French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin has called for the deportation of all migrants who commit serious crimes no matter what their legal status in the country is.
Interior Minister Darmanin proposed relaxing the conditions to deport serious criminals from France during an interview with French media.
“Today, a foreigner who has committed serious acts is not expellable as long as he meets certain conditions, such as arriving on the national territory before the age of 13,” Darmanin said and added, “We want to allow the expulsion of any foreigner found guilty of a serious act by the courts, regardless of his condition of presence on the national territory,” Dernières Nouvelles d’Alsace reports.
A new law proposing to relax the deportation of criminal migrants is expected to be presented at the beginning of the school year, and Minister Darmanin said the government of President Emmanuel Macron was willing to discuss the issue with various other parties in parliament as the government failed to win a majority in this year’s parliamentary elections.
Darmanin did not state that the government would work with the far-left France Insoumise or Marine Le Pen’s populist National Rally (RN) on the issue, stating the government would work with centrist parties on the right and the left instead.
Marine Le Pen, however, has expressed support for the relaxing of the deportation rules, telling broadcaster BFMTV, “It’s yes, 100 times yes,” and added, “We will sign with both hands. We will even improve its text, in my opinion, to allow it to be more effective, more efficient.”
During her presidential campaign, Le Pen proposed a major overhaul of the French immigration system and called for a referendum that would have also facilitated more deportations from the country.
A tougher migration policy is likely to be popular among the French public as well, as a survey from last month showed that as many as six in ten French say that country has seen too much immigration.