Emmanuel Macron came to French politics in 2017 not merely to become president, but seemingly to recreate France. Traditional parties were outdated, the political class had lost its credibility, and society was demanding change. Macron positioned himself to fill that void as a new type of leader — “neither right nor left,” standing above the old political world, capable of making rational decisions, understanding the economy and leading Europe behind him.
In France, his governing model was not accidentally dubbed the “Jupiter presidency.” The logic was clear: the president would not be an ordinary participant in the political system; he would stand above the system, determine its direction, while others would implement his will.
Almost a decade later, what remains of that grand construction?
An 18% trust rating in the presidency. More than €3.5 trillion in public debt. Debt reaching 117.5% of GDP. Political successors trying to distance themselves from Macron’s legacy. Advisers leaving the Élysée Palace. And, finally, accounts gathered by French journalists from within Macron’s own administration: a hesitant president, the informal influence of his inner circle, and an Élysée Palace gradually losing its political weight.
Macron promised to transform France. In the end, what changed first was the myth created around Macron himself.
Was “Jupiter” merely a façade?
In May 2026, French journalist Florian Tardif published a book about Emmanuel and Brigitte Macron titled Almost a Perfect Couple. The significance of the book lies not in its portrayal of the presidential couple’s personal relationship. Based on testimonies from former ministers, advisers and people who worked with the Élysée Palace, Tardif attempts to uncover the behind-the-scenes mechanisms of Macron’s rule.
The picture that emerges almost completely dismantles the “Jupiter” image presented to the French in 2017. For years, Macron portrayed himself as a leader who understood complex problems faster than others, managed the political system from above and was capable of making decisive choices at critical moments. The reality, however, appears to be the opposite: Macron was reportedly a political figure who became lost in every detail, repeatedly returned to the same issue before making a decision, hesitated and sometimes prolonged the decision-making process himself.
Thus, behind the “decisive Jupiter” image sold to the French for years emerges a hesitant president who delayed decisions and became trapped by the political myth he had created around his own intellectual superiority.
The issue is not merely Macron’s personality. The problem is that he deliberately centered French governance around himself. The political system was built not on compromise, collective decision-making and a balance between institutions, but on the assumption that the president supposedly knew better than everyone else.
In such a model, the president’s hesitation is no longer merely a personal weakness — it becomes a weakness of the entire state mechanism.
This is where Macron’s government fell into the trap it had created itself. By pushing parliament and political intermediaries into the background, he concentrated decision-making in the Élysée. But now it is becoming apparent how unstable that very center of power is.
The “Jupiter” image was not strong leadership. It was political staging.
So who is running France?
A more serious issue raised in Tardif’s book concerns Brigitte Macron’s role at the Élysée. Emmanuel Macron’s wife is portrayed not simply as an emotional source of support, but as someone capable of changing the president’s mind and influencing certain political matters. The book says some ministers used Brigitte Macron as an intermediary to influence the president and that her position also played a role in the referendum issue in 2025.
In France, the authority of a minister is defined. The legal status of the prime minister is defined. The mandate of a member of parliament is defined. The function of a civil servant is defined.
But the political influence of the president’s personal circle has neither a mandate, nor accountability to parliament, nor accountability to voters.
Macron likes explaining to other countries how institutional democracy should work. But institutional democracy has a simple rule: whoever holds power must also bear responsibility.
When personal relationships prevail over institutional mechanisms in shaping decisions, the issue is no longer “presidential government” but palace politics.
82% of French people do not trust the president
The most damaging figures concerning Macron were not produced by his opponents. They were published by France’s own political research center.
According to the 2026 Political Trust Barometer by CEVIPOF at Sciences Po, trust in the President of the Republic stands at just 18%. In 2025, the figure was 23%. Trust in politics stands at 22%, political parties at 15%, and the National Assembly at 20%. Trust in mayors, meanwhile, stands at 60%.
CEVIPOF specifically emphasized that trust in the president and political parties has fallen to the lowest levels recorded since measurements began in 2009.
Macron’s political tragedy is hidden in these figures.
In 2017, he came to power precisely as a product of distrust in traditional political institutions. The French were told that the old parties had failed, that old politics was over and that Macron would build a new system.
A decade later, the new system cannot produce trust either.
An even more ironic situation has emerged: citizens trust their local mayor — someone they see in their community — more than three times as much as they trust the president.
Macronism did not bring the French back into politics. It transformed political power into a structure that was more distant, more centralized and more closely identified with one person’s personality.
If only 18% trust a president, there is no political meaning left in the explanation that “the people do not understand me.”
Maybe the problem is not the people.
Maybe the problem is the president.
The €3.5 trillion bill of the economic genius
The second major myth created around Macron was his economic competence. A former investment banker, former economy minister and technocrat who understood the language of markets — Macron’s biography was an important part of his political image.
The figures from 2026, however, treat that image harshly.
According to France’s official statistics agency, INSEE, at the end of the first quarter of 2026, France’s public debt had reached €3.5361 trillion. In just three months, the debt increased by €75.6 billion. Public debt stood at 117.5% of GDP.
If Macron was willing to take credit for achievements in 2017, he cannot distance himself from responsibility for the results in 2026.
The diagnosis from France’s Court of Auditors is even more severe.
In 2025, the Cour des comptes said the reduction in the budget deficit was achieved largely through approximately €23 billion in tax increases. The institution noted that France’s public finances remained among the worst in the eurozone.
It forecasts that public debt will rise to 118.6% of GDP by the end of 2026. It also warned that debt-servicing costs could reach approximately €74 billion that year and rise above €100 billion by 2029.
This is no longer abstract economic statistics.
€74 billion in interest payments is not a school.
It is not a hospital.
It is not new infrastructure.
It is not a new industrial facility.
It is the price of past debt.
Macron’s favorite political stage is not France’s borders but Europe. For years, he presented himself as one of the key political figures shaping Europe’s strategic future.
But strategic leadership is not created merely by delivering grand speeches at the Sorbonne. To be a leader, you need an economic base, political stability and the trust of partners.
One figure in the French Court of Auditors’ 2026 report puts Macron’s entire “European leadership” rhetoric into perspective in a single sentence: yields on France’s 10-year government bonds have risen over the past two years and, in February 2026, came very close to the levels of debt-burdened Italy and Greece.
“Jupiter” lectures Europe about fiscal discipline.
The market, meanwhile, demands a higher risk premium from France.
When politics has to choose between rhetoric and the balance sheet, markets do not listen to speeches.
The problem is not the scale of the ambition.
The problem is who will pay the bill.
His own successors deliver the harshest verdict
To understand Macron’s political situation, there is no need to look at what Marine Le Pen, Jean-Luc Mélenchon or other opposition leaders are saying.
It is enough to look at his own political camp.
Former Macron ministers have documented the president’s failures in their books. At least ten of Macron’s close associates have left their positions at the Élysée Palace this year.
Gabriel Attal and Édouard Philippe, who served as prime ministers during Macron’s presidency and were his protégés, are trying to distance themselves from his legacy.
By July, the issue had already become an open problem for the 2027 campaign.
On the one hand, Attal and Philippe are successors to certain policies of the Macron era. On the other hand, they are trying to demonstrate to voters that they have moved beyond a decade of rule in order to present themselves as agents of “change.”
The public perception that Macronism failed to find real solutions to France’s problems has become a burden on their candidacies.
It is difficult to imagine a greater political irony.
In 2017, everyone wanted to demonstrate their closeness to Macron.
In 2026, his political successors have to explain how close they actually are to him.
They are not running from a successful political legacy.
They are competing to become its successor.
When a legacy becomes a burden, successors begin looking for distance.
Macron’s real legacy
Emmanuel Macron said he would renew France.
He dismantled the traditional parties, but did not build a more trusted political system in their place.
Trust in the presidency fell to 18%.
He presented economic competence as one of his main advantages, yet France ended the first quarter of 2026 with €3.536 trillion in public debt.
He offered strategic leadership in Europe, yet France’s borrowing costs approached the levels of Italy and Greece.
He presented his political movement as a model for the future, but toward the end of his rule, the most prominent figures in that movement began calculating how far they needed to distance themselves from Macron’s legacy to secure their own futures.
The “Jupiter” presidency was supposed to end differently.
Macron wanted to leave behind a stronger France, a renewed political system and undisputed leadership in Europe.
Instead, France is approaching 2027 with a fragmented political landscape, heavy public debt and deep distrust of central government.
Macron identified power so closely with his own personality over the course of a decade that, in the end, France’s problems also became identified with his personality.
Perhaps this is the greatest paradox of his presidency.
In 2017, Emmanuel Macron told France: the old system does not work, and I am coming.
In 2026, the question that has emerged is harsher:
Macron is leaving. But who will pay the bill he has left France after ten years?