French President Emmanuel Macron was pelted with an egg while visiting with a crowd in Lyon on Monday.
Macron was walking around at the SIRHA food and hospitality fair in Lyon when he was egged by an apparent protester in the crowd. Video of the incident showed Macron was walking through a busy crowd when someone in the back of the crowd threw an egg that bounced off the French president’s shoulder.
Florence Lago, a journalist for the French publication Lyon Mag, told CNN that the egg “bounced off Macron’s shoulder and burst on the floor right in front of me.”
After the egg bounced off Macron, a bodyguard could be seen moving forward to shield the president, while two more people in Macron’s security detail pulled the apparent protester aside.
An Elysée Palace spokesperson downplayed the incident in an interview with CNN.
“The President walked around for two hours, he was warmly welcomed and everything was calm. There is nothing to say about it because it did not disrupt his walking around,” the spokesperson said. “I was next to the President, I can tell you there is no story.”
According to security sources who spoke with Le Parisien, the egging attack was carried out by “an extreme left activist.”
Left-wing French politician Jean-Luc Mélenchon condemned the egging attack on Monday and said problems with Macron should be resolved at the ballot box. The French presidential election is set to take place in April 2022.
Monday’s incident is not the first time Macron has been targeted with an egg.
In 2017, then-candidate Macron was pelted with another egg during a visit to the annual Paris Agricultural Fair. That time the egg burst on his head.
In June of this year, Macron was again targeted, this time by a man who stood in the crowd and slapped the French president as he came by to shake hands.
Sky News reported the man arrested for the June offense, Damien Tarel, 28, received a four-month prison sentence and an additional 14-month suspended sentence for the slap.
As part of his sentence, Tarel was also banned from ever holding public office and from owning weapons for five years.
In court, Tarel described himself as right-wing “patriot” and a member of the yellow vest economic protest movement. He said the June attack was unplanned and prompted by anger at France’s perceived “decline.”
