Darmanin may be creating a headache for Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN), which has been demanding similar measures for years. If the NR supports him in this, they will be seen as following his initiative. If they refuse, they will have to explain their churlishness. This would be doubly helpful to Darmanin, marking him as a less controversial alternative to Le Pen, but also enabling him to show Emmanuel Macron that he can make the RN look bad. Which, considering that in recent months Macron has been dissatisfied with Darmanin’s performance (and overweening ambition), might smooth matters between the two — or might not.
Finally, it’s rarely harmful to a French political career to pick a very visible battle with Brussels, especially on sovereignty. The EU is less popular in France than her neighbours believe: the old strain of intransigent Gaullism appeals. And when you would like to become president one day, it’s the best mood music you can pick.
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SubscribeHeartening news for European culture and security. Never mind the bloke’s motives, get him over here and let him put some backbone into our Civil Service blob.
Don’t be so confident. These are politicians speaking, not people of solid character.
They’ve been doing this for some time. Mayotte (part of metropolitan France and the EU) has been sending migrants arriving in boats from the Comoros Islands back for some time. But it gets very little publicity here.
If we’re moving towards a concensus that the current immigration and asylum laws and conventions are no longer workable then perhaps we’re finally making some progress. Ideally, we could construct a new and more realistic legal framework here which isn’t subject to endless legal challenges and quibbles.
Bon courage, M Darmanin. Future of France depends on success in your mission.
I assume that the migrants crowded on the Channel coast are all illegally present in France, being neither citizens of EU/Schengen zone countries nor claiming asylum status there. Presumably they could be arrested and imprisoned tomorrow if France chose to do so, but for obvious reasons this does not happen: it would leave France with the cost and responsibility of either dealing with an asylum claim or seeking to deport them. And so they are left there to attempt to cross the Channel with some cosmetic attempts to arrest a few of them from time to time but otherwise ushered towards the boats with a cheery “bonne chance”. I wouldn’t mind, but we have paid a lot of money to France to maintain this charade.
Those crossing the Channel may rest assured that no UK civil servant or politician would ever dare to c**k a snook at ECHR in the way that M. Darmanin claims he shall.
Meanwhile, in America, Texas recently surpassed 50,000 migrants bussed to northern sanctuary cities like NYC, Chicago, and DC, whose facilities are finally feeling the strain that Texas has to put up with. President Biden, with an election year looming, recently renewed construction on the border wall. Politicians and governments all over the world are starting to see which way the political wind is blowing and pulling back from free trade and free movement. Whether it’s through new politicians and parties taking power, as with Meloni in Italy, or through the same finger in the wind waffling we’ve come to expect from politicians of all stripes (Biden was a master political chameleon in his younger days), the tide has turned against globalism. I expect to see many more politicians like Darmanin who, regardless of party affiliation, break from the globalist herd to further their own careers. Their success will encourage more to do the same, and we’ll eventually reach a more pragmatic, less stupid, less utopian political consensus.
Stable door, bolted horse springs to mind.
Let’s believe it when we actually see it, eh guys.
Indeed. If they actually said what they believe/plan to do (encourage continuous massive immigration) we Natives might ‘rise up’.
As it is these insincere promises to do something are just enough to keep us passive until we are powerless in our own country.
Test
Is this the same Darmanin who has been accused of sexual violence/harassment and who lied repeatedly about fake tickets at the UEFA Champion’s League final – long after it became abundantly clear that the fault was with UEFA and the French authorities? Is that him?
Why you would believe anything this guy says is beyond me. Fine, expel people – possibly in violation of the ECHR. But where exactly are you going to expel them TO? If their home country refuses, you’ve got nothing.