Summary of the day
Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) and its allies won 33% of the vote in Sunday’s first round of France’s snap legislative elections, fuelling fears at home and abroad about the rise of the far right.
The leftwing New Popular Front alliance (NFP) got 28%, while president Emmanuel Macron’s centrist bloc came third with 22% of the vote.
Most of the 577 seats in the national assembly will now be decided in a second-round runoff on Sunday.
Rival parties were engaged in frantic bargaining and tactical voting plans on Monday in an attempt to stop the far right’s rise.
Le Monde published an editorial warning that “the far right is on the doorstep of power.” The paper said that “only the formation of a powerful republican front can stand in the way of a party which, despite all its concealments, remains highly dangerous.”
The RN president, Jordan Bardella, published a letter to the French people in which he sets out the party’s strategy for mobilising voters in the second round: focusing on spending power and making ends meet, while warning against the left — who it will face in numerous run-offs.
Bruno Le Maire, the economy minister and Macron ally, said this morning that “for me, France Unbowed is a danger for the nation, just as the National Rally is a danger for the Republic.”
France’s Unbowed’s Eric Coquerel, meanwhile, argued that “all those who continue in the former majority to put a line of equality between LFI [France Unbowed] and the RN [National Rally] affirm that for them, it is not a problem to give the majority to the RN.”
Clément Beaune, a Macron ally, has pointed to the upcoming British election in his plea for France not to turn to the far right. “At a time when our British friends are about to turn the page from demagogic nationalism, let’s not dive into it. Coming out of it is long and painful,” he said.
Donald Tusk, the Polish prime minister, has issued a warning about the far right. “They love Putin, money and power without control. And they are already in power or are reaching for it in the East or West of Europe,” he said.
Spain’s socialist prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, described Sunday’s French election results as a warning
The German foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, said “it cannot leave anyone unmoved if, in our own country, for example in the European elections, or in our closest partner and best friend, a party that sees Europe as the problem and not the solution is far ahead.”
Le Monde has published an editorial warning that “the far right is on the doorstep of power.”
The situation is made all the more dangerous by the fact that there are barely six days left to avoid the worst – preventing the RN from gaining an absolute majority in the Assemblée Nationale.
Only the formation of a powerful republican front can stand in the way of a party which, despite all its concealments, remains highly dangerous because its policies are based on “national preference,” a concept that amounts to classifying people according to where they come from.
The editorial also criticised Emmanuel Macron’s camp and the centre right not allied with the National Rally for unclear messaging.
In view of the gravity of the situation, this kind of complacency is unforgivable: It contributes to trivializing the vote in favor of the far right, at a time when there is very little time left to attempt to build the ultimate wake-up, by calling on all the values of the French Republic.
On Sunday, July 7, what is at stake is not just a transfer of power – it may be a tipping point.
