A “fierce defeat” for the presidential camp, a “total failure” for Emmanuel Macron, “now openly contested even by his own”. Le Monde thus summarizes the first round of the early legislative elections in France. The battle for the second round next Sunday is different from yesterday’s and the Macronian coalition is looking for ‘solutions’. The words on the agenda become “desistance” pacts, chosen “case by case” in the face of imperatives “neither (Rassemblement National) nor (La France Insoumise)”.
The game of alliances
The ‘game’ is played with hundreds of possible triangular or quadrangular. After the first round, Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella’s Rn is largely in the lead, on the threshold of power, it could obtain – but it is not certain – an absolute majority, at least 289 deputies in the National Assembly. Behind the Le Penist party and allies, including Éric Ciotti, the left-wing bloc Nouveau Front populaire – La France Insoumise, with Parti socialiste, Ecologistes and Parti communiste – and third is the Ensemble coalition (Renaissance-MoDem-Horizons).
Everyone against Le Pen?
“Not even one vote must go” to RN on July 7, French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said last night, with the aim of preventing the Lepenists – who already have 38 elected deputies and 297 candidates leading the first round – “from having an absolute majority in the second round”. It is the most optimistic forecast for the Lepenista party. But it is a possibility that Attal, who came to power at the age of 35, will have to give way at Palazzo Matignon to Bardella, the 28-year-old Le Pen dolphin who in recent days assured he would not want the prime minister’s seat unless in the event of an absolute majority. Today, however, Sebastien Chenu, a member of the RN, declares that the party is ready to govern even with a relative majority.
Thus the invitation to the candidates of the Ensemble coalition who finished third in the first round is to “desist”. To avoid the election of a far-right deputy. Same line indicated by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of La France Insoumise, part of the NFP bloc. The Cfdt, the Confédération française démocratique du travail, the main trade union in France, invites us to “prevent the far right from gaining power” and urges, “wherever there is an extreme right candidate, to vote for the opposite candidate who is in the best position to win.” And “regardless of political formation”.
The stumbling block of voting for La France Insoumise
Yet in the halls of power, and among the candidates, not everyone would think so. Ensemble candidate Sylvie Casenave-Péré, who came third behind Marine Le Pen’s sister Marie-Caroline (Rn) and the Nouveau Front Populaire in the fourth constituency of La Sarthe, has already decided not to withdraw.
For former prime minister Edouard Philippe, leader of Horizons who, with his thoughts on 2027, does not hide his ambitions towards the Elysée, “no vote should go to the candidates of the RN, nor to those of La France Insoumise, with whom we differ not only on programs but on fundamental values”. A line that could favor Rn.
And for the president of MoDem, François Bayrou, “many French people would be absolutely desperate to find themselves faced with the choice between RN and LFI”. For him, “a large” block that is “clearly democratic and republican” is needed. And, Le Monde notes, Attal never mentioned LFI in his speech. The campaign headquarters specifies that “withdrawal” in favor of the “insoumis” is not excluded. But the profiles of the candidates will be carefully examined because “some of the LFI are clearly enemies of the values of the Republic”, they say from Attal’s entourage, as reported in Le Monde.
Macron’s long hours
So amidst fears and divisions, the study of the situation of each constituency began, to find alliances, to block the advance of the Rassemblement National. Six days left until the second round. Candidates have until 6pm tomorrow to file – or not – their candidacy.
Macron, the French media highlight, has not given clear indications. After the confrontation with the majority it is for him “time, in front of the Rassemblement National, of a large” bloc, “democratic and republican for the second round”. Indeed a large bloc, as suggested by Bayrou, “clearly democratic and republican”. For Macron, with a mandate until 2027, it will perhaps be the longest hours at the Elysée. A “strategic meeting” is said to be taking place here. The “cohabitation” would be behind the door.
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