The RN is in a position of strength in these 2024 legislative elections, if we are to believe the results of the polls. But surprisingly, his victory is also very feared.
Nothing seems to stop the good momentum of the National Rally in the polls for the 2024 legislative elections, the party of Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella is clearly in the lead in voting intentions in the first round. The left, united under the banner of the New Popular Front, is in 2nd position, several points ahead of the parties of the presidential majority.
Two elements are notable: first, it is probable that despite its victory at the polls, the RN does not have an absolute majority and therefore that the far right is unable to form a government. Then the survey Ipsos of June 22 shows that only 39% of French people want a victory for the RN (31% want the left to win, 29% for the presidential majority to win). This is a surprise given the polls which show the RN very clearly ahead: a large majority of French people do not want the RN to win these 2024 legislative elections.
The legislative election campaign may still hold surprises, as much as the results of the votes of June 30 and July 7, and French politics risks being undeniably disrupted. If the results of legislative polls are interesting for understanding the trends and preferences of voters at a given time, they should not be considered as predictions. Especially since the legislative elections are similar to 577 local elections, one for each constituency, some of which lean more to the left and others more to the right, but the polls are carried out on a national scale. The 2nd round polls are therefore even more subject to caution, because qualified candidates and the game of vote carryovers are difficult for the institutes to understand.
What are the results of the polls in the first round of the legislative elections?
► The latest voting intentions poll
The National Rally remains above the fray and above the 30% mark in voting intentions in the latest Ifop-Fiducial poll for LCI, Le Figaro and Sud Radio and that of Opinionway for Cnews, Europe 1 and the JDD, published on June 21. The extreme party also exceeds the symbolic threshold of a third of voting intentions with scores of 34 and 35% in the two aforementioned surveys.
If the union of the left does not let itself be left behind by the extreme right, it is still displayed 5 to 8 points behind. But it is the presidential majority which completes the leading trio with a score lower than the first two opposition groups and often lower than the 20% mark. Emmanuel Macron’s camp, however, regains a few points in the Ifop-Fiducial polls without however catching up with the adversaries. The gap which was around ten points is narrowing to get closer to that which separates the RN from the New Popular Front. The fact remains that the presidential majority is, according to this survey, still less likely to qualify for the second round than the other two blocs.
NB: the lists showing 0.0% were not measured as such by the institute in the latest voting intention surveys, but inserted in the union lists, according to party agreements.
► The evolution curve of polls
The voting intentions polls on the legislative elections may evolve according to the facts of the campaign and in particular the political offer which will be proposed on June 30 and July 7. Here are the developments observed as the institutes’ investigations progress. An indicator of the dynamics that can influence the results of the election:
What results in the 2nd round of the legislative elections and what projection in number of seats?
These estimates give a first idea of the new composition of the National Assembly: according to the Elabe survey for BFMTV, the RN would become the first group in the Assembly. The left alliance would form the second force and the presidential majority group would lose power. The Republicans would be considerably weakened.
These 2nd round projections suggest a historic situation. The absolute majority being at 289, the party with the flame would not be able to reign supreme over the National Assembly, but it would only need a few combined votes to have control over the legislative power. It would therefore be nice to see one of its members be appointed Prime Minister and others be appointed within the government. Today, the RN has 89 elected officials. It had 8 in 2017. At that time, La République en Marche (now Renaissance) had 308 seats. After its fall in 2022 to 244 deputies, thus losing the absolute majority, the party founded by Emmanuel Macron would therefore continue its decline.
Note that at the end of 2023, the Les Républicains party commissioned a survey from the Ipsos institute on the voting intentions of the French if legislative elections took place very soon. Unveiled in March 2024 by The Obs, the results showed that the National Assembly could lean greatly to the extreme right, or even pass into an RN majority. According to the answers obtained by Ipsos, between 243 and 305 seats could be won by the formation of Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella.
Note that according to an Elabe poll for BFMTV and La Tribune Dimanche published on June 16, 32% of French people want a victory for the RN, 26% say they want a victory for the left alliance, the New Popular Front, and 17% want whether it is Renaissance and the presidential majority who win these 2024 legislative elections. 25% of respondents have no opinion on the question.
2nd round polls distorted by triangulars
The projections for the number of votes are still very uncertain, due to the unique nature of each of the 577 legislative elections. A very important parameter completely escapes pollsters and their models: the number of triangular elections in the 2nd round of these legislative elections. With strong participation, estimated at more than 60% by institutes, it is likely that in many constituencies, 3 candidates will qualify for the second round. For what ? Any candidate who obtains at least 12.5% of the votes of registered voters qualifies for the 2nd round: the more people vote, the lower the qualification threshold.
However, we do not know what the candidates and parties will do in the event of a triangular situation. Without the withdrawal of a competitor in a triangular situation, it is historically and mechanically the far right which is the most advantaged, due to the scattering of votes between the two other candidates. It is too early to know what the candidates involved in triangular elections will do, what the voting instructions will be and how the votes will be carried over.
We must therefore keep in mind, when approaching all these projections, the limits of the polls on the legislative elections. National assumptions sometimes clash with realities on the ground, where the choice of vote is not always made according to one’s convictions. Certain territories prove it. The most rural territories and constituencies made up of small municipalities seem more inclined to vote for the National Rally, this is also what emerges from the analysis of the results of the 2024 European elections. Rural municipalities from 2000 to 20,000 residents largely opted for Jordan Bardella on Sunday June 10, as demonstrated by the Elabe survey for La Tribune and BFMTV.
The fact remains that the polls highlight a dynamic for the extreme right which should be looked at carefully: the surveys on the voting intentions of voters carried out before the last elections (presidential, legislative, European) are less and less removed from the reality of the counting. The European results were also particularly well anticipated by pollsters.