And after she got elected in 2019, she made financial services firm Blackrock a favorite punching bag. Along with The Left group’s Manon Aubry, Lalucq campaigned against the European Commission’s selection of the asset management company to draft a report on sustainable investment.
Government debt
Before her conversion to politics, Lalucq was an academic first and foremost, one interested in social and political questions. Ecology — and its intersection with the economy — looms large in her past. She was one of the founding members of, and until 2019 helped lead, the Veblen Institute, a foundation dedicated to economic and policy issues tied to the green transition.
Now 45, she was first elected to the Parliament with the political party Place Publique, which she co-leads along with Raphaël Glucksmann.
A move that likely didn’t win her many friends among her northern European colleagues was when she called on the European Central Bank to write off government debt in response to the coronavirus pandemic.
Legislatively speaking, Lalucq’s focus in her previous term was on taxation, where she was the lead negotiator on two files. The MEP also spearheaded a citizen’s initative aimed at increasing taxes on the ultra-rich.
She was also the lead lawmaker for ESG (environmental, social and governance) ratings rules in the European Union — where, according to officials involved in the negotiations, she was seen as a competent negotiator, rigorous on technical detail. And she was co-president of the Green New Deal inter-group.
