France has maxed out on migrants. It’s a message that Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party has been pushing for years, but it’s one now endorsed by the government’s Justice Minister. In an interview with a newspaper at the weekend, Gérald Darmanin declared that the Republic has ‘reached the limits of our capacities for integration and assimilation’.
Darmanin believes that a three-year suspension of legal immigration is the answer, and in particular he wants a crackdown on the policy of family reunification. Introduced in 1976, the policy allowed migrants – mainly from North Africa – who came to France to work to also bring their family. ‘We must put an end to immigration as it exists today,’ said Darmanin.
A report last week estimated that there are more than a million illegal immigrants in France, many of whom have arrived from central Africa and war-torn countries of the Middle East. But it is legal immigration that has most unsettled the French this century.
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Last year, more than 380,000 non-European nationals received their first residence permit in France, an increase of 40,000 on 2024. The figures have climbed steadily since Emmanuel Macron came to power, and that is one reason why Darmanin’s remarks carry little authority. He is a Macron loyalist who, before being appointed Justice Minister in 20204, served as the Interior Minister for four years.
