But the result puts France in uncharted territory, as it has never had a parliament without a dominant party. Much of what happens next will depend on the highly unpopular president, Emmanuel Macron.
A coalition of the French left has won the most seats in the second round of a high-stakes legislative election, fending off the rise of the far right but failing to secure an absolute majority.
According to the final results, the left-wing alliance of the New Popular Front, formed only three weeks ago, won 182 seats.
289 seats are needed to obtain a majority in the National Assembly, which has 577 seats.
President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist Ensemble coalition came in second with 168 seats while the far-right National Rally, widely expected to win after coming out on top in the first round, finished with 143 seats.
After the first results were published shortly after polls closed, National Rally leader Jordan Bardella castigated what he called “the alliance of dishonor” and said it was pushing France toward the far left.
“Depriving millions of French people of seeing their ideas brought to power will never be a viable destiny for France. Tonight, by deliberately taking it upon himself to paralyze our institutions, Emmanuel Macron has pushed the country towards uncertainty and instability,” he told his supporters in Paris.
Marine Le Pen, leader of the National Rally, who plans to run in the 2027 presidential election, said the results meant France would be “at an impasse”.
“It’s unfortunate, we’re going to lose another year, another year of illegal immigration, another year of loss of purchasing power, another year of explosion of insecurity in our country. But if that’s what it takes, well, that’s what it takes,” she said.
The leader of La France Insoumise, the largest party in the winning coalition, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, said the result was a clear rejection of the unpopular Emmanuel Macron and that the president should call on the New Popular Front to govern.
“The president must bow down and accept this defeat without seeking to circumvent it in any way. The prime minister must go. He never received the confidence of the National Assembly. He has just managed the campaign lost by his camp, and he received a massive popular motion of censure,” he said.
Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said Sunday evening that he would present his resignation to Macron on Monday morning, saying that “tonight, a new era begins.”
What happens now?
This is uncharted territory for modern France, which has never had a parliament without a dominant party.
A weakened Macron could seek to come to an agreement with the moderate left to form a joint government, but France has no tradition of such arrangements. A deal could take the form of an informal, loose alliance, which would likely be fragile.
And already, the leaders of the New Popular Front are pushing Macron to give their alliance the first chance to form a government and to propose a prime minister to share power with him.
If he fails to reach an agreement, Macron could appoint a government of experts independent of political parties to handle the day-to-day work of keeping one of Europe’s largest countries running. But that would require parliamentary approval. And the first session with the new members of the National Assembly will take place on July 18.
Meanwhile, no personality has yet been identified as prime minister. Emmanuel Macron’s office has indicated that it will wait until the new National Assembly is formed before taking “the necessary decisions”.
