The conspiracy theory being promoted by the radical left, led by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the head of the France Unbowed party and a presidential candidate, holds that security authorities failed to contain the demonstrators and maintain order. This shortcoming was acknowledged by French Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez, whose resignation President Emmanuel Macron rejected. According to this theory, the failure allowed groups intent on causing destruction to operate wherever they pleased, with the aim of undermining the growing protest movement by turning public opinion against it, giving political authorities and the administration grounds to restrict demonstrations across the country, and stirring up hostility toward Mélenchon. The ultimate objective, the theory suggests, is to keep him out of the decisive second round of the presidential election scheduled for next May.
