International
French government collapses after budget vote, Le Pen demands elections
Quick Hit:
France’s government collapsed Monday after Prime Minister François Bayrou lost a high-stakes confidence vote tied to his budget plan. Marine Le Pen quickly seized the moment, calling for fresh elections to resolve the deep political gridlock.
Key Details:
- Bayrou’s budget plan proposed tax hikes on high earners, welfare cuts, and fewer public holidays to address soaring deficits.
- The National Assembly voted 364–194 against Bayrou, making him the first prime minister of the Fifth Republic to be ousted in a confidence vote he initiated.
- Le Pen called for new elections, saying: “A president is never wrong to rely on the people… The dissolution is not a whim; it is an institutional lever.”
Diving Deeper:
On Monday the French government under Prime Minister François Bayrou collapsed following a crushing defeat in the National Assembly. Bayrou, who staked his premiership on a budget plan aimed at curbing France’s spiraling debt, lost a confidence vote by a wide margin, 364 to 194. The collapse marks the fourth-shortest tenure of a French prime minister in modern history, just 269 days in office.
The crisis traces back to President Emmanuel Macron’s decision last summer to forge a fragile pact between his centrist coalition and the leftist New Popular Front (NFP) to block Marine Le Pen’s surging National Rally. That maneuver left the Assembly fractured into three camps, none with the power to govern effectively.
Macron first tapped former Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier as prime minister, but his government imploded in just three months after pushing through budget measures without parliamentary approval. Bayrou, a longtime Macron ally, was brought in as a stabilizing figure but quickly found himself boxed in by both the left and Le Pen’s populist right.
Facing EU pressure over rising debt and fears of a credit downgrade, Bayrou proposed painful austerity: raising taxes on the wealthy, cutting welfare, and even reducing the number of public holidays. Neither the left nor the National Rally would support him. Cornered, Bayrou dared parliament to bring him down, declaring: “Ladies and gentlemen, you have the power to overthrow the government, but you do not have the power to erase reality… Expenses will continue to increase even more and the weight of the debt, already unbearable, will become increasingly heavy and more expensive.”
The gamble failed. With his resignation expected Tuesday, President Macron must now decide whether to attempt a third prime ministerial appointment or dissolve parliament and call new elections. The left is lobbying for one of their own, but Marine Le Pen is pushing for a national vote.
“A president is never wrong to rely on the people,” Le Pen told the Assembly. “If there is a dissolution, we will accept the verdict of the polls. If the people do us the honour of a clear mandate… we will go to Matignon to implement, without waiting for the presidential election, a national recovery program.”
Le Pen and her allies also blasted Bayrou’s record, with party stalwart Eric Ciotti branding him a “pyromaniac firefighter” who, alongside Macron, has presided over “the French debacle.”
Stuart Kaplan on “Jesse Watters Primetime” discussing Kirks assassination [Screenshot/Fox News/”Jesse Watters Primetime”]
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
By Hailey Gomez
Former FBI special agent Stuart Kaplan said Wednesday on “Jesse Watters Primetime” that the assassination of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk may have been a “professional hit.”
The 31-year-old TPUSA founder had been speaking with students at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, when he was shot and killed. While discussing a potential suspect the FBI had interrogated but later released, Fox’s Jesse Watters asked Kaplan for his reaction to the attack.
“You know, Jesse, I think this assassination, different than the assassinated attempt [against President Donald Trump] back in Butler, Pennsylvania, was a very well-planned, very well-orchestrated plot that was put in motion days before. This individual had a plan of escape to elude detection of being out up on a rooftop and also being able to evade and elude law enforcement after that shot was taken,” Kaplan said.
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“When you take a look at what happened in Butler, Pennsylvania, [Thomas Matthew] Crooks came onto the venue, he left the venue, he came back, he was questioned. I mean, it was really an amateur scenario,” Kaplan added. “This assassination of Charlie Kirk, to me, is indicative of a professional hit, and I’m not so sure that we are going to quickly be able to apprehend this individual without some luck, hopefully.”
Kirk had regularly gone on college campuses to debate students on their political stances, with thousands in the Utah crowd eager to see the TPUSA founder. About 20 minutes after Kirk had been debating with a student, a shot rang out, hitting Kirk and ultimately killing him.
WATCH:
A university spokesperson told the Daily Caller that the shot came from a building about 200 yards away. Following the attack, FBI Director Kash Patel posted on X that a subject was captured and being interrogated, but the subject was later released.
Watters went on to ask Kaplan what he meant by “professional hit,” asking if he believes anybody with “any sort of basic training” could have carried out the attack.
“Well, when you take a look at the video and you take a look at the venue and the spectators and how close they are to Charlie Kirk, and then you have that kind of umbrella over him, that kind of tent, you have to know that this shooter had to be perched in a position with respect to being able to lay his sights perfectly, basically a headshot,” Kaplan said. “The shot that was taken was taken to immediately incapacitate Charlie Kirk. So this was not some amateur who just got up on a rooftop because it was what I consider spontaneous combustion. He got up this morning and decided he was going to do something crazy.”
“This seems the earmark of a professional that got up onto this rooftop well in advance of the venue being occupied by the spectators. He was clearly undetected,” Kaplan said. “There was no indication that anybody saw him up on this rooftop. Obviously, after that one single shot was taken, he was able to basically very quietly and systematically elude any further detection and escape. There’s been no indication that there’s a vehicle identified or any mode of how he actually escaped the venue. So to me, this is someone who had some experience, some level of sophistication to have mapped out exactly how this was going to go down.”
In Patel’s most recent post on X as of Wednesday evening, the FBI director said the “subject in custody has been released after an interrogation by law enforcement.” Patel added that the FBI’s investigation will continue and that it will further “release information in interest of transparency.”
Kirk is survived by his wife Erika and their two young children.
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
Authorities found ammunition from a rifle in the killing of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk in Utah with messaging described as pro-transgender and anti-fascist, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday, citing anonymous sources. (According to an internal law enforcement bulletin and a person familiar with the investigation)
Officials recovered a rifle in a wooded area after Krik was fatally shot in the neck during a TPUSA event at Utah Valley University in Orem on Wednesday. The shooter, still on the run, is described as a male of college age.
The FBI’s Salt Lake City office declined to comment to the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) did not respond to a request for comment.
This is a breaking news story and will be updated with more information as it becomes available.
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