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    How Billionaires Are Shaping France’s Presidential Campaign

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    In a nation with strict political finance laws, control over the news media has provided an avenue for the very rich to influence elections, this one more than ever.PARIS — The face of President Emmanuel Macron’s possibly fiercest rival in France’s coming election is not on any campaign poster. He has not given a single speech. His name will not be on the ballot.He is not a candidate at all, but the man often described as France’s Rupert Murdoch: Vincent Bolloré, the billionaire whose conservative media empire has complicated Mr. Macron’s carefully plotted path to re-election by propelling the far-right candidacy of Éric Zemmour, the biggest star of Mr. Bolloré’s Fox-style news network, CNews.With the first round of France’s presidential election just a month away, polls show Mr. Macron as the favorite. But it is Mr. Zemmour who has set the themes of the race with the openly anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim views he had put forth each evening on television for the past couple of years.“Bolloré’s channels have largely created Zemmour,” François Hollande, France’s former president, said in an interview. But Mr. Zemmour’s emergence is just the latest example of the power of France’s media tycoons, Mr. Bolloré most prominent among them, to shape political fortunes. In a nation with very strict campaign finance laws, control over the news media has long provided an avenue for the very rich to influence elections.“If you’re a billionaire, you can’t entirely finance a campaign,” said Julia Cagé, an economist specializing in the media at Sciences Po, “but you can buy a newspaper and put it at the disposal of a campaign.”The political reach of media tycoons like Vincent Bolloré, center, has become enough of a concern that the French Senate opened an inquiry.Isa Harsin/Sipa, via Associated PressIn the long run-up to the current campaign, the competition for influence has been especially frenzied, with some of France’s richest men locked in a fight over some of the nation’s top television networks, radio stations and publications.The emergence of Mr. Bolloré, in particular, has intensified the jockeying in this election season as he buys up media properties and turns them into news outlets pushing a hard right-wing agenda.The phenomenon is new in the French media landscape, and it has prompted fierce jostling among other billionaires for media holdings. It has been the hidden drama behind the 2022 elections, with some of the media billionaires angling strongly against Mr. Macron, and others in support of him.On one side are Mr. Bolloré and his media group, Vivendi; on the other are billionaires regarded as Mr. Macron’s allies, including Bernard Arnault, the head of the LVMH luxury empire.The political reach of media tycoons has become enough of a concern that the French Senate has opened an inquiry. In hearings broadcast live in January and February, they all denied any political motive. Mr. Bolloré said his interests were “purely economic.” Mr. Arnault said his investments in the news media were akin to “patronage.”But there is little doubt that their media holdings give them leverage that France’s campaign finance laws would otherwise deny them. In France, political TV ads are not allowed in the six months before an election. Corporate donations to candidates are banned.Personal gifts to a campaign are limited to 4,600 euros, or about $5,000. In this election cycle, presidential candidates cannot spend more than €16.9 million each, or about $18.5 million, on their campaigns for the first round; the two finalists are then limited to a total of €22.5 million each, or about $24.7 million. By comparison, when he was a presidential candidate, Joseph R. Biden Jr. raised more than $1 billion for his 2020 campaign.Bernard Arnault, the head of the LVMH luxury empire, with President Emmanuel Macron of France in Paris last year. He is regarded as an ally of Mr. Macron.Christophe Archambault/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“Why do you think that these French capitalists whose names you know buy Le Monde, Les Echos, Le Parisien?” Jean-Michel Baylet, whose family has owned a powerful group of newspapers in southwest France for generations, said in an interview, mentioning some of the country’s biggest newspapers.“They’re buying influence,” said Mr. Baylet, a former minister of territorial cohesion, who himself has been accused of using his media outlets to advance a parallel career in politics — a charge he denies.The control of media by industrialists, whose core businesses depend on government contracts in construction or defense, amounts to “a conflict of interests,” said Aurélie Filippetti, who oversaw the media sector as a minister of culture.Armed with media properties, businessmen enjoy leverage over politicians.“Politicians are always afraid that newspapers will fall into unfriendly hands,” said Claude Perdriel, the main shareholder of Challenges, a weekly magazine, who said that he made sure to sell his previous outlets, including the magazine L’Obs, to other businessmen who shared his left-leaning politics.For Mr. Macron, that is what happened when early this year Jérôme Béglé, who is a frequent guest on CNews, took over the Journal du Dimanche, a Sunday newspaper once so pro-Macron that it was called the “Pravda” of the government. After Mr. Bolloré gained control over the newspaper’s parent company last fall, it began publishing critical articles and unflattering photos of Mr. Macron.It recently zeroed in on what right-wing competitors consider the most vulnerable aspect of Mr. Macron’s record: his crime policy, which the publication referred to as a failure and his “Achilles’ heel.”Though not widely read, the newspaper enjoys a following among the French political and economic elite and an agenda-setting role. “It’s one of the two or three most influential newspapers,” said Gaspard Gantzer, a presidential spokesman under Mr. Hollande.A newsstand in Paris. “If you’re a billionaire, you can’t entirely finance a campaign,” said Julia Cagé, an economist at Sciences Po, “but you can buy a newspaper and put it at the disposal of a campaign.”Christophe Petit Tesson/EPA, via ShutterstockOne of Mr. Bolloré’s television channels, the youth-oriented C8, has served as a powerful echo chamber for promoting far-right ideas. A recent study by the CNRS, France’s national research organization, showed that from September to December last year, C8’s most popular show devoted 53 percent of its time to the far right and to one figure in particular: Mr. Zemmour.But it is through CNews, created in 2017 after his takeover of the Canal Plus network, that Mr. Bolloré continues to extend his influence in the final stretches of the campaign. With its ability to shape the national debate around issues like immigration, Islam and crime, CNews quickly grew into a new, and feared, political force in France. It made Mr. Zemmour, a newspaper reporter and best-selling author, a star.Learn More About France’s Presidential ElectionCard 1 of 6The campaign begins. More

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      Éric Zemmour, Far-Right Pundit, Makes French Presidential Run Official

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      After months of speculation, Mr. Zemmour, an anti-immigration writer and right-wing television star, said he was running in the presidential elections next year to “save” France.PARIS — Éric Zemmour, a polarizing far-right writer and television star, announced on Tuesday that he was running for French president in elections next year, ending months of speculation over a bid that upended the race before he had even made it official.Mr. Zemmour, 63, is a longtime conservative journalist who rose to prominence over the past decade, using prime-time television and best-selling books to expound on his view that France was in steep decline because of Islam, immigration and leftist identity politics, themes he returned to in his announcement.“It is no longer time to reform France but to save it,” Mr. Zemmour said in a video with dramatic overtones that was published on social media, conjuring images of an idealized France and then warning about outside forces that threatened to destroy it. He has fashioned himself as a Donald J. Trump-style provocateur lobbing politically incorrect bombs at the French elite establishment — saying, for instance, that the law should require parents to give their children “traditional” French names — and rewriting some of the worst episodes from France’s past. He has been charged with inciting racial or religious hatred several times over his comments, and twice convicted and fined.Mr. Zemmour spoke over 1950s footage full of men in hats and vintage Citroën cars, contrasted with recent clips of crowded subways, crumbling churches, burning cars and violent clashes with the police.“You feel like a foreigner in your own country,” Mr. Zemmour said, reading from notes at a desk in front of old bookshelves in a way that seemed intent on replicating Charles de Gaulle’s posture when he issued a call to arms against Nazi Germany from London in June 1940.Mr. Zemmour said that he was running “to prevent our children and our grandchildren from experiencing barbarity, to prevent our daughters from being veiled and our sons from being subdued.”He accused the elites — journalists, politicians, judges, European technocrats — of failing France, which he said was represented by a long list of illustrious men and women, including Joan of Arc, Louis XIV and Napoleon.“We will not be replaced,” added Mr. Zemmour, who has espoused the theory of a “great replacement” of white people in France by Muslim immigrants — a conspiracy theory that has been cited by extremists in several mass shootings.Mr. Zemmour’s announcement video shows him speaking in a setting designed to recall a wartime address by Charles de Gaulle.Thomas Samson/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe announcement, after months of barely veiled hints that Mr. Zemmour intended to run, surprised no one. It also came after the yet-to-be-declared candidate had endured a dip in the polls and a series of setbacks in recent days — including a disastrous visit to Marseille, in southern France, that ended with him making a crude gesture at a protester. The vulgar gesture gave ammunition to critics who say Mr. Zemmour is not fit to be president.“One may have doubts as to his ability to represent our country and serve in its highest office,” Gabriel Attal, a French government spokesman, told Europe 1 radio on Tuesday.Mr. Zemmour has already reshuffled the political calculus for several candidates in the presidential elections, which will be held in April next year.French presidential elections use a two-round system, with the top two candidates in the first round advancing to a runoff. Recent polls have put Mr. Zemmour in third place, with roughly 14 to 15 percent support, behind President Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Rally party, who met in the runoff of the last presidential election in 2017.Even so, Mr. Zemmour has drawn in some of Ms. Le Pen’s supporters with his hard-line stance on immigration and identity. He has also pushed Les Républicains, France’s traditional conservative party, further to the right. The party is expected to pick its own candidate this week.Mr. Zemmour’s latest book, “France Has Not Said Its Last Word Yet,” which he released in September to mark his unofficial entry into the presidential race, has sold more than 250,000 copies.Some of his books have contained incendiary statements about women and minorities. They have also contained historical inaccuracies as Mr. Zemmour attempted to clear France of wrongdoing in some of the worst episodes of its past, including in World War II and Algeria’s war for independence from France.Mr. Zemmour is the son of parents from Algeria, and he styles himself as a defender of France’s Christian civilization against the influence of Muslim immigrants. But he himself is Jewish, and his repeated attempts to rehabilitate France’s collaborationist government and its leader, Marshal Philippe Pétain, have been condemned in vigorous terms by leaders of the French Jewish community, even as some Jews have identified with his anti-Islam message.Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Rally party, has seen some of her supporters drawn to Mr. Zemmour.Dmitry Kostyukov for The New York TimesOlivier Faure, the head of France’s Socialist Party, quipped on Twitter that Mr. Zemmour had used “De Gaulle’s microphone but Pétain’s speech” for his announcement.“Beethoven’s music but the wrong notes of a fantasized past for a caricatured present,” he added, referring to the soundtrack Mr. Zemmour used in Tuesday’s video. Mr. Zemmour has excelled as a right-wing television pundit deploying virulent nationalist, anti-immigrant rhetoric. In 2019, he joined CNews, a Fox-style news network, which provided a platform for him to express his ideas to hundreds of thousands of viewers.Mr. Zemmour experienced a rapid rise in the polls over the past few months, fueled by feverish media coverage of his latest book tour, but he has stumbled in recent weeks.Several supporters, including a key French financier who had lent him money, have distanced themselves, describing his campaign as disorganized and amateurish. Mr. Zemmour is not backed by a powerfully established political force, like Mr. Trump was with the Republican Party, and it remains unclear whether he can gather the official support of 500 elected representatives — a requirement to run for president in France. Some recent moves have also cast doubt on Mr. Zemmour’s ability to handle the challenges and pressures of the campaign trail.He was widely criticized for making political statements to journalists in front of the Bataclan concert hall in Paris on the sixth anniversary of the terrorist attacks there, and in Marseille, he was heckled by protesters and was photographed making the crude gesture toward a woman who had done the same thing toward him.“He has a lot of qualities as a polemicist, a lot less as a presidential candidate,” Ms. Le Pen, the far-right leader, told Sud Radio on Tuesday, accusing Mr. Zemmour of being “disconnected” from the French working class and of dividing voters. “If you want to be president, you have to unite.” More

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      How Éric Zemmour Is Turning French Politics Upside Down

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      Éric Zemmour, an anti-immigrant writer and TV commentator, is surging in opinion polls before presidential elections next year — and he is not yet a candidate.PARIS — He is the anti-immigration son of parents from Algeria. He styles himself as the great defender of France’s Christian civilization, though he himself is Jewish. He channels Donald J. Trump in an anti-establishment campaign. And he is now scrambling the battle lines before France’s presidential election in April.The meteoric rise of Éric Zemmour, a far-right author and TV pundit, has turned France’spolitics upside down.Until a few weeks ago, most had expected France’s next presidential elections to be a predictable rematch between President Emmanuel Macron and the far-right Marine Le Pen that, polls showed, left voters who wanted alternatives deeply dissatisfied.Though still not a declared candidate, Mr. Zemmour, 63, shot to No. 2 in a poll of likely voters last week, disrupting campaign strategies across the board, even beyond those of Mr. Macron and Ms. Le Pen.“The French want to upset a political order that hasn’t won them over, and Éric Zemmour appears to be the bowling ball that’s going to knock down all the pins,” said Pascal Perrineau, a political scientist at Sciences Po University specializing in elections and the right.Mr. Perrineau warned that voters were not seriously focused yet on the elections and that polls could be volatile.Yet candidates are not taking any chances.Mr. Macron’s campaign has focused on winning support on the right and forcing a showdown with Ms. Le Pen, in the belief that the French would reject her party in the second round of voting, as they have for decades.Now it is far less clear whom he would meet in a runoff: A strong showing in the first round could propel Mr. Zemmour into the second one, or it could split the far-right electorate to allow a center-right candidate to qualify for the finals.After weeks of ignoring Mr. Zemmour, Mr. Macron is now criticizing him, though not by name, while government ministers and other Macron allies have unleashed a barrage of attacks.Mr. Zemmour is the author of several books, and a star on the right-wing CNews network. Nicolas Tucat/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMr. Zemmour’s rise has been most unsettling for Ms. Le Pen, who is plummeting in the polls — so much so that her own father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, the party founder, said that he would support Mr. Zemmour if the writer were in a stronger position.Ms. Le Pen has for years tried to broaden her base with a so-called un-demonizing strategy of moving her nationalist, anti-immigrant party from the most extreme xenophobic positions that it was known for under her father. Now she finds herself in the unusual position of being outflanked on the right.Mr. Zemmour became one of France’s best-selling authors in the past decade by writing books on the nation’s decline — fueled, he said, by the loss of traditional French and Christian values, the immigration of Muslim Africans bent on a reverse colonization of France, the rise of feminism and the loss of virility, and a “great replacement” of white people, a conspiracy theory that has been cited by gunmen in multiple mass shootings.As the child of Algerians who settled in metropolitan France, he has presented himself as the embodiment of France’s successful system of assimilation. He has said that the failure to integrate recent generations of Muslim immigrants lies with the new arrivals, who hate France, and not with a system that others say has not kept up with the times.Mr. Zemmour’s influence rose to an entirely new level in the past two years after he became the star of CNews, a new Fox-style news network that gave him a platform to expound on his views every evening.His supporters include voters most deeply shaken by the social forces that have roiled French society more recently and that they now lump into “wokisme” — a #MeToo movement that has led to the fall of powerful men; a racial awakening challenging France’s image of itself as a colorblind society; the emergence of a new generation questioning the principles of the French Republic; and the perceived growing threat of an American-inspired vision of society.“In its history, France has always had a strong cultural identity, but now there’s deep anxiety about that identity,” Mr. Perrineau said. “People feel that their culture, their way of life and their political system, all is being changed. It’s enough.”Mr. Zemmour at a book promotion event in Nice last month.Valery Hache/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“Éric Zemmour plays on that very well, on this nostalgia for the past, and this fear of no longer being a great power, of dissolving in a conglomerate that we don’t understand, whether it’s Europe or globalization or the Americanization of culture,” he added.In the 2017 election, Mr. Macron was the new face who overturned the existing political order. But during his presidency, “the new world of Emmanuel Macron has come to look a lot like the old world,” disillusioning voters, Mr. Perrineau said.Philippe Olivier, a close aide to Ms. Le Pen and a member of the European Parliament, said that French voters seek a larger-than-life figure in their president.“In the United States, a president could be a movie actor like Reagan or a carnival performer like Trump,” said Mr. Olivier, who is also Ms. Le Pen’s brother-in-law. “In France, we elect the king.”But the two-round system compels much of the electorate to vote in the runoffs against candidates — and not for someone of their liking.“In the second round, the point is who is more repulsive,” Mr. Olivier said. “I believe Macron would be more rejected than Marine, but Zemmour would be much more rejected than Macron.”As France has grown more conservative in recent years, Mr. Macron has tacked right on many issues to try to grab a bigger electoral slice, especially among voters in the traditional center-right Republicans party.The Republicans, who have yet to select their presidential candidate, are now facing a new threat themselves, because Mr. Zemmour draws support from them as well as from the far right.In their own bid to attract far-right voters, many leaders on the traditional right have flirted with Mr. Zemmour in recent years, excusing or overlooking the fact that the writer has been sanctioned for inciting racial hatred.“The traditional right made a serious mistake that is now exploding in their face,” said Jean-Yves Camus, director of the Observatory of Radical Politics. “Because it’s long been in competition against the far right on issues like national identity, immigration and sovereignty, it kept winking at Zemmour.”A fan taking a photo with Mr. Zemmour at a book signing in Toulon last month.Eric Gaillard/ReutersNow the traditional right is looking for ways to distance itself from the TV star without alienating his supporters.Patrick Stefanini, a Republican who ran President Jacques Chirac’s successful 1995 campaign, said Mr. Zemmour was benefiting from divisions within the traditional right on issues like immigration.“Mr. Zemmour has turned immigration into the single key to understanding the difficulties facing French society,” said Mr. Stefanini, who is now leading the presidential bid of Valérie Pécresse, the head of the Paris region. “The Republicans are having a little trouble positioning themselves because the tendencies aren’t the same within the Republicans.”Mr. Stefanini attributed Mr. Zemmour’s rise partly to the traditional right’s failure to quickly decide on a candidate, and said he felt confident that the TV star’s ratings would peter out.But for now, many voters appear to be taking a look at Mr. Zemmour, who has been attracting huge crowds at campaign-like events across France as he promotes his latest book, “France Has Not Said Its Last Word Yet.”Last week, three residents of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, a wealthy suburb of Paris, came together to attend an event with Mr. Zemmour in the capital.Françoise Torneberg, who said she was in her 70s, said she liked Mr. Zemmour because “he gives a kick in the anthill,” she said.Her friend Andrée Chalmandrier, 69, said, “We love France but not the France of today.”“We’re not at home,” Ms. Chalmandrier said, adding that often when she shops in her suburb, “I’m the only French representative. There are four or five veiled women around me, who furthermore are extremely arrogant.”“And yet it’s a good neighborhood,” Ms. Torneberg said. “It’s not at all a working-class neighborhood.”Léontine Gallois contributed reporting. More

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      From TV to the French Presidency? Éric Zemmour Eyes Trump's Path

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      Éric Zemmour, a writer and TV celebrity known for his far-right nationalism, dominates political talk in France as he weighs a run for president.PARIS — France’s election season began in force this week, with candidates for the presidency launching their bids or holding campaign-style events. But the person who stole the show was not a candidate, or even a politician, but a right-wing writer and TV star channeling Donald J. Trump.Éric Zemmour became one of France’s top TV celebrities through his punditry on CNews, a Fox News-like channel, even as he was sanctioned twice for inciting racial hatred. This week he dominated news-media coverage in the kickoff to elections next April.A poll released Wednesday shows him rising among potential voters, beating out declared candidates like the mayor of Paris. While his share would appear to put the presidency out of reach, he could disrupt the long-anticipated scenario of a duel between President Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen of the far-right National Rally.In a well-orchestrated blitz that blurred the lines between media and politics, Mr. Zemmour, 63, one of France’s best-selling writers, released a new book Thursday titled “France Has Not Said Its Last Word Yet,” with a cover showing him standing with arms crossed in front of the French flag.In a brief telephone interview, Mr. Zemmour said that the cover had been modeled after Mr. Trump’s “Great Again,” the 2015 book that outlined his political agenda ahead of his election victory the following year, and that showed Mr. Trump in front of the American flag.The cover, Mr. Zemmour said, was not the only way Mr. Trump had inspired him. While Mr. Zemmour coyly deflected longstanding rumors of a possible candidacy, this month he has sent stronger signals that he may follow Mr. Trump in a leap from television to politics.“Obviously, there are common points,” Mr. Zemmour said. “In other words, someone who is completely from outside the party system, who never had a political career and who, furthermore, understood that the major concerns of the working class are immigration and trade.”In France’s two-round presidential election, the two top vote-getters in the first round meet in a runoff. Mr. Macron has aggressively courted the traditional, more moderate right in a strategy to produce a final showdown with Ms. Le Pen, whom he beat in 2017. But the presence of Mr. Zemmour, with his appeal across the right side of France’s political spectrum, could upset that calculus.Supporters of Mr. Zemmour have put up posters all over France, like these in Paris, urging him to run for president.Olivier Morin/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“French politics has become totally unpredictable,” said Nicolas Lebourg, a political scientist specializing in the right and far-right.“In this extremely fluid context, things could end with the election of a Republican president after Macron is defeated because Zemmour picks up a few points,” Mr. Lebourg added, referring to the Republicans, the party of the traditional right.The poll released Wednesday showed 10 percent of voters supporting Mr. Zemmour in the first round of the election, up from 7 percent a week earlier and 5 percent in July. He is one of the few candidates registering in the double digits, outscoring some from France’s established parties, including the Socialist mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo.According to a poll published on Monday, Mr. Zemmour is one of the few candidates to draw support from both the French traditional right and far-right — a point he underscored in the interview, saying that the far-right National Rally “puts off the French bourgeoisie,” while the Republicans “have only an extremely aging constituency and don’t connect with the young or the working class.”The poll also showed he is strong with the working class, men and young voters.“His straight talk appeals a lot to a generation that has been very disappointed by politicians’ lies and that is very mistrustful of the media,” said François de Voyer, a host and financial supporter of Black Book, a seven-month-old YouTube channel that has featured long interviews with Mr. Zemmour and other personalities, mostly from the right and far right. He said Mr. Zemmour gives the impression of “never hiding what he thinks, even if it means making controversial remarks,” adding, “I think it has the effect of creating trust.”Still, a run by Mr. Zemmour — whose hard-line views on immigration, Islam’s place in France and national identity are regarded as being to the right of Ms. Le Pen — would immediately inject into the election some of the most explosive issues in an increasingly polarized society.The Grand Mosque of Paris. Mr. Zemmour has said that Islam doesn’t share France’s core values. Andrea Mantovani for The New York TimesA longtime journalist for the conservative daily Le Figaro, Mr. Zemmour became a best-selling author in the past decade with books that described a France in decline, under threat from what he claimed was an Islam that doesn’t share France’s core values. His celebrity and influence rose to another level after he became the star of CNews in 2019, where, each evening in prime time, he expounded on his ideas to hundreds of thousands of viewers.He has portrayed himself as a truth-teller in a news media dominated by politically correct, left-leaning journalists. He has railed against the immigration of Muslim Africans, invoking the existential threat of a great replacement — a loaded term that even Ms. Le Pen has avoided — that will overwhelm France’s more established white and Christian population.Over the weekend, Mr. Zemmour said that, if he were president, he would ban “non-French” first names like Mohammed and Kevin, because they created obstacles to an assimilation process that used to turn immigrants into what he considered real French people.These kinds of comments have occasionally drawn the attention of French authorities. In May, the government broadcast regulator fined CNews 200,000 euros, about $236,000, for speech inciting racial hatred. On his show in September 2020, Mr. Zemmour had said that unaccompanied foreign minors should be expelled from France, calling them “thieves,” “killers” and “rapists.”Some presidential candidates from the Republicans dismissed Mr. Zemmour’s challenge. Xavier Bertrand, the leader of a region in northern France, said that Mr. Zemmour was a “great divider.” Valérie Pécresse, the head of the Paris region, said that he offered “no genuine proposals.”Mr. Lebourg, the political scientist, said that Mr. Zemmour’s “ethnic nationalism” was rooted in the ideology of the National Front of the 1990s, the predecessor to the National Rally that was led by Ms. Le Pen’s father, Jean-Marie Le Pen. More than any other individual, Mr. Zemmour succeeded over the years in imposing his vision on politicians in the traditional right, Mr. Lebourg said.Supporters say that is why Mr. Zemmour is the only candidate who can appeal to both the traditional right and far right.Mr. Zemmour signing copies of his book “The French Suicide” in 2015.Sebastien Salom-Gomis/Sipa, via Associated Press“Éric Zemmour opened the eyes of a certain number of people, including in my political family,” said Antoine Diers, a spokesman for Friends of Éric Zemmour, a group that is raising funds for a potential presidential bid. Mr. Diers is also a member of the Republicans and an official at the city hall of Plessis-Robinson, a suburb south of Paris.Because of Mr. Zemmour’s influence, Mr. Diers said, candidates of his party “finally take positions on immigration, on questions of identity and French culture.”Arno Humbert, another member of Friends of Éric Zemmour, said he left Ms. Le Pen’s National Rally in June after more than a decade, disillusioned by her efforts to widen her appeal by toning down her party’s positions in a strategy of “de-demonizing.”Mr. Zemmour was forced off the air on Monday after the government regulator ordered a limit on his broadcast time because he could be considered a player in national politics. He and his supporters were quick to cry censorship.Asked whether the decision would ultimately help him by burnishing his image as a truth teller among his supporters, he said, “Of course.”“It was a blessing in disguise,” he said.Léontine Gallois More