Jean-Marie Le Pen has long been tricard to the media. Marine Le Pen it, occupies the plateaus. Does being a woman make the FN theses less dangerous?

The media birth of Marine Le Pen dates from the two-tower of 2002. Party cadres are aware that the party is scary. For them, something has to change. Jean-Marie Le Pen is in the second round, but it is his daughter who goes on the plateaus. And she likes it. She is already preparing for Jean-Marie Le Pen. The devolabilization company has started. She has mounted "Generations Le Pen", an association of thirties, her age at that time. Unsatisfied in the National Front National Historic Canal, she was elected president of the FN in 2011. Her score in the first round of the presidential 2012 creates the surprise: 17.9%. The other surprise? For the first time, nearly one in two FN voters is a woman. The true novelty of the FN of Marine Le Pen is the vote of the women.

Does it use the feminine as a political argument?

Yes, very clearly. "I'm a woman, I'm a mother, I'm a lawyer, mother of three children," she says in her campaign clip. Karine Lemarchand's M6 in October 2016, "An intimate ambition", made a huge buzz: the president of the FN overexposed her femininity. Her way of expressing that she is like you and me.

Why does Marine Le Pen target women so clearly?

When Le Pen father was in charge, the percentage of women who voted for him was very small. Today, they represent a real challenge for the presidential elections. Marine Le Pen wants to soften the image of this party, and its image to it. The scrub of his patronymic, complicated to wear, also participates in this strategy. It is called a Marine, it puts forward a woman's story. There is no more Le Pen in there . Within the party, some consider that the FN could change its name.

His position on abortion has recently evolved. Is this an opportunistic evolution on the electoral level?

The fight against the right to abortion has always been one of the ideological markers of the FN. For the past few months, two positions FN on the abortion have been relayed: that of Marion Maréchal Le Pen who defends the withdrawal of the abortion and that of Marine Le Pen which is in fact not so clear. She says she does not want to question the right to abortion, while denouncing her abusive practice. The FN is also positioning itself for the "cancellation of the abortion of comfort (sic) ", except in case of rape. Today, supporters of the repeal of the Veil law are in the minority within the FN: the generational renewal of the party and the ebbing of the traditionalist trend partly explains this evolution. However, the Lepenist formation is careful not to cut itself off from the Catholic vote. So it is with caution that the FN addresses this issue, while camping on a conservative vision of women. Feminism is above all an excuse for the FN. It serves as an alibi.

Feminism is above all an excuse for the FN. It serves as an alibi.

In the frontist cities where you investigated "The national illusion", do women vote FN for different reasons than men?

Not really. I think of Sabrina, of Beaucaire, who puts forward his anxiety for his daughter. But it justifies its NF vote by immigration, which crystallizes the motivations of both women and men, at municipal and national level. Only Dominique, a family assistant in Hénin-Beaumont, former communist elector, speaks of the abortion. She told us in the course of the investigation that if this position did not change, she would not vote for FN in 2017. On the other hand, for most of the women we met, identification with Marine Le Pen was significant.

In your wanderings in the three frontier towns, has the issue of women's rights been addressed by the voters you met?

No, apart from Dominique, the family assistant, an old woman on the left. But I often heard other words related to being a woman: "You can not wear miniskirts any more, you get whistled in the street by strangers." Xenophobia passes through the prism of the feminine: immigration and foreigners pose a danger for women. When in the year 2016 there were rape committed by migrants in Cologne, and Marine Le Pen, a politician, had exploited this crisis in this direction.

Reading your book is exciting and glamorous. What's ice, it's the rather nice and normal side of many of the people you've met. These people do not have heads of fachos.

The majority of the people we met are persuaded to support a new party, a new political figure. Marine Le Pen has changed some things: on the abortion, and on anti-Semitism, against which she positioned a month after her election to the party presidency by sweeping one of the Lepenist fundamentals with this statement appeared in The Point : "Everyone knows what happened in the camps and under what conditions. What happened there is the pinnacle of barbarism. "

The FN enters a new period by freeing itself from Holocaust denial.

A necessary step for a possible standardization. On the other hand, the main ideological markers persist. Certainly, some are evolving, knowing that nationalism and xenophobia remain at the center of the software of this party founded in 1972. Among the people who founded it, there are people in the past with militiamen, Waffen SS, and members of the New Order, a neo-fascist group.

What hit you most in your investigation?

The total social misery, exploited by this party. We heard intolerable words: "one can not any more of these migrants who take the place of the French", "They live in luxury hotels while we, galley like crazy". These voters feel a deep injustice and draw pseudo-information on social networks more than in the media. After the attacks, this xenophobic speech exploded and was liberated. What is impressive is that the FN voters of these cities believe in this illusion. I do not judge them. I called Sabrina to see if she had had her lodgings. She told me about what is going on concretely around her: "The center of Beaucaire is more alive, there are shops that open". And after these words, the xenophobic discourse emerged, echoing the Charter "Ma commune sans migrants", which Steeve Briois, Mayor of Hénin-Beaumont, and Julien Sanchez, Mayor of Beaucaire, signed.

Do not you fear that your book will give even more audience to the xenophobic theses of this party?

The question has been raised. How to stay fair? I am a historian, attached to the Institute of History of the present time. The difficulty was not to be caricatural. To adapt to the format of the bubbles, the interviews of several hours, without betraying the people who spoke to us. And there is an introduction, and the presentation of the problematic of each city. It is far from being a hagiographic work.   In my opinion, it is a rigorous historical work, which does not give pride of place to the FN.

It is still a blow of fertilization on the ideas of this party ...

I think we can talk about this party. We wanted to talk about it differently, adopting this form of photo-documentary. We wanted to show what the National Front is. When we close the book, the despair of these people is palpable. We also measure the huge job that the other parties should be doing.

"The national illusion", Valérie Igounet and Vincent Jarousseau; ed. The XXI arena. 22,90 €.