France: Candidates exit runoff in tactic to stop far-right
July 2, 2024
Scores of candidates opposed to France's far-right National Rally party bowed out of a second round of voting. The tactic aims to unite the NR's oppenents and their voters.
The fate of the remaining 501 seats will be determined in next Sunday's run-offsImage: Artur Widak/NurPhoto/picture alliance
Macron plans to prevent 'absolute majority' for far right
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What we know so far
Roughly 210 pro-Macron and left-wing candidates withdrew from competing in Sunday's second round for the 577-seat national parliament by a Tuesday evening deadline.
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Macron's camp has started cooperating with the NFP, hopeful that tactical voting will prevent RN and certain aligned candidates from winning the 289 seats needed for an absolute majority.
The tactical withdrawals would be accompanied by cross-party calls for voters to back whichever candidate is best placed to defeat their local RN rival.
Macron decided to call a snap election after a poor showing in European elections last month, with RN gaining 31.4% of the vote compared with 14.6% for Ensemble.
The decision, which some analysts think may have been an effort to test the public — or RN's capacity to govern — is widely considered to have backfired.
French elections: Thousands protest rise of far right
Following the victory of the National Rally in the first round of the French parliamentary elections, thousands have demonstrated against the far right. Protesters are pinning their hopes on the new left-wing alliance.
Image: Fabrizio Bensch/REUTERS
'Enough of this hateful era!'
After partial election results were made public on Sunday evening, thousands of people came out to protest the far-right National Rally in a number of cities nationwide. In Paris, this woman held up a sign speaking out against a "hateful era" in France. The populist party emerged victorious in the first round of the parliamentary elections with 33% of the vote.
Image: ARNAUD FINISTRE/AFP/Getty Images
Protest with fireworks
In the capital, thousands gathered on the Place de la Republique following a call by the left-wing alliance New Popular Front, which came in second place with 28% of the vote. Some protesters climbed the monument there, waving banners and setting off fireworks. Leading left-wing politicians also joined the protest.
The National Rally was the clear winner of the first round of voting, with President Emmanuel Macron's centrist camp slipping to third place at just under 21%. In the divided country, right-wing populists, led by Marine Le Pen (above), are fighting for power against left-wing parties and centrists like Macron.
Image: Yves Herman/REUTERS
'Disgust, sadness and fear'
Many French people have been deeply shocked by the National Rally's election victory. "I am not used to demonstrating," Najiya Khaldi, a 33-year-old teacher in Paris, told the Reuters news agency. Nevertheless, she came out so she wouldn't "feel alone" with her feelings of "disgust, sadness and fear."
Image: ARNAUD FINISTRE/AFP/Getty Images
Clear message
In the western city of Nantes, many people marched against the shift to the right with banners expressing their resolve: "Ce qu'on n'aura pas par les urnes, on l'aura par la rue" ("What we don't get at the ballot box, we'll get on the streets") and "Manger 5 flics & Nazis par jour" ("Eat 5 cops and Nazis a day").
Image: SEBASTIEN SALOM-GOMIS/AFP/Getty Images
Clashes with police
Some of the protest participants in Nantes wore masks and hoods. After the demonstration broke up, individual protesters clashed with police, firing off fireworks. Police responded with tear gas.
Image: SEBASTIEN SALOM-GOMIS/AFP/Getty Images
Barricades, bottles and fireworks
Rallies and protests also took place in Dijon, Lille and Marseille. According to media reports, there were also clashes between demonstrators and the police in Lyon, France's third largest city. Amid barricades, officers were pelted with bottles and fireworks. Some shop windows were also broken.
Image: Fabrizio Bensch/REUTERS
Front against fascism
The exact distribution of the 577 seats in the National Assembly will not be decided until the runoff election on July 7. Demonstrators, like these people seen here, have pinned their hopes on the left-wing New Popular Front. But according to poll forecasters, the National Rally is likely to once again be the strongest force — although it could fall just short of an absolute majority.
Image: Fabrizio Bensch/REUTERS
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While RN swept up a third of the first-round vote for the National Assembly, France's lower house, the left-wing New Popular Front garnered 28% and Macron's Ensemble managed just over 20%.
What happens next?
Only 76 lawmakers, mostly from the far-right and left, were elected outright in the first round of voting.
The fate of the remaining 501 seats will be determined in run-offs between two or three remaining candidates or, in some instances, four.
While most projections show that RN will fail to clinch an absolute majority next Sunday, the situation remains unclear.
Under France's two-round voting system, anyone with more than 12.5% of the vote is eligible for the second round, but they are not obliged to stand. Whoever secures the most votes in the second round wins the seat, they do not need an absolute majority.
RN leader Marine Le Pen has urged voters to give RN an absolute majority in parliament, a development that would see her protege, 28-year-old Jordan Bardella, become prime minister.
Should that happen, there would be a tense period of "cohabitation" between Bardella's RN-led government and Macron, who has promised to complete his term until 2027.
The "republican front" famously proved successful in 2002 when voters of rival stripes rallied behind Jacques Chirac to stop Le Pen's father, Jean-Marie, in a presidential contest. Similar tactics have been employed in later elections too.
Another potential outcome could be a hung parliament that could usher in a period of political paralysis.
