Amid fears of more violence, France's Macron abandons fuel tax rise

Catherine Garcia, The Week US's avatar
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French President Emmanuel Macron has decided against increasing the fuel tax, following several violent protests across the country.

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe told lawmakers "the tax is now abandoned" in the 2019 budget. Protests against the tax started in November, with violent rioting in Paris last Saturday. Four people have died in the protests, and before Macron scrapped the tax, one of the movement's leaders warned "there will be chaos" if a protest planned for Saturday went ahead.

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US
Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.