French voters flocked to the polls on Sunday to cast their ballots in the first round of early parliamentary elections suddenly called this month by President Emmanuel Macron, plunging the gamble into great uncertainty over the country’s future.
According to the interior ministry, turnout was 59.39% as of 5 pm local time on Sunday, a significant increase over the last parliamentary elections in 2022, when turnout was just 39.42%, and reflects the high interest in the vote that will determine the future of Macron’s second term.
Voters elect 577 representatives to the National Assembly, the lower house of parliament and the most important chamber. A new majority of lawmakers opposed to Macron could force him to appoint a political rival as prime minister, sparking a fundamental shift in French domestic policy and chaos in foreign policy.
Without a clear majority, the country could fall into months of turmoil and political deadlock, and Macron, who has ruled out resigning, would not be able to call new parliamentary elections for a year.
France’s nationalist, anti-immigration National Rally party is widely expected to win the election, with a broad coalition of left-wing parties likely to come in second. Macron’s centrist Renaissance party and its allies are expected to lose many seats.
Most polling stations on Sunday close at 6pm local time, but in larger cities they close no later than 8pm. National voting forecasts issued by polling agencies based on preliminary results are due to be released just after 8pm and are usually reliable. Official results, to be released by the Ministry of Interior, are due to be published in the middle of the night.
Here’s what you can expect:
The vote will be held in two rounds and participation has already been high.
France has 577 constituencies (one for each seat) covering the mainland, overseas departments and territories, and French citizens living abroad. In each constituency, the seat is awarded to the candidate who receives the most votes.
Any number of candidates can appear on the first round of voting in each district, but there are certain criteria to advance to the second round, which takes place a week later on July 7.
In most cases, a second round of voting will determine the top two candidates, and then the person with the most votes in the runoff will win, but there are exceptions.
A candidate who receives at least 50% of the votes in the first round wins as long as they represent at least one-quarter of the voters in that district. Some districts may have three or four candidates in a runoff election, provided they receive the votes representing at least 12.5% of the voters.
Both scenarios have been rare in years past, but they become more likely if voter abstention is low, as is expected on Sunday. Most pollsters expect turnout to exceed 60% in the first round, compared with 47.5% in 2022.
France’s parliamentary elections are typically held just weeks after presidential elections, often favouring the party that just won the latter election, and are therefore unlikely to appeal to voters who feel the outcome is predetermined.
But this time the stakes are much higher.
The rise of far-right forces, strong alliances among left-wing forces, and the decline of centrist forces have become clear.
The goal for each party and their alliance is to win enough seats to form a majority. If none of them achieve this, France could face months of political turmoil and deadlock.
But if control of the National Assembly were to pass to Macron’s opposition, he would be forced to appoint a prime minister and cabinet from a different party, which would then control domestic policy. The president traditionally retains authority over foreign policy and defense issues in such a scenario, but the constitution does not always provide clear guidance.
The National Rally is comfortably ahead with about 36 percent support in the latest opinion polls. After decades on the fringe, anti-immigrant, eurosceptic far-right parties have never been so close to the French government, a surprising development for a country that has been at the heart of the European initiative. A National Rally prime minister could clash with Macron over issues such as France’s contributions to the European Union budget and support for Ukraine in its war with Russia.
A coalition of the Socialists, Greens, Communists and far-left French Invincible party is in second place with around 29% support and believes it has a chance to defeat the far-right and form its own government. The coalition wants to reverse some of the policies of the Macron government over the past seven years, such as raising the retirement age. It also wants to reverse corporate tax cuts and tax cuts for the wealthy, significantly increase social security spending and pass a big increase in the minimum wage.
This election will be an uphill battle for Macron’s centrist party and its allies. Opinion polls have put it in third place with about 20 percent of the vote and it is widely expected to lose many of its 250 seats. Among Macron’s political allies running for the presidency are leaders of other centrist parties, members of Macron’s own cabinet, and even prime minister, and a loss of any of them would be a blow.
The results from the first round of voting alone may give an incomplete impression of where the vote is headed.
In the 2022 general election, Macron’s center-right coalition and the Left Party were neck-and-neck in the first round of voting, each winning about a quarter of the vote, beating all other parties. A week later, both parties still led their rivals, but Macron’s coalition won nearly 250 seats and the Left Party fewer than 150.
In other words, while the first round of votes is an indicator of what the final outcome will be, it is not a perfect predictor.
One way to analyze the first round of voting is to look at national voting trends: what percentage of the vote did each party receive nationwide? This is a good way to see whether polls accurately predicted each party’s general popularity and to see which forces are gaining momentum in the final weeks of the election campaign.
But the national turnout obscures the fact that France’s legislative elections are essentially 577 separate elections, with most seats decided only in the second round of voting.
Each party’s prospects will depend on how many of its candidates advance to runoff elections. The more candidates advance, the better that party’s chances of victory on July 7. It will also become clearer what kind of matchups they’ll face.
And a lot can happen between the two rounds of voting: Voters whose favorite candidate doesn’t make it to the runoff may switch to another candidate or choose not to vote at all.
Political parties will issue local or national voting advice to influence the outcome of elections. In the past, parties often appealed to their members to strategically vote against the far right, but that tactic is falling apart.
Candidates can decide to withdraw from three- or four-way races if they are concerned about splitting votes, and several left-leaning parties have already announced they will encourage candidates to withdraw.
It also marks the start of a new campaign week — plenty of time for gaffes, missteps and twists that could change the course of the election.
