It's worth reading
this Twitter post of Antton Curutcharry, President of the Public Office for the Basque Language and Vice-President of the Linguistic Policy department in the North Basque Country. He's responsible for overseeing the two languages Basque and Gascon (Occitan) present in the North Basque Country.
The following translation was done using DeepL, because I can't be bothered translating it myself but with some slight modifications made by me.
"The language of the Republic is French... to the exclusion of all other territorial languages". This is how the Constitutional Council has been telling us since Friday that the Article 2 of the Constitution should be understood. Not to the exclusion of English anyway. Since our national identity cards are now going to be produced in bilingual format, French-English, without the government or the constitutionalists raising any eyebrows... And to think that I was told a hundred times that this Article 2 had been added to the fundamental law to protect the French language from the hegemonic omnipresence of English.. I didn't understand that the real threat was coming from our 51,000 Basque speakers... That's how France goes, strong with the weak, and weak with the strong. To crush the small and the moribund, but to accompany the giant along in its domination... in the name of the French cultural exception, I suppose... Today, the wound is deep. It hurts, it hurts a lot. The wound is raw. There are millions of us that are hurt by it. For my part, I claim here, loud and clear, my inalienable right to live, communicate, exchange in Basque. This right is outside the constitution, it is above it. It is my right as a human being. Inhabitant of this planet. Nobody will take it away from me. French is my mother tongue, Basque my father tongue. In the name of which text is it that only one of the two languages has the right to be used in school? But, what is the use of Basque language, we are often asked. I always answer: it is used for speaking. Like the French language. But today, by censoring the immersive system in education, the only system to provide children with a good quality Basque, the Nine condemn our poor languages, already weakened and marginalized, to be poorly mastered, poorly spoken. Sub-languages in tatters, which are exhibited for local folklore, because little by little, our streets no longer hear them sing... The Wise Men, powerful with the weak, condemn us to survive "in palliative care", as once was said by a mayor of a very small mountain municipality used to fight for everything, to organize survival... I refuse. The Basque language pre-existed the French language. It has seen the arrival, then the extinction of Latin. It has survived all the regimes but is now in great difficulty. Through the National Education, the Republic has a historical debt towards the Basque language, and towards all the territorial languages which fight and struggle for life today. Children passing through the immersive system, associative, as well as public, are today engineers, journalists, doctors, lawyers, as well as craftsmen, traders, farmers, teachers. They live and express themselves perfectly well in Basque and in French. An out-of-touch minister, a Jacobin nationalist, an ideologue, reinforced by the iniquitous decision of the Constitutional Council, has managed to undermine what decades of militant struggles, political negotiations and institutional partnerships have built. This is totally unacceptable. We will have to find solutions, and not half measures. Because we will not back down. And there are many of us. And angry.
Ignore the part about Basque being older than French, which is not true. It is true that Basque has been in the geographical location where it currently is for far longer than French has been, but Basque as a language isn't older than the French language.
The Wise Men is a translation of the 'Sages', the name the media gives to the 9 members of the Constitutional Council.
It's noteworthy that the highest responsable member for linguistic policy in the North Basque Country feels that there is a serious, credible threat against the Basque language and is publically making a statement about it. And not using nice words either. There's a rally that's going to be held France wide by speakers of French languages and anyone who is interested on the 29th to protest about this recent decision. Make your voice heard.