Prominent French center-left politician Raphael Glucksmann said on Tuesday the United States under President Donald Trump was no longer an ally of France and Europe, criticizing what he said was Washington's interference in European affairs.
"For 80 long years, the United States was a strategic ally of European democracies. Today, this administration is no longer our ally," Glucksmann, a member of the European Parliament and potential contender in France's 2027 presidential election, told the LCI 24-hour TV news channel.
"We are not US states, and therefore the US administration cannot interfere in European internal affairs, and that's what we must address," he added, calling on European leaders to show "an extremely firm attitude toward the American administration."
He did not elaborate on what he meant by interference, but a renewed push by Trump for US control over Greenland, which is a semi-autonomous territory of the EU member Denmark, has prompted severe tensions in recent months.
France has also been at odds with the US, with disputes ranging from trade to foreign policy and the war in Ukraine.
Tensions mounted on Monday as France restricted US Ambassador Charles Kushner's access to government ministers after he failed to respond to a summons over social media comments made by the US embassy on the killing of a French far Right activist.
Glucksmann has not officially announced whether he will seek the presidency but is widely regarded as one of the strongest contenders in the moderate left field.
A November Elabe poll showed him polling at 11%, double the support of Socialist Party leader Olivier Faure and ahead of former President François Hollande, though trailing far-right leader Marine Le Pen, centrist Edouard Philippe, and Jean-Luc Melenchon from the far-left.
In another poll released by Toluna Harris in October, Glucksmann gathered between 12% and 14%, same as Melenchon.
US envoy calls French minister after foreign ministry snub, source says
The US Ambassador to France, Charles Kushner, called France's foreign minister on Tuesday and said he did not want to interfere in the public debate, a day after snubbing a summons at the foreign ministry, a source close to the minister said.
Kushner was banned by Jean-Noel Barrot on Monday evening from meeting members of the French government after the foreign ministry had summoned him over comments made by the embassy on the killing of a French far-right activist last week.
Quentin Deranque was beaten to death in a fight with alleged hard-left activists earlier this month. The fallout from the incident has stoked anger and accusations across the political spectrum just over a year from the presidential election.
The US Embassy in France and the US State Department's Bureau of Counterterrorism said they were monitoring the case, warning on X that "violent radical leftism was on the rise" and should be treated as a public safety threat.
The US move was deemed by French authorities as interference in its own affairs. With ties already strained between Washington and some of its European allies, Paris sought to make clear this would not be accepted.
"The ambassador acknowledged this, expressed his intention not to interfere in our public debate, and reaffirmed the friendship between France and the United States," a source close to the minister said after Kushner called Barrot.
"The Minister and the Ambassador agreed to meet in the coming days to continue working towards a close bilateral relationship, which celebrates its 250th anniversary this year," the source said.
The source did not say whether Kushner, father of US President Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, would be given access to other government members in the immediate term.