Macron Struggles to Contain Marine Le Pen’s Far-Right National Rally: NPR

PARIS — The crucial runoff election for metropolitan France takes place Sunday. It could deliver a historic victory for Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally and her inward-looking, anti-immigrant vision, or produce a parliament with no absolute majority and a political impasse.

French President Emmanuel Macron took a huge risk by dissolving parliament and calling elections after his centrists lost the European elections on June 9.

Early elections in the nuclear-armed country will influence the war in Ukraine, global diplomacy and Europe’s economic stability, and they will almost certainly weaken Macron for the remaining three years of his presidency.

The first round, on June 30, saw the strongest ever progress by the National Rally, a nationalist and anti-immigration party led by Marine Le Pen.

Just over 49 million people are registered to vote in the election that will determine which party controls the 577-member National Assembly, the lower house of France’s parliament, and who will be prime minister. If support for Macron’s narrow centrist majority erodes further, he will be forced to share power with parties that oppose most of his pro-business and pro-European Union policies.

Voters at a Paris polling station were acutely aware of the long-term consequences for France and beyond.

“It is individual freedoms, tolerance and respect for others that are at stake today,” says Thomas Bertrand, a 45-year-old voter who works in advertising.

Racism and anti-Semitism marred the election campaign, as did Russian cybercampaigns. More than 50 candidates reported being physically attacked, a highly unusual occurrence in France. The government deployed 30,000 police officers on election day.

French President Emmanuel Macron, right, votes in the second round of legislative elections in Le Touquet-Paris-Plage, northern France, on Sunday.

Mohammed Badra/AP

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Mohammed Badra/AP

The heightened tensions come as France celebrates a very special summer: Paris is set to host an exceptionally ambitious Olympic Games, the national football team has reached the semi-finals of the 2024 European Championship and the Tour de France is traveling the country alongside the Olympic torch.

As of noon local time, turnout stood at 26.63%, according to the French Interior Ministry, slightly higher than the 25.90% recorded at the same time in the first round last Sunday.

The turnout in the first round, close to 67%, was the highest since 1997, ending nearly three decades of growing voter apathy for legislative elections and, for a growing number of French people, for politics in general.

Macron voted in La Touquet, accompanied by his wife Brigitte Macron. Prime Minister Gabriel Attal had previously voted in Vanves, in the Paris suburbs.

Marine Le Pen is not voting because her constituency in northern France is not holding a runoff after her victory last week. Across France, 76 other candidates won seats in the first round, including 39 from the National Rally and 32 from the left-wing New Popular Front alliance. Two candidates from Macron’s centrist list also won their seats in the first round.

The elections end on Sunday at 8:00 p.m. (6:00 p.m. GMT) in metropolitan France and Corsica. The first projections are expected on Sunday evening, and the first official results are expected on Sunday evening and Monday morning.

Voters residing on the American continent and in the French overseas territories of Saint Pierre and Miquelon, Saint Barthélemy, Saint Martin, Guadeloupe, Martinique, Guyana and French Polynesia cast their ballots on Saturday.

If the National Rally wins an absolute majority and its leader, Jordan Bardella, 28, becomes prime minister, the election could give France its first far-right government since the Nazi occupation during World War II. The party came out on top in the first round of voting last week, followed by a coalition of center-left, far-left and environmentalist parties, as well as Macron’s centrist alliance.

Pierre Lubin, a 45-year-old business leader, was worried about whether the elections would produce an effective government.

“This is a question that concerns us,” Lubin said. “Will it be a technical government or a coalition government composed of (different) political forces?”

The outcome of the vote remains highly uncertain. Polls between the two rounds suggest that the National Rally could win the largest number of seats in the 577-seat National Assembly, but fall far short of the 289 needed to secure a majority. It would nevertheless be historic if a party historically linked to xenophobia and Holocaust minimization, and long considered a pariah, became the largest political force in France.

If he wins a majority, Macron would be forced to share power with a prime minister deeply at odds with the president’s domestic and foreign policies, in an awkward arrangement known in France as “cohabitation.”

Another possibility is that no party has an absolute majority, which would result in a parliament without an absolute majority. In this case, Macron could continue coalition negotiations with the center-left or appoint a technocratic government without party affiliation.

Whatever happens, Macron’s centrist camp will be forced to share power. Many candidates in his alliance lost in the first round or withdrew, meaning he does not have enough candidates to come close to the majority he had in 2017, when he was first elected president, or the plurality he won in the 2022 legislative elections.

Both moves would be unprecedented for modern France and would make it harder for the European Union’s second-largest economy to make bold decisions about arming Ukraine, reforming labor laws or reducing its huge deficit. Financial markets have been jittery since Macron surprised even his closest allies in June by calling early elections after the National Rally won France’s largest number of seats in the European Parliament elections.

Whatever happens, Macron has said he will not resign and will remain president until the end of his term in 2027.

Many French voters, especially in small towns and rural areas, are frustrated by low incomes and a Parisian political leadership seen as elitist and indifferent to the daily struggles of working people. The National Rally has successfully connected with these voters, often by blaming immigration for France’s problems, and has won broad and deep support over the past decade.

Marine Le Pen has softened many of the party’s positions (she no longer calls for leaving NATO and the EU) to make it more electable. But the party’s core far-right values ​​remain. The party wants to hold a referendum on whether being born in France is enough to earn citizenship, limit the rights of dual citizens and give police more freedom to use guns.

As the outcome of a high-stakes election looms in uncertainty, Valérie Dodeman, a 55-year-old lawyer, says she is pessimistic about the future of France.

“No matter what happens, I think this election will leave people unhappy on all sides,” Dodeman said.