The autumn night in Paris was cooler than it was in the previous years, not because the temperature dropped, but because the French political center suddenly fell into silence.The prime minister just announced a new cabinet, turned and resigned, less than 12 hours before.
The lights of the Elysée Palace did not turn off all night long, but did not illuminate the end of this political storm.Political turmoil, high debt, low public opinion, can Macron still hold the ship that is about to hit the reef?
26 days after the collapse of power
The French are known for their romance, but the reality of politics is cold as ice.Sebastian Leclerc was forced to "flash" in office less than a month, setting the shortest government life record since the Fifth Republic of France.
A 39-year-old former defense minister, who was supposed to be a representative of the president's "younger" line, has become the new regime's shortest-lived experiment.
What really crushes this young prime minister is not personal ability, but political reality. The parliament is divided into three parts of the world, and no one wants to let it go or talk about it.
Lecorney tried to break the impasse by throwing olive branches at the parties, while promising no longer to circumvent Parliament’s “49.3 clause” and putting out a cooperative gesture.
He just announced the list of the new cabinet, 10 of the 15 ministers are "self-family" and do not leave any place for the left and extreme right.
In just 12 hours, the opposition voice was overwhelmed and the support camp was silent. Le Corni could only hand over his resignation in a dusty face.
This is not his own failure, but the shadow of the Macron administration’s attempt to “boat crossing” again. Since re-election in 2022, Macron has defeated five prime ministers. French politics is like a train that doesn’t stop changing its head but doesn’t move.
Tripartite tug-of-war, Parliament is out of control
The current situation in the French parliament, described in one word, is: pull the saucer war. 577 seats, no party can exceed half, Macron's intermediate coalition in the National Assembly became a "bake-up cookie", and it can not go up and down.
The left-wing “New People’s Front” bite the prime minister nominated by Macron, they oppose the end. The far-right “National Alliance” attitude is more direct and lazy. This makes any new prime minister as if pushed into the battlefield without armor, and is an enemy in front and behind.
It is not that the parliament cannot cooperate, but that no one is willing to cooperate. Le Korney put it bluntly. They only draw red lines and never give green lights. Every nominated prime minister seems to be dancing on a trap and stepping on the miss at any time.
And this is not the first time, Macron has failed to get a stable majority three times in the past cabinet, and every time he pushed the bill hard by "abandoning the parliament", which resulted in more rebounds and more difficult.
Nowadays, even this trick cannot be used, the prime minister is gone, and the parliament is more like a pot of porridge. Everyone wants to stir it up, but no one wants to clean it up.
Parliamentary "paralysis" directly affects policy implementation, pension reforms are stuck, fiscal budgets are difficult to produce, social policies are stalled, France seems to be "institutional exhausted", the government has the will, but no hands and feet.
The debt bomb has been ignited
Political chaos is only a symptom. The deeper problem is that France's finances are already riddled with holes. The latest data shows that France's total public debt has approached 116% of GDP, ranking third in the euro zone after Italy and Greece.
Debt is not an abstract number, it means that France spends far more money each year than it makes. France's fiscal deficit ratio in 2024 is as high as 5.8%, while the upper limit required by the EU is 3%. It's like a person's monthly salary is 10,000 yuan, but he spends 16,000 yuan, and he still doesn't pay the debt?
What is even worse is that debt is not just a hole in the past, it is also a burden in the present, as long as debt does not decrease and interest rates rise, interest spending will be increasingly heavy.
The return on France’s 30-year bonds has surged to 4.52 percent, and the markets have questioned France’s ability to pay off debt.
Deutsche Bank's analysis is even more straightforward. If France does not move its fiscal structure, a debt crisis may break out within two years at most. The French Court of Auditors is also not optimistic, believing that 80 billion euros must be saved in the next five years, otherwise the finances will be completely out of control.
The problem is that French society has long fallen into dependence on welfare, pensions, unemployment benefits, transfer payments, all of which are “political high-pressure lines”, and whoever dares to touch is “out of line”.
Against this backdrop, any fiscal reform that attempts to cut spending is likely to trigger a social backlash, which is why every reform attempt in France in the past few years has ended in massive street protests.
The government wants to save money, the people want to guarantee, the parliament doesn’t give it, the market is watching – this is a “four-faceted” financial trouble.
Macron's desperate stake
In the face of this multi-crisis, Macron is at a crossroads with little choice, either to dissolve parliament for re-election or to continue trying to form a government that can “support.”
But the problem is that elections don't necessarily bring about a turning point. Polls show that Macron's support rate has dropped to 32%, which is the second lowest point in his political career.
What's more troublesome is that more than 60% of French people think that he "can't lead the country anymore". If the election is held in advance, the far-right National League may become the largest party, which will be a disaster for Macron.
Another way is to continue to find the "prepared prime minister", but the history of the previous car is in sight, each new prime minister is like a temporary actor, in exchange for five could not stabilize the situation, and in exchange for one can be reversed?
The more realistic problem is that the sense of trust in French society is rapidly losing, with the political elite changing wave by wave, and the people unable to see the change.
Young people have employment difficulties, the tax burden of middle-income is heavy, and marginalized groups rely on welfare increasingly, and the common feeling is that "the government can't handle things, it will only change people."
In the midst of this political chaos, the debt crisis is quietly approaching, French government bonds are sold out of the market, credit ratings are faced with downgrades, and investor confidence is shaken.
The crisis in France at the moment is not only a power vacuum brought about by the resignation of the Prime Minister, but also a "systemic stall" under the combined effect of high debt, collapse of public opinion and weak system.
Standing at the center of the storm, Macron was in a dilemma and was attacked front and back. On one hand, the iron gate of the parliament is closed, and on the other hand, the alarm bells of the market are ringing. Dissolve the parliament or continue to hold on? No road is safe.
But no matter what he chooses, France has entered a “high-risk period,” with triple political, economic, and social pressures simultaneously, like a debt grenade that has been removed from insurance, ringing in the streets of Paris.
Without fundamental structural adjustments, without substantial political consensus, the bomb could not just blow up a government but shake the institutional foundations of the whole of France.
Source of information:
Sudden! Le Corni submitted his resignation to Macron, less than a month after being appointed as Prime Minister of France October 6, 2025 16:10 Daily Economic News
What does Le Corny, who resigned as French Prime Minister, have only 48 hours to talk about? 2025-10-07 18:59:53 Source: General Station Global Information Broadcasting
French political turmoil escalates, high debt pressure triggers governance crisis September 11, 2025 17:34 CCTV