French First Lady ramps up online catfight with president’s ex

FRANCE’S new First Lady Valerie Trierweiler warned her partner, president François Hollande, “you’ll see what I’m capable of” before firing off a tweet that could wreck the political career of his former wife, it was claimed yesterday.

She is said to have been furious the president was publicly backing his former partner and predecessor as socialist presidential candidate, Ségolène Royal, for a seat in parliament. So she posted a Twitter message pledging her support for her male opponent.

Le Point magazine journalist Anna Cabana said Elysée Palace insiders had told her: “She was deeply hurt that he had not consulted her over his support for Ms Royal. She told him ‘You’ll see what I’m capable of’, then a few hours later she sent the tweet.”

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Ms Royal, mother to Mr Hollande’s four children, reacted with fury over the message posted online on Tuesday night.

Ms Royal, 58, told a political meeting in La Rochelle on Wednesday night: “I did not want to react yesterday because the blow was so violent. But that does not mean I didn’t feel mortified by it, I am not a robot.

“I demand respect as the mother of a family whose children hear what is said.

“I didn’t want to respond in the heat of the moment because I am fighting a tough political battle and I need to stay in a good state of mind.

“As a woman politician, I demand to be respected, just as the political support the president is giving me as a candidate should also be respected.”

The mounting tension between the president’s former and current lovers comes after Ms Trierweiler’s sparked outrage across France.

In an extraordinary break with protocol, it even forced prime minister Jean-Marc Ayrault to give Ms Trierweiler, 47, a public warning.

He told France-Info radio: “Her role is a discreet one which is not easy to pin down. Everyone should know their place.”

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One French newspaper described the tweet from the woman dubbed The Rottweiler as a “Scud missile” fired at the woman who shared her partner’s life for 30 years.

Another said it exposed the president as “a man sandwiched between two feisty women”.

Magazine Le Nouvel Observateur said it was now “like Dallas at the Elysée Palace”.

Twice-divorced Ms Trierweiler, a political journalist for more than two decades at glossy magazine Paris-Match, yesterday refused to apologise for the tweet and said it was “idiotic” to suggest that she was jealous of Ms Royal.

And she insisted it was “unfair” to brand her a traitor for backing rival socialist candidate Olivier Falorni in the parliamentary vote this Sunday..

She told RTL radio: “To speak of jealousy in this business is idiotic. I see no muddying of public and private lives here. It has got out of all proportion and things should be got back into perspective.”

Mr Hollande and Ms Royal lived together for 30 years until he left her for Ms Trierweiler in 2005.

Magazine L’Express wrote of Ms Trierweiler last month: “For her, Ségolène Royal remains the object of profound and irrational jealousy that complicates political relations. It is almost impossible to even speak about the woman in front of her, even from a purely political angle. It’s stronger than she is.”

A Socialist party insider described her backing of Mr Falorni as a “devastating blow” for an “infuriated” Ms Royal.

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