The far-right National Rally in France is set to beat President Emmanuel Macron’s Renaissance by a wide margin in the country’s European Parliament elections, according to broadcasters’ projections from Sunday evening.
The eurosceptic National Rally received 31.5 to 32.4% of the vote, while Macron’s pro-European camp only received around 15.2%, broadcasters France 2 and TF1 reported on Sunday after the polls closed.
The Socialists came third with 14 to 14.3%, just behind Macron’s centrist bloc, according to the projections.
The result is a bitter defeat for Macron. The right-wing nationalists were already ahead of his camp in the last European elections in 2019. However, while the right only had a narrow lead back then, they have now increased this considerably and probably won around twice as many votes as Macron’s centrist forces.
National Rally’s landslide victory is likely to put further pressure on the government, which no longer has an absolute majority in the lower house of parliament, the National Assembly.
France is also looking ahead to the 2027 presidential election: Macron, who won the run-off election twice against the right-wing figurehead Marine Le Pen, will not be able to run again after two terms in office.
It is still unclear who the centre-right forces will send into the race and who would stand a chance against Le Pen.
The daughter of far-right founder of the party then known as the National Front, Jean-Marie Le Pen, has successfully managed to present a much more moderate image in recent years and make her party electable, making major gains with centre-right voters.
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