Overview
- Jean‑Luc Mélenchon told La France insoumise militants in Paris that he had "changed his mind" and called his past opposition to the veil a "grave error," remarks he made at a conference reported on Wednesday, September 2.
- He said the reversal came after direct conversations with women who wear the veil and with women of different beliefs, and that those meetings convinced him the previous view was wrong.
- The statement came as the Rassemblement National proposed penalizing public wearing of the veil, making the issue a live campaign topic and forcing parties to take clearer positions.
- Critics say Mélenchon’s shift abandons the left’s traditional universalist form of laïcité, while his supporters portray it as a corrective against the stigmatization of Muslim citizens.
- Mélenchon also urged his supporters at the same conference to stop replying to opponents with insults on social media, and the coverage traces his earlier 2010 and 2017 remarks to show how his stance has evolved over more than a decade.