France’s far-right National Rally (RN) party won a major victory in the first round of early parliamentary elections, exit polls showed, as political maneuvering between rival parties over whether the RN would stay in power sparked protests in major cities.
Pollsters IFOP, Ipsos, Opinionway and Ellerbe projected Marine Le Pen’s RN to win around 34% of the vote, with the left-wing New Popular Front (NFP) coalition on around 29% and President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist Ensemble alliance in third place with around 20.3%.
After the RN’s success in last month’s European elections, Macron stunned the nation by calling snap elections, betting that the anti-immigration party with historical ties to anti-Semitism would not repeat its success at the national level.
In Marine Le Pen’s Hénin-Beaumont constituency in northern France, supporters waved French flags and sang the Marseillaise.
“France has shown its will to put an end to contemptuous and corrosive power,” she told the cheering crowd.
Jordan Bardella, leader of the RN and candidate to succeed Le Pen as prime minister, said the second round would be “the most important in the history of the French Fifth Republic”.
He said Macron’s party was devastated and accused the far-left of causing an “existential crisis” and posing “a real danger for France and all French people”.
Pollster Ellerbe said in a projection for BFM television that the RN and its allies could win between 260 and 310 seats in the second round on July 7, while Ipsos, in a poll for France television, predicted the RN and its allies would win a range of 230 to 280 seats.
Both Le Pen and Bardella have said their parties are seeking an absolute majority (289 seats in total) in France’s lower house, the National Assembly.
Macron calls for ‘broad democratic alliance’
Whether the RN can take power and form a government will depend on political negotiations between rival parties over the next few days. Until now, centre-right and centre-left parties have worked together to keep the far-right out of power.
Macron has called for a “broad” democratic alliance to counter the far-right.
“In the face of popular rebellion, the time has come to assemble a broad, visibly Democratic and Republican coalition for a second round of voting,” he said in a statement.
He added that the high voter turnout in the first round spoke to “the importance of this vote for all our compatriots and the desire to clarify the political situation.”
Prime Minister Gabriel Atal warned that far-right forces were at the “gates of power” and that “there should be no vote for the National Rally.”
Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the left-wing New Popular Front party, said he would withdraw his candidate who came third in the first round of parliamentary elections in a bid to defeat the far-right New Popular Front’s top candidate in the next election.
If no candidate receives 50% of the vote in the first round, the top two candidates and any candidate who receives 12.5% of registered voters automatically qualify to move on to the second round. In the runoff election, the candidate who receives the most votes wins the district.
“In accordance with our principles and positions in previous elections, we will never allow the National Rally to win,” Mélenchon said.
Laurent Bergé, former secretary-general of the French Democratic Labour Confederation and now president of the European Trade Union Confederation, called for a “lockdown” in a post on X.
“Tonight, with a national assembly on the brink of power, our democratic and republican values are at stake,” Berger said.
“In the face of the danger… it is urgent to stop the far right.”
High voter turnout
Ipsos estimated on Sunday that turnout would be 65.5% when polls close at 8pm (8pm GMT), the highest since 1997.
The RN was long politically marginalized in France, but since taking over from her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, she has sought to revamp the party’s image and now brings it closer to power than ever before.
According to Professor Lym Sara Arouan of the University of Capitole de Toulouse, Le Pen has “given plastic surgery to her party”.
“But is it still the same corrupt, xenophobic, anti-Semitic, anti-Islamic, anti-minority party… We know what the far-right stands for,” Arouan told Al Jazeera.
She said the vote was also a rejection of Macron’s policies, which she saw as “arrogant” and pandering to the wealthy.
“I personally know examples of people who voted for the far right because of Macron’s policies, especially his economic policies,” Arouan said.
The result sparked protests in the streets of major cities including Paris, Lyon and Nantes.
Thousands of anti-RN demonstrators gathered at a left-wing coalition rally in Paris’ Place de la Republique on Sunday night.
Nazia Kaldi, a 33-year-old teacher, said the RN’s positive results left her feeling “disgusted, saddened and scared.”
“I’m not used to participating in protests,” she said. “I guess I came to reassure myself, so that I wouldn’t feel alone.”
If the RN wins an absolute majority in the second round of voting, it would set up a tense period of “coexistence” with President Macron, who has vowed to serve until 2027.
A different outcome could lead to protracted negotiations to form a sustainable government.
Risk analysis firm Eurasia Group said there was a “high probability” that the RN would fall short of an absolute majority, adding that France would face “at least 12 months of a fiercely blocked National Assembly and, at best, a ‘national unity’ technocratic government with limited capacity to govern.”
