An announcement that did not fail to find imitators on the other side of the Atlantic. While France itself must consider cutting its budget, several right-wing figures congratulated Elon Musk on his promotion. “I dreamed of it, Musk is going to do it”, reacted on X Valérie Pécresse, the president of the Île-de-France region. More surprisingly, the Minister of Civil Service, Guillaume Kasbarian, also congratulated Elon Musk “for accepting this great challenge”. And added: “I look forward to sharing with you best practices to fight against excess bureaucracy, reduce paperwork, and rethink public organizations to improve efficiency.” public officials."
Remarks that quickly sparked indignation from the left and unions. “We thought that Trumpism in France was limited to the far right. We were wrong. We have Guillaume Kasbarian, the French Elon Musk without the electricity,” criticized the leader of the socialists, Olivier Faure, on X. “Better and better, we clearly have an aficionado of Trump's action and the libertarian Musk in government. A comment by Michel Barnier on this praise in English from a supporter of the total destruction of the “state” ? also reacted the rebellious deputy, Eric Coquerel on X. “We have never experienced this, it is of an unheard-of violence”, reacted the AFP on the UFFA-CFDT side. Same story with other unions.
Faced with the outcry, government spokesperson Maud Bregeon was keen to put the minister's remarks into perspective on Wednesday, denying any “convergence” between the French government and US President Donald Trump. “There is no need to overinterpret. My colleague Guillaume is extremely mobilized for years on the need to simplify and debureaucratize the French administration. He congratulated his counterpart and “that's it,” she assured.