Les Républicains have to stake a claim somehow to being the Opposition (they have a numerical advantage in Parliament, though they are consistently out-polled par the far right), so they are opposing the government.

Also, they are as bitterly divided ideologically as the left (but have a better survival instinct so stay in the same party)... The majority strand are in awe of all the shit they never dared to try and Macron gets away with... but there are statists among them.

_{It is rightly acknowledged that people of faith have no monopoly of virtue - Queen Elizabeth II}