He has not yet turned 30 and is already tired of signing autographs. Jordan Bardella (Drancy, 1995), son of Italian immigrants and with Algerian ancestors, has been grabbing covers, acclaimed like the new poster boy of the extreme right and natural successor of Marine Le Penwhich in 2021 made him president of the National Group (RN), with 26 years.
“It has not only been Marine Le Pen who has been unjustly condemned; it is French democracy that has been executed.”was the first reaction of the dolphin as soon as he knows the sentence that may mean the political death of his godmotherwith whom he has also maintained Blood ties (He maintained a romantic relationship with Nolwenn Olivier, Marine’s niece).
Until the weekend, Jordan Bardella officially was part of the squad of denialists of his own party that resisted thinking about the disqualification of the 56 -year -old historical leader, who was still being a favorite for the 2027 presidential elections.
But the truth is that the ancient apprentice of Le Pen had been rehearsing the role of successor for some time, which has been able to give rise to friction in recent months for his eagerness for prominence, signed during the weekend for his stellar presence in a Congress on anti -Semitism in Israel (personally blessed by Benjamin Netanyahu).
“It’s vital that we never forget Hamas’ barbarism”Bardella proclaimed as he passed through the Holy Land. “They were civil victims, women and children, who were massacred, and that barbarism has touched Israel as it has played France. We are facing an existential threat to all democracies. “
“There is today a mortal honeymoon between Islamic fundamentalism and the extreme right,” Bardella proclaimed, who paid tribute to the victims of the Holocaust, in an attempt to definitely bury the stigma of the anti -Semitism that pursued for decades to the National Front, the RN embryo. “I never met Jean-Marie Le Pen’s game,” is the excuse that Bardella usually puts, embarked in parallel to a campaign to soften his image.
A little over a month ago, precisely, he jumped to the headlines for another highly symbolic gesture, when he suddenly canceled his appearance to give the Conservative Action Political Conference (CPAC) In response to the apparently Nazi greeting on stage Steve Bannonformer advisor of Donald Trump.
With a new generation politician, rabidly young, high and repeated, Bardella has been climbing whole until it appears in the surveys that Marine Le Pen, who did not hide his wishes to make him prime minister if he arrived at some day to President. The maximum commitment of Bardella, which gave the final bell in the European of 2024, has been precisely that: consummate the RN transition from the protest party to the government party.
In its skillful way it has known how to alternate the anti -immigration messages launched to the base of the hard right with statements aimed at a broader spectrum of the electorate: “I belong to a generation of immigrants who when they arrived in France in the 60s made the effort to abandon part of their culture to assimilate the national culture. That effort is not required today to immigrants, and the result is people who are undoubtedly born in French soil. But that has its hearts in a different country. “
Bardella usually remember how her grandmother did not let him speak Italian (he learned later). His family arrived from Toronto in 1963 and settled in Saint-Denis, one of the suburbs most punished for poverty and drugs north of Paris. His childhood was marked by the separation of his parents, by street violence in his neighborhood and for his lonely video game fans such as Call of Duty.
He stayed at the gates of Paris Political Stadiums Instituteand studied Sorbonne geographyalthough he ended up leaving the classrooms to consecrate himself to politics. With 17 years, the National Front joined, attracted by the personality and the message of Marine Le Pen: “It was the only policy that seemed to understand how I felt, capable of talking to people about how difficult it is to reach the end of the month, the increase in the cost of life, security and identity, the pride of being French.”
Le Pen signed him in 2018 as a party spokesman and President of the National Youth Front (FNJ), then renamed as national generation, in tune with the change of image of the party to which it contributed so personally. As Clément Guillou and Corentin Lesueur remember in The worldBardella assumed the presidency of RN “when he was on the verge of becoming the Titanic” and was not only able to straighten the ship in three years, but also in the case of the helm of a presidential campaign.
What I’m looking for (What I’m looking for) It is the title of the autobiographical book that Bardella launched in November, just when the trial against Le Pen for embezzlement was seen for sentence. Four months later, with more than 200,000 copies sold, the leader of the new French right no longer needs a presentation card. He plan B His name is Bardella.