France faced a hung parliament and deep political uncertainty after the three main political groups of the left, center and right emerged from early parliamentary elections on Sunday with large shares of the vote but nothing close to an outright majority.
Preliminary results overturned widespread predictions of a clear victory for National Rally, Marine Le Pen’s anti-immigration party that dominated the first round of voting a week ago. In contrast, the left-wing New People’s Front won 178 seats.
President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist coalition, which caused turmoil in the country a month ago by calling the election, came in second with 150 seats. It was followed by the National Rally and its allies, which took 142 places.
The results were compiled by The New York Times using data from the Interior Ministry and confirmed earlier predictions that no party or bloc would win a majority.
The details of the result may still change, but it is clear that, to a remarkable extent, the struggle of the centrists and the left to form a “republican front” to face the National Rally in the second round of voting worked. Candidates across France withdrew from three-way races and called for unity against Ms Le Pen’s party.
“The president now has the task of inviting the New Popular Front to govern,” said Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the far-left leader who is the charismatic but polarizing voice of the left-wing coalition. “We are ready.”
But France looked almost ungoverned, with the Paris Olympics opening in less than three weeks. The left grew, the National Rally added dozens of seats to its presence in the National Assembly and Mr Macron’s party suffered a crushing defeat, with the 250 seats held by his party and its allies in the National Assembly reduced by around a third.
The result was that in the sharply divided lower house of Parliament, where most legislative power resides, no governing coalition seemed immediately conceivable, with Mr Macron’s centrists wedged between far-right and far-left groups who loathe each other and him. .
Jordan Bardela, a protégé of Ms Le Pen who led the National Rally to victory in European Parliament elections and the first round of parliamentary elections last month, called the deals that thwarted her push for an outright majority an “alliance of the dishonorable” and said that Mr Macron had condemned France to “uncertainty and instability”.
Even with fewer seats than predicted, the National Rally has now taken a place in French politics that erased a post-war political landscape built around the idea that the far-right’s history of overt racism and anti-Semitism made it unfit for positions of power.
Ms Le Pen has repudiated this past. But even in its revamped form, the party’s core message remains that immigrants are undermining a glorified French national identity and that tighter borders and tighter regulations are needed to keep them out or prevent them from benefiting from the French social net. security.
France rejected this vision, but voted overwhelmingly in favor of the change. He didn’t want more of the same. It sent a stinging message to the pro-business elites who have rallied around Mr Macron, who is term-limited and must leave office in 2027.
“France is more divided than ever,” said Alain Duhamel, a prominent political scientist and author. “We learned that it was a very bad idea for Mr. Macron to dissolve parliament and call these elections.”
At a time when a faltering President Biden is struggling to counter the nationalist America First message of former President Donald J. Trump, the prolonged French political vacuum could add to a volatile international situation. Close to Russia, Ms Le Pen has sought to recast herself as a staunch supporter of Ukraine, but there is little doubt that Moscow will welcome the growing influence of the National Rally.
The New Popular Front campaigned on a platform that would raise France’s monthly minimum wage, lower the legal retirement age to 60 from 64, reintroduce wealth tax and freeze the price of energy and natural gas. Instead of reducing immigration, as the National Coalition promised, the alliance said it would make the asylum process more generous and smooth.
The platform said the alliance supports Ukraine’s fight for freedom against Russia and called on President Vladimir V. Putin to “account for his crimes before international justice.”
Exactly how the alliance’s economic program would be financed at a time when France is facing a ballooning budget deficit and how a pro-immigration policy would be implemented in a country where it is perhaps the most sensitive issue was unclear.
The New Popular Front, which is sharply divided between moderate socialists and the far left, did very well among young people in the first round of voting and in heavily North African immigrant-populated projects around major cities, including Paris.
Mr Mélenchon’s staunchly pro-Palestinian stance proved popular in those quarters, although he sparked outrage when he appeared to cross the line into anti-Semitism, accusing Yaël Braun-Pivet, the Jewish speaker of the National Assembly, of “camping out in Tel Aviv to encourage the massacre”. He said of a large demonstration last November against anti-Semitism that “the friends of unconditional support for the massacre have had their appointment”.
Nothing had forced Mr Macron to call early elections, but he was ready to play, he could be a unifying figure against the extremes. In fact, he had lost the charm to do so seven years into office. He declared left and right as obsolete labels when he came to power in 2017. They are not anymore.
However, Mr Macron’s centrist alliance fared better than expected in the end and lived to fight another day.
Mr Macron now appears to have two options, barring resignation, which he has vowed not to consider.
The first is to try to build a broad coalition that could stretch from the left to what is left of moderate Gaullist conservatives, some of whom broke a taboo during the campaign by aligning themselves with the National Rally.
That possibility seems remote. Mr. Macron has made no secret of his strong dislike of Mr. Melanchon. the feeling is rewarding.
The second, less ambitious option would be for Mr Macron to try to form some sort of interim government to handle current affairs.
Mr Macron could, for example, ask former prime ministers from parties in a centrist bloc – his own, the Socialists, the centre-right Republicans – to suggest a government of technocrats or prominent figures who could face a limited agenda in next time. year.
According to the Constitution, at least one year must pass before the next parliamentary elections.
One area where Mr Macron may still be able to exert significant influence, more so than if he had been forced into a “marriage” with Mr Bardella as prime minister, is international and military affairs, his traditional background president in the Fifth Republic.
A staunch supporter of the 27-nation European Union, which the National Rally wants to weaken, he will no doubt continue his push for a “European powerhouse” with more integrated armies, defense industries and technological research, but his influence may be diminished by domestic weakness.
Mr Macron, once tempted by a rapprochement with Mr Putin, has also become an outspoken supporter of Ukraine’s struggle for freedom. With the US presidential election just four months away, doubts have grown about the West’s willingness to continue arming and funding Ukraine.
Russia clearly believes that France will sway. “The people of France seek a sovereign foreign policy that serves their national interests and a break from the dictates of Washington and Brussels,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement a few days ago. “French officials will not be able to ignore these profound changes in the attitudes of the vast majority of citizens.”
France, in short, faces great uncertainty, both internally and externally. It seems that a constitutional crisis cannot be ruled out in the coming months. Gabriel Atal, the outgoing centrist prime minister who tendered his resignation on Sunday, said “tonight no absolute majority can be controlled by the extremes thanks to our determination and our values”.
He claimed a small victory, but of course the center does not have such a majority.
Unlike many other European countries, including Belgium, Italy and Germany, France has no tradition of months-long negotiations to form complex coalition governments between disparate parties or of temporary alliances. Indeed, Charles de Gaulle designed the Fifth Republic in 1958 to end the parliamentary turmoil and short-lived governments of the Fourth Republic.
One theory offered for Mr Macron’s mysterious decision to call the election was that, with the National Rally in power and Mr Bardela as prime minister, the shine would have gone out of the far-right party ahead of the 2027 presidential election.
It was another gamble based on the idea that it’s easier to stand on the sidelines than to make tough government decisions. Mr Macron does not want to hand over the keys to the Elysee Palace, the seat of the presidency, to Ms Le Pen three years from now.
In this sense, the election result may confound Mr. Macron and benefit Ms. Le Pen. She has shown her growing popularity without her party taking on the burdens of office. On the other hand, an entrenched French resistance to the idea of ​​power passing to the far right was once again on display.
