French President Emmanuel Macron let loose on people who have chosen not to take the experimental vaccines currently being offered for COVID-19. In an article with French news outlet Le Parisien, released Tuesday, Macron vowed to make life nearly impossible for citizens who refuse to take one of the controversial vaccines.
Macron estimated that 90 percent of French citizens had already been vaccinated, but railed against what he called a “small minority” of citizens who have, thus far, refused to receive a vaccination for the Chinese virus.
As of this writing, France’s Public Health Department estimated that 77 percent of the nation was “fully vaccinated,” meaning that 77 percent have received the two initial shots plus the booster.
“How do we reduce that minority? We reduce it, sorry for the expression, by pissing them off even more,” Macron said.
While Macron demurred just a bit, saying that he “won’t send [unvaccinated people] to prison,” the French president did not mince words when laying out his plan to get holdouts to the vaccine to get with the program by “limiting as much as possible their access to activities in social life.”
“I’m not for pissing off the French,” Macron said. “Now the unvaccinated, I really want to piss them off. And so, we’re going to keep doing it, until the end. This is the strategy.”
While Macron was quick to say that mandatory vaccinations were not yet being considered, he made it clear that citizens who were not vaccinated would pay a price for their choice.
“So we need to let [the unvaccinated] know: From January 15 you will no longer be able to go to a restaurant, you won’t be able to get a drink or a coffee or go to the theatre or the cinema,” Macron said.
With the French presidential election a scant three months away, Macron’s radical comments drew reaction from both supporters and opponents.
Macron ally and prime minister Jean Castex said during a news conference, “The president’s remarks are perfectly consistent with what we’ve been doing.”
But opponents were quick to attack Macron’s words.
“No health emergency justifies such words,” said Bruno Retailleau, head of the conservative Les Républicains party in the Senate, adding, “We can encourage vaccination without insulting anyone.”
Criticism of Macron also came from France’s far left: “Astonishing confession from Macron,” said Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the far-left France Insoumise party. “It is clear the vaccine pass is a collective punishment against individual freedom.”
His opponents in the upcoming presidential election were also quick to chastise the French president.
Right-wing challenger Marine Le Pen called Macron’s comments “vulgar,” adding that a president “shouldn’t say that,” and that it was “unworthy of his office.”
Le Pen also said that Macron is intent on making unvaccinated people into “second-class citizens.”
The woman considered Macron’s top challenger, Valérie Pécresse, a member of France’s Soyons Libres Party, said, “It’s not up to the president of the Republic to pick out the good and bad French people.”
Pécresse added that France needs a government “that unites people and calms things down.”
In a Harris Interactive poll released on Wednesday, Macron topped all four of his closest challengers. In the first round of the election, the poll shows that Macron would garner 24 percent of the vote, compared to 16 percent apiece for Le Pen, Pécresse, and Éric Zemmour, the leader of France’s Reconquête Party.
The poll also predicted a Macron victory in the run-off election against all three challengers, with the incumbent winning 51-49 percent over Pécresse; 55-45 percent over Le Pen, and 61-39 percent over Zemmour.
Although Macron is the favorite to win the upcoming election, he has not yet officially stated that he is running for office again.
“There is no false suspense. I want to,” Macron stated on Wednesday.
“Once the health situation allows it and I have made everything clear — inside myself and with respect to the political equation — I will say what [my decision] is.”
