French President Emmanuel Macron was forced to make two quick Cabinet changes Tuesday after a second popular minister resigned in a week, the latest setback as he battles record-low ratings. Macron was already seeking a replacement for Environment Minister Nicolas Hulot, whose shock decision to quit last week caught France’s political establishment off guard.
Hulot, a star TV presenter who enjoyed the Cabinet’s highest ratings, accused the president of not moving fast enough on key green pledges, including France’s reliance on nuclear energy. His resignation was a blow for Macron, who famously responded to U.S. President Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the 2015 Paris climate deal with a pledge to “make our planet great again.”
Parliament Speaker Francois de Rugy, a former Greens party member who joined Macron’s Republic on the Move party last year, will replace Hulot. Rugy got a cautious welcome from environmentalists.
“He has a history of commitment to the environment, particularly with his anti-nuclear stance. The fear is that without any change on the part of Emmanuel Macron or [Prime Minister Edouard Philippe] there is little chance Francois de Rugy will do any better than Nicolas Hulot”, said Jean-Francois Julliard, the head of Greenpeace France.
Earlier Tuesday, Sports Minister Laura Flessel, a popular fencing champion overseeing preparations for the 2024 Olympics in Paris, also stepped down.
Flessel cited “personal reasons”, with a source close to the minister denying any link to tensions over state funding for the Games. She will be replaced by Roxana Maracineanu, a backstroke silver medalist at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney.
The Cabinet shuffle – which maintains Macron’s pledge for an equal number of men and women – comes as he tries to rebound from his lowest approval ratings since taking office in 2017.
An Ifop poll Tuesday showed his ratings at just 31 percent, down 10 points from July. His popularity waned before the holidays after a top security aide was caught roughing up protesters while wearing a police helmet during a demonstration.
“The government has been on the defensive since the summer, it’s no longer on the offensive,” Ifop analyst Jerome Fourquet said. “It’s like riding a bike – when you stop pedaling, you fall over.”
Stephane Rozes, professor at Sciences Po university and president of CAP consultancy, agreed that “the Macron dynamic has stagnated somewhat.”