Following the National Assembly’s massive success in the first round of the French election, President Macron is calling on all other French parties to form a united front to prevent the far right from taking power.
It has worked before.
But this time it is not certain that the fear of Le Pen is strong enough in France.
Never before has the extreme right been so close to power in France. With 29% of the votes, National Assembly became the largest party, and now for the first time has a good chance of securing its own majority in the National Assembly in the second round of elections. Marine Le Pen’s patient work to soften the party’s image and avoid overtly racist outbursts has paid off. The party no longer appears as intimidating.
With the calabash of the yellow vests fresh in their minds, many French today are almost as afraid of the extreme left. Macron himself, in an effort to keep his moderate center alliance alive, has singled them out as extremists as dangerous as Le Pen. But now he needs them. The election’s second big winner is the new left-wing alliance Folkfronten, which received 28% of the voters’ support and where the extreme left is the dominant force.
To stop Le Pen’s party from taking power, the political center and the radical left now need to cooperate. Macron’s market liberals and radical left activists must put aside old grudges and back each other’s candidates in the second round of the election.
It is not impossible that they manage to bite the sour apple and do it. But we will see intense bull trading in the next few days. The drama in French politics is far from over. The only thing we know for sure is that President Macron is the big loser, and that it is a weakened president who remains in the Elysée Palace.