The French president is bored stiff by meetings with European counterparts that he thinks are “depressing and utterly lacking in creativity,” according to private messages revealed in a new book.
Macron also confirmed that he had called France’s disastrous snap election in 2024 partly to catch Marine Le Pen’s hard-Right party unprepared.
He predicted the National Rally (RN) candidate, who is the current presidential favourite, would fail in her fourth attempt at France’s top job, as would hard-Left candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
He criticised flatterers turned critics as “b——s” and complained that the French were “all too hard on me.” The remarks are among hundreds of private exchanges on the encrypted Telegram app over two years with Françoise Degois, a Left-wing journalist who is publishing them without the president’s permission in a book on Friday.
The Élysée reportedly only learnt of the existence of “Vous êtes tous trop durs avec moi” (“You’re all too hard on me”) only four days before its release.
