Sandrine Rousseau in the sights of the recreational hunting lobby: 57,000 demand resignation, 500,000 demand a hunting halt

French Green Party MP Sandrine Rousseau remains under pressure following her call to resist recreational hunting.

A resignation petition, launched by the president of a fishing association, reached 56,867 verified signatures on 17 September. Rousseau accuses her opponents of distracting from the crucial question: what happens to wild animals that have survived wildfires, drought and heat, only to find themselves back in recreational hunters' sights shortly afterwards?

The dispute over Sandrine Rousseau is escalating. Nearly four weeks after her speech at the UniREVcité near Tours, a petition calling for the MP's resignation continues to gather signatures.

Who is behind the resignation petition

The petition «Pour la démission de Sandrine Rousseau de son mandat de députée» was put online on Change.org on 27 August. It was launched by Anthony Cuoq, president of the Association des pêcheurs de la Plaine de Valence. The number of signatures rose quickly: after a few days it stood at around 11,500, by 2 September over 28,000, and by 6 September, according to Le Monde, 47,000. On Thursday, 17 September, the petition had 56,867 verified signatures, with almost 1,000 added on that day alone.

The petition text itself acknowledges that French law contains no mechanism by which citizens could end a deputy's mandate through a petition. It is thus a political pressure tool. Regional hunting associations, such as that of the Ariège department, openly called on their members to sign.

What Rousseau had said

The trigger was remarks made on 23 August. At UniREVcité, the summer university of Aymeric Caron's movement «Révolution écologique pour le vivant», Rousseau spoke about the imminent opening of the recreational hunting season following a summer of heatwaves, drought and forest fires. She called for people to oppose this opening and to go in large numbers into forests, rural areas and onto footpaths: «C’est parce que nous serons là, debout, face à eux, physiquement, qu’enfin ils prendront conscience de la réalité de ce que nous sommes.» In essence: Because we will be there, standing upright, physically facing them, they will finally understand who we are.

The Fédération nationale des chasseurs (FNC) subsequently announced a criminal complaint and contacted the President of the National Assembly. Several regional hunting associations followed suit, notably in Ariège and Gard. Two members of parliament, including Matthias Renault of the Rassemblement National, involved the public prosecutor's office on the basis of Article 40 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. We covered the background to this in «France: criminal complaint filed over call against recreational hunting».

Political sharpness is not yet a criminal offence

Whether the speech can be construed as a punishable incitement remains open. For a conviction of public incitement, French law generally requires a sufficiently concrete call to commit a specific offence. Rousseau's choice of words is sharp, but can equally be read as a call for visible, non-violent presence in hunting areas. Anyone who enters forest and field to bear witness there is doing nothing different from walkers, mushroom pickers or hikers.

The hunting lobby treats this distinction not as a legal but as a political question. The pattern is familiar from France: As we showed in «Recreational hunters as victims? Hunting criticism and figures from France», the FNC likes to portray itself as a threatened minority, even as millions of wild animals are killed every year. And how FNC president Willy Schraen stages the season opening is shown in «Willy Schraen and the opening: pride in killing».

Rousseau: «They don't want to talk about wild animals»

Rousseau rejects the resignation demand. Speaking to Le Monde, she described the petition as «une façon de détourner le débat» — a way of diverting the debate — and added: «Ils ne veulent pas que l'on parle de l'état de la faune sauvage.» They don't want people talking about the state of wild animals. Speaking to Actu.fr, she called the mobilisation against her a «totalitarisme rural», a rural totalitarianism.

Her criticism touches on a real conflict. Recreational hunting continues to be treated as a normal leisure activity in France, even when non-human animals can barely find refuge, food or water after fires.

Almost ten times as many people are calling for a hunting halt

While the resignation petition reached just under 57,000 signatures, a second petition is many times larger. "Pas de fusils sur les cendres" (No guns on the ashes) was launched on Change.org on 14 July, initiated by Bruno Valentin, who runs an animal shelter in the Cantal. It is addressed directly to President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu. On 5 September it counted over 485,000 signatures, and on 15 September it passed the 500,000 mark — one day after the season opening in most départements.

The petition calls for a complete ban on recreational hunting in all forest areas burnt in the summer of 2026, protection zones around the burnt areas so that wild animals can retreat to unharmed regions without being pursued there, and a moratorium of at least three years to allow vegetation, food chains and reproductive cycles to recover. The text describes the surviving wild animals as «épuisés, affamés, privés de leurs abris et de leurs points d'eau»: exhausted, starving, without shelter or watering places.

The government delegates, the statistics gloss over reality

The government rejects a nationwide moratorium. Mathieu Lefèvre, ministre délégué for the ecological transition, referred the prefects to Article R.424-3 of the Environmental Code, which allows recreational hunting to be suspended in the event of a disaster, leaving the decision up to them. On 3 September he announced that 23 départements had restricted recreational hunting over the summer.

The figure sounds like decisive action, but it is broadly defined. Every measure that restricted recreational hunting either directly or through the closure of forest areas was counted. This also includes access bans due to acute fire risk, which have nothing to do with wildlife protection. The animal welfare organisation ASPAS had already asked the prefects of 44 départements for hunting suspensions on 17 August.

The example of Var: closed season for the next hunting season

The Var département shows what such protective measures look like in practice. Following the fires at Gros Bessillon and Les Arcs-Taradeau, which together burned around 6,300 hectares at Gros Bessillon alone, the prefect ordered a one-year closure of the burned forest areas in nine municipalities starting on 13 September. However, drive hunting of wild boars remains permitted, justified by damage to agriculture.

What is remarkable is who wanted the closure: the département's hunting association had requested it itself. The stated aim is to allow small game to repopulate the burned areas. Meanwhile, recreational hunters from the affected areas are being redirected to other forests. What is being protected here is not the individual non-human animal for its own sake, but the future population, which is meant to be opened up for killing again later. A glance across the border shows that things can be done differently: in «Fire, Heat, Shotguns: Why France Refuses What Portugal Has Long Since Regulated» we described the binding rules in Portugal.

The real question

The resignation petition against Sandrine Rousseau is mobilising support, but it does not answer any of the questions raised by the summer of 2026. Why is recreational hunting of non-human animals continuing when they have just survived fires, extreme heat and the loss of their habitats? Why is a wild animal fleeing a burnt forest allowed to be pursued again in the next intact patch of woodland? And why does a politician who asks these questions become the target of a nationwide campaign?

The counter-mobilisation shows one thing above all: as soon as recreational hunting is no longer treated as an untouchable tradition but as a practice that can be changed, its organised circles respond with maximum outrage. Yet the more than 500,000 signatures for «Pas de fusils sur les cendres» make clear where the majority stands. They are not demanding anything radical for wild animals after fire and drought — just a breathing space.