François Bayrou's 40 billion cuts, "it's the time of his life": time of reckoning for the debt prophet

Five decades of political life in one day. By calling the press on Tuesday, July 15 at 4 p.m. to lift the veil on his budget for 2026 , François Bayrou imagines himself facing history. "This is the most perilous time since the Algerian War," he exaggerated last week in front of the parliamentarians of his camp, always ready to measure himself against Henri IV, Churchill, Mendès France or de Gaulle. "The man who sees himself writing his autobiography!" one minister joked. Making a fragmented Assembly swallow 40 billion in efforts, finally a challenge worthy of his ego, he who prophesied a year before his accession to Matignon that he would only be sought out to save