Petition to Remove CNews From French Broadcasting Tops 600,000 Signatures

A surge after the October 23 attack

Lucas Massoni, a private citizen, submitted the petition to the National Assembly's platform on June 10, 2026. According to i24NEWS, it attracted little attention for months before support surged in late October.

DW reported that signatures increased after an October 23 attack in Trappes and La Verriere, west of Paris, killed a Frenchman of Congolese origin. One person died and seven were wounded. French media reported that the suspect regularly watched CNews.

Kévin Tessier, a 39-year-old Frenchman, has been charged with murder and attempted murder. National anti-terrorism prosecutor Olivier Christen said the suspect deliberately fired at people he perceived as Muslim, African or North African. According to the prosecutor, the suspect said he was "targeting individuals who appeared to be Muslim, African, or North African."

The petition seeks to remove CNews from French broadcasting, describing the channel as a "propaganda machine" rather than a source of information. Its critics say it devotes extensive airtime to anti-immigrant rhetoric and takes a hard line on immigration and crime.

What the signature threshold means

The campaign has cleared the numerical threshold for a possible National Assembly debate. Eligibility requires at least 500,000 signatures from 30 departments or overseas collectivities, and the Assembly's governing bodies must still approve the procedure, according to i24NEWS. A parliamentary commission must first review the petition and decide whether to recommend a debate.

A previous petition illustrates why the signature count alone is not decisive. BFMTV reported that a petition opposing the law on the presumption of legitimate use of weapons by police forces also exceeded 500,000 signatures. The Law Commission dismissed it in July, and no floor debate followed.

France Inter reported that even if lawmakers discuss the CNews petition in the chamber, the debate would not be followed by a vote. It therefore could not, by itself, shut down the channel.

The petition also points to a separate regulatory avenue: it says Arcom can unilaterally withdraw a digital terrestrial television, or TNT, broadcasting agreement for repeated violations. France's TNT frequencies were recently renewed for 10 years. Le Parisien described withdrawal as unlikely.

Regulatory scrutiny and CNews' response

The petition cites a cumulative 27 formal warnings and 630,000 euros in fines imposed on CNews by audiovisual regulator Arcom since 2019. In June 2026, Arcom also formally ordered the channel to remedy what it considered a clear, persistent imbalance in the range of views expressed on air, BFMTV reported. The notice singled out coverage of the supposed threat posed to French society by immigration and Islam.

CNews has denied promoting far-right positions or racist stereotypes, presenting its approach as a defense of freedom of expression. The channel declined to address the campaign, calling it a "political petition."

The broadcaster has also faced accusations of airing racist remarks about Bally Bagayoko, the mayor of Saint-Denis, Paris' largest suburb. Bagayoko, a Frenchman of Malian descent, has become prominent for defending local students against police violence during recent protests.

Earlier this year, France expelled Russian news pundit Xenia Fedorova, who had been accused of spreading Kremlin propaganda on CNews.

Political pressure on a leading news channel

Owned by conservative French billionaire Vincent Bollore, CNews has grown from a 1% market share at its 2017 launch to become France's most-watched free-to-air news channel last year. Critics have compared it with Fox News in the United States and accused it of increasingly aligning with Marine Le Pen's far-right National Rally.

National Rally leads polling ahead of the 2027 presidential election. Le Pen has promised to privatize France's public broadcasting system, a policy that could benefit CNews.

Two Green lawmakers have urged the lower house to withdraw the channel's broadcasting accreditation, saying the measure would defend "democracy" against "racist hatred." Opposition has also taken to the streets: at a rally in Aubervilliers, a northern Paris suburb, last week, protesters displayed posters saying "CNews kills."

During nationwide demonstrations over the cost of living on October 17, protesters hurled projectiles at CNews' Paris headquarters and broke its windows.