The new French Interior Minister poses a threat to immigrants

The names assigned to manage the immigration file in the new French government indicate that the primary target during the next five-year term is the Algerian community in particular and immigrant communities in general. This can be seen from the person assigned to the Ministry of Interior portfolio, replacing his predecessor Gerald Moussa Darmanin.
The immigration file is managed from the Ministry of Interior, which is one of the most prominent portfolios that was the subject of difficult negotiations between the presidential camp represented by the “Renaissance” party and the right-wing party “The Republicans”, which came in fourth in the last legislative elections, in order to form the new government, which was assigned to head by another right-winger, namely Michel Barnier.
As is known, the Interior Ministry portfolio was assigned to Senator Bruno Rotayot, from the right-wing “Republicans” party, which is nominally affiliated with the Gaullist movement, but this politician’s ideas are closer to the far right, the current “National Rally” party and the former “National Front”, led by Marine Le Pen and her puppet Jordan Bardella.
Before that, Prime Minister Michel Barnier, immediately after being assigned to this position by the French President, had linked the problems of the French state to immigration and immigrants, and placed this file at the top of his priorities, and the issue of combating immigration is considered one of the pillars on which his alliance with the far right stands to form the government.
The extremist positions of the new French Interior Minister can be sensed through his previous statements as a prominent politician in the right-wing camp and head of the parliamentary group in the “Republicans” party at the level of the French Senate, which were generally offensive to immigrant communities and the countries from which they originate, most notably Algeria, as it has the largest community residing on French soil.
Returning to Bruno Rotayot’s previous positions, it becomes clear that this man was appreciated and encouraged by prominent figures in far-right parties. Here we refer to Jérôme Sainte-Marie, a politician belonging to the National Front party founded by the Le Pen family, who expressed satisfaction with the appointment of Bruno Rotau as Minister of the Interior, because he expresses “positions that are in line with the demands of two-thirds of the French majority regarding the issue of immigration,” as stated in statements to the French private channel BFM TV on September 20.
The immigration file is considered one of the issues that secures Macron’s camp’s alliance with the far right or leads to its collapse, and therefore this file was assigned to a man known for his attacks on immigrants without convincing justification.
He previously considered the “suburbs”, which are similar to the “quays” surrounding the French capital Paris and inhabited by immigrants, as lands outside French sovereignty and called for their “reclaiming”, in a racist statement that undermines the societal harmony that French politicians have always bet on within the framework of what they call the “integration policy”.
If Bruno Rotayot carries these ideas to the Ministry of the Interior building, then it can be said that the will of the French has been hijacked, and that division will become the apparent feature of the French community, which is inconsistent with the values of the “republic” as they call it, of which nothing remains except the name during the last few years, even when it was run by Gerald Moussa Darmanin, who is of Algerian origin, who is supposed to be sympathetic to immigrant communities.
Among the issues that will be raised when Rotayo is assigned the Interior Ministry portfolio is the issue of reviewing the 1968 agreement regulating immigration between Algeria and France. He is one of those who call for organizing a referendum on immigration, putting pressure on countries that the French claim refuse to receive their illegal immigrant citizens, and tightening immigration laws. However, countries are not usually run according to the logic of ideas that people adopt before they come to power.