Macron is just ahead in the polls, but turns cannot be ruled out. The first round two weeks ago painted a scenario that was not at all decisive and left everything in limbo: in the lead the outgoing president with 27.8% of the vote and in second place the challenger with 23.1%. In third place, but just a percentage point behind, was France Insoumise’s radical left ‘tribune’, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, with 22% of the vote.
The left does not openly side with Macron
– A huge vote pool of an orphaned left candidate in the poll, with only one in three voters saying they will vote for Macron. Most supporters of the radical left will stay at home, vote blank or even vote for Le Pen.
The centre-right electorate is also divided
– Similar uncertainties exist on the Républicains’ right, who completely missed the presidency mission by presenting Valérie Pécresse for the Elysée, which ended up under 5%. On the right, too, the huge moderate reservoir is likely to be largely divided between those who want to stay on the far right and those who were closer to polemicist Eric Zemmour than the moderates.
Unknown abstention
– The previous evening’s polls predicted an abstention rate that would be a record for the second round, between 25 and 30%, a percentage that would weigh like a boulder on the voting intentions of the two candidates in these two weeks: between 53 and 57 % for Macron, between 43 and 47% for Le Pen, again with a margin of error of 3-3.2%. A possible gap for the outgoing president, still much smaller than the 66% by which he won the election five years ago, putting the opponent at 34%. Until the last rally or election meeting, the two candidates urged their supporters to vote without listening to the polls.
In Wednesday’s televised duel, a clear majority – 59% versus 39% – said they liked Macron more than Le Pen. Strong conflict between the two, particularly on economic issues, security, schools, pensions. Note, on the left, Mélenchon’s declaration that he is a “candidate” for prime minister, inviting his people to vote en masse in June’s general election, which will elect the new parliament. When asked which president he would prefer between the two vying for “living together,” he left no choice. According to many analysts, the parliamentary reshuffle, dubbed the “third round” in France, is becoming more important than ever, as all the conditions for a parliamentary majority other than that of the President are never in place, as in this case.
Waiting for the EU –
Almost all of Europe is following the outcome of the French vote with great interest. Macron is not only the current president of the EU semester, but with the end of the Merkel era, he is also one of the (few) leaders that Brussels looks to for solid support. A page that is more important than ever as Europe is locked in the war in Ukraine. In Brussels, more than one analyst is warning optimists, even as polls give the outgoing president an edge by reminding him what happened with Brexit and with Donald Trump’s victory in the US.
Elsewhere in Europe, the war in Ukraine has changed perspectives in several countries. If it’s no secret in Hungary that the government is cheering on Le Pen, in Mateusz Morawiecki’s Poland there was a dispute with the EU until a few weeks ago, and the friendship between the leader of the Rassemblement National and Moscow weighs heavily. Of course, the yes to Macron in the EU is not without criticism. In the EPP, one would have wished for a match between the outgoing President and Republican Valerie Pecresse. And the Greens are struggling to forgive the role that the tenant of the Elysée ascribes to nuclear energy. But in front of the populist wall, the very large part of the so-called “Metsola majority” will only cheer for one name: Macron.
WHO IS MARINE LE PEN
Real name is Marion Anne Perrine Le Pen. She was born on August 5, 1968 in Neully-sur-Seine, a residential suburb of Paris, the daughter of Jean-Marie Le Pen, founder of the Front National, the main right-wing extremist group in France. born. He joined his father’s party at the age of 18, and in 1998 he received his first political mandate as a regional councilor in Nord-Pas-de-Calais. Within the party, the first positive election results accredit her as a possible future leader, and she begins to set up groups and internal organizations that will form the future of the “clarified” movement. Her first appearances on television built her new character on the far right and in 2004 she was elected MEP. His father’s failure in the 2007 presidential election is offset by his excellent result. He begins to build “his” party, less rigid and more attentive to the popular classes. He expels his father’s lieutenants one by one until he succeeds his parents as President of the Front National in 2011. Another “anti-liberal” twist follows and he gets 17.90% in the 2012 presidential election, improving on his father’s performance in 2002. He begins to gain a foothold on the ground, taking on the victories in the municipal elections and – in parallel – the family war the father, excluded from the party and disowned because of his more extreme positions. In 2015, Jean-Marie Le Pen was expelled from the party he founded. In 2017, Marine comes to the presidential election, but then stumbles head-to-head against the young candidate Emmanuel Macron on television. In the 2022 presidential election, when she seemed to have been ousted by far-right rival Eric Zemmour, she still manages to win the election, always against Macron. She has three children from her first husband, Franck Chauffroy, whom she divorced in 2000 only to remarry to Eric Iorio two years later. Divorced again in 2006. Since 2009, has been paired with National Front Secretary General Louis Aliot, from whom he split in September 2019. | WHO IS EMMANUEL MACRON
Born in Amiens on December 21, 1977, he was the 8th President of the Republic. He studied philosophy before moving to the renowned ENA School of Administration. His career sees him very young at the General Inspectorate of Finance, then as a commercial banker at Rothschild. In politics, he approaches the civic movement of Jean-Pierre Chévenement, a left sovereignist, then the socialists of Michel Rocard, but the turning point comes in 2012 when he is appointed Deputy Secretary General of the President of the Republic under François Hollande. The latter appointed him Economy Minister in August 2014, replacing Arnaud Montebourg. He immediately caused controversy by passing the law regulating Sunday work, then he founded his own movement “En Marche!” with the intention of introducing himself |
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