THE PEN. Marine Le Pen is running for a second term as MP in the 11th constituency of Pas-de-Calais and the results of the polls are very favorable to her. Can she win in the first round despite a late campaign?
On a personal note, Marine Le Pen is aiming for re-election as an MP in Pas-de-Calais, but as a leader she is more ambitious and hopes to form a National Rally group in the Assembly. Suffice to say that the former presidential candidate is playing big for the legislative elections of June 12 and 19, 2022. The figure of the far right has redoubled her efforts since May 30 and the start of the official campaign, but her entry into the race was late, maybe too late.
On the evening of the second round of the presidential election, Marine Le Pen gave voters an appointment for the legislative polls and hoped that the enthusiasm and the historic results of the RN – 41.45% of the vote, eight points more than in 2017 – would follow and be reflected in the results of the legislative elections compared to a “third round”. Only the effervescence of the presidential election dissolved during the deputy’s two-week absence from the media and this time of rest was taken advantage of by the left, which took the place that Marine Le Pen wishes to occupy, that of the first opposition force to Emmanuel Macron.
To win against the New Popular Ecological and Social Union (Nupes) of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, Marine Le Pen constantly recalls the results of the presidential election and ensures that the Insoumis plays the game of the leader of State. A well-rehearsed strategy to show itself as the only alternative. But faced with the coalition of the left, the RN must race alone after having repeatedly refused an alliance with Eric Zemmour and his Reconquest party! to form the “national bloc”. A few days of voting, will Marine Le Pen and the 567 candidates invested in the legislative elections by the RN be able to convince?
Marine Le Pen, legislative candidate?
If she took the time to announce it, Marine Le Pen is officially a candidate in the legislative elections and is seeking a second term in the 11th constituency of Pas-de-Calais, that of her stronghold of Hénin-Beaumont. It was first Jordan Berdella who affirmed the candidacy of the leader of the National Rally during a trip to Fréjus on April 28. A few days later, the confirmation came from the main interested party. But it was only two weeks after the announcement that the campaign of Marine Le Pen and more broadly of the candidates invested by the RN began.
Marine Le Pen, who put forward the argument of the grassroots campaign and proximity to the French during the presidential campaign, could not give up her role as MP for Pas-de-Calais. Above all, after her defeat in the presidential election, she could not deprive herself of the last means at her disposal to weigh in national politics: a seat and an RN group in the National Assembly. The politician therefore hopes to obtain a sufficiently powerful group within the hemicycle to block certain reforms by Emmanuel Macron. At a meeting in Hénin-Beaumont on June 5, Marine Le Pen dangled the possibility of obtaining more than a hundred RN deputies: “Potentially, if all our voters come to defend our ideas, we will be able to send between 100 and 150 deputies to the next assembly”. A scenario which is based on the good results of the presidential candidate, “we gathered 50% of the voices in more than 150 constituencies and 55% of the votes in more than 90 constituencies”. Great ambitions which have however been revised downwards because at the end of the presidential election Marine Le Pen was aiming for nothing less than a majority in the National Assembly, a scenario difficult to imagine by leading the race alone and in the current context. of tripartism between the alliance of the left, the presidential majority and the extreme right.
What is Marine Le Pen’s program for the legislative elections?
Marine Le Pen takes the same line as that defended during the presidential campaign. The proposals and subjects that she and the other candidates of the RN intend to bring to the National Assembly are modeled on the presidential program of the far right. And, as during the presidential campaign, one of the subjects that comes up most often a few days before the vote in the legislative elections is purchasing power, at the heart of the news when inflation has climbed by five points, for which Marine Le Pen defends a reduction or even an abolition of VAT and shoots the temporary aid and the energy or food checks put in place by the Head of State. A law for the purchasing power must precisely be voted at the end of June at the end of the legislative according to the announcements of the government. Retirement is also a point of friction between the LREM group and allies and that of the RN because if the first defends the reform of the pension and the postponement of the age to 64 or 65 years, the second militates for a progressive system allowing the retirement between 60 and 62 for long careers and later depending on the age of entry into working life.
What result can Marine Le Pen hope to have in the legislative elections?
In Hénin-Beaumont and in the 11th district of Pas-de-Calais, Marine Le Pen is on conquered ground. The candidate is confident about her potential victory in the legislative elections, especially since the results of the presidential election and the polls are favorable to her. In the first round of the presidential election, Marine Le Pen obtained 45.1% of the vote with 25 points ahead of Jean-Luc Mélenchon and 28 over Emmanuel Macron in his constituency. She also won the second round with 63.4% of the vote.
Sunday June 12, Marine Le Pen could win the legislative elections in the first round according to the results of the Ifop-Fiducial survey for LCI published on June 6. The survey gives the RN candidate largely in the lead with 51% of the votes, i.e. an absolute majority, in the first round against 30% for the Nupes candidate, Marine Tondelier, and 12% for that of the presidential majority, Alexandrine Pintus. But to regain her seat as a deputy in the first round, Marine Le Pen must also obtain 25% of the votes of voters registered on the electoral lists, a detail which can be complicated by a high abstention rate.
According to Ifop, “given the balance of power measured in the first round, the hypothesis of a second round seems unlikely at this stage” in the 11th district of Pas-de-Calais. The institute nevertheless tested the hypothesis and once again gave the RN candidate the lead ahead of these opponents from Nupes (56% against 44%) and the presidential majority (63% against 37%).
Why did Marine Le Pen refuse an alliance with Eric Zemmour?
On the evening of the second round of the presidential election, Eric Zemmour called on Marine Le Pen to form an alliance of “national unity” after highlighting the 8th defeat hitting the “name of Le Pen”. “I call for national unity in view of the legislative elections. We must forget our quarrels and join forces. It is possible, it is essential, it is our duty”, he began, before d explain his point. “Let’s build the first coalition of rights and patriots as quickly as possible so that the elected representatives of Reconquête!, RN, Debout la France and those of the Republicans who do not want to join the president have a chance to dominate in the next Assembly. ” A union deemed essential by the zemmourists so that the far right can weigh in the hemicycle. Yet repeated calls have never found a positive response from Marine Le Pen and the National Rally.
The flame party defended itself by explaining that it did not want to team up with the candidate who had made so many efforts to try to make it disappear. The RN executives notably assured that they did not need the support of Reconquest! advancing the large lead of the party in the results of the presidential election but also the postponement of the 2.5 million votes of voters from Eric Zemmour to Marine Le Pen in the second round without an alliance being concluded. These are also financial reasons that motivated Marine Le Pen to go it alone. Having as many RN deputies compete as possible allows the party to benefit from more public funding as soon as a party wins at least 1% of the votes in 50 constituencies in the first round, each vote earns it 1.42 euros. Each deputy election adds 37,000 euros in grants. And these sums are paid the year of the election and the following four years. And since 2017, several regions have become territories with high electoral potential for the RN such as Moselle, Finistère and Côtes-d “Armor, the north of France but also the south-west, from Dordogne to Corrèze, and the southeast.
Finally, we can estimate that Reconquest! needs this alliance much more, without which its chances of victory in the legislative elections are limited, than the RN, well established and able to impose itself alone. For the RN, curbing Zemmour’s party the very year of its rise would nip the opponent’s whims in the bud.