France 2024 elections, Le Pen aims for an absolute majority. What can happen at the ballot

Marine Le Pen and her RN dominated the first round of the legislative elections in France. Rassemblement National and its far-right allies reached 33.14% of the vote. Macron’s majority was far behind, Ensemble stopped at 20.04%. The left united in the New Popular Front did better than the gauche, reaching 28%. According to the projections in seats, the far right could, for the first time in France, obtain an absolute majority in the National Assembly and the post of prime minister for Le Pen’s heir, Jordan Bardella. In the projections, the lepenists are in a range between 255 and 295 potential seats, with the absolute majority set at 289. The left would have 120-140 seats, Macron’s majority 90-125 seats. According to data from the Ministry of the Interior, a total of 10,625,662 French people voted.

The reactions

President Emmanuel Macron was the first to speak: “In front of the Rassemblement National, the time has come for a broad, clearly democratic and republican union for the second round.” Jean-Luc Mélenchon, from the left, said: “Not even one vote will go to the RN, wherever we are third we will withdraw our candidate.” With the consequent indication of voting for RN’s local opponent, in this case the Macronian majority. The same line was then taken by Raphael Glucksmann, the leader of Place Publique and one of the main exponents of the ‘New Popular Front’ coalition. Aware of the enormous stakes and the non-positive perception of La France Insoumise among centrists and the moderate right, Glucksmann, who brought the Socialist Party back to third place in the European elections, raised the cry of alarm: “We have 7 days to avoid a catastrophe in France”. On the other hand, the winner Marine Le Pen rejoiced: “We have begun to cancel the Macronian block”. The dolphin, Jordan Bardella, adds: “The outcome of the vote represents a verdict without appeal, a clear aspiration of the French to change”. For the far-right prime minister candidate, “alternation is within reach”, there is “unprecedented hope throughout the country”. “I will be everyone’s prime minister” he added, maintaining that Sunday’s vote will be one “of the most decisive in the entire history of the Fifth Republic”.

The alliances

Macron called for “republican union” to form a bloc against the far right. Ahead of the second round he asked to study every single constituency in France to find alliances “case by case”, including with candidates from France Insoumise (LFI). Other members of the majority gave less clear indications. Edouard Philippe, for example, called on his militants “to desist to avoid the election of RN or LFI candidates, La France Insoumise”. Since LFI is the decidedly strongest party in the left-wing coalition, the desistance dam would break wherever there are majority candidates who desist but whose votes will not go to the Front Populaire if the local candidate is from LFI. On the other front, the Républicains who did not follow Eric Ciotti in his agreement with Marine Le Pen, and who nevertheless obtained a considerable 10% of the votes, have already announced, for their part, that they will not give deliveries of votes to their voters .

The run-up to the ballot

The crucial week for the future of the République has already begun. Among the 577 constituencies that elect the 577 deputies of the new National Assembly, there are a large majority that the parties will compete for next Sunday in the second round. On the basis of agreements, withdrawals, carryovers and voting instructions, which will be decided during the next 7 days. The constituencies in which the majority was not reached yesterday are the object of a vote hunt. In particular, those in which there will be three qualified for the second round on July 7, the famous “triangular” of the French runoff. Macron’s majority, which is the weakest of the three main lists (Rassemblement National, Nouvelle Front Populaire and the government majority united in Ensemble), must hope to have had access to the greatest number of “triangular” candidates, so as to be able to try to win in some of these challenges, and to give up in others, inviting its voters to vote for one of the two lists most likely to win the final prize. On the basis of these calculations, analysts have studied all the possible hypotheses that can be pursued from Monday 8 July for the government of the country. Governability had already been compromised with the transition from Macron’s first term (2017-2022), in which the government had an absolute majority (350 seats out of 577), to the second, in which it had to settle for 250 seats for the first 2 years. With the decision to dissolve Parliament, Macron has taken on the responsibility of having even fewer seats, given all the electoral forecasts of a sharp decline in the outgoing majority.

What could happen

These are the main hypotheses that arise, in perspective, after the vote in the second round:

• ABSOLUTE MAJORITY IN THE RN: already strong with 88 deputies, the Le Pen party could win over 289 seats. Or, with a few dozen less, go to government anyway by counting on the support of external deputies with whom an agreement has been reached. This fourth case of cohabitation in the Fifth Republic between a president of one political color and a prime minister of another, is based on the certainty that Jordan Bardella, candidate of the party of possible majority, the RN, will be nominated by Macron. This is not an automatic process, according to the French Constitution, but a custom, since the head of state must ensure that the person nominated obtains the confidence of Parliament and, in the case of an absolute majority of the RN, the choice would be obligatory.

• MAJORITY RELATIVE TO RN: Bardella stated that with this hypothesis he would not have the tools to ensure the French “change”. It would be one of the most evident cases of ungovernability in the country, since the proposals of a possible RN prime minister would be immediately rejected in the chamber by the union of the New Popular Front of the left together with the deputies of Ensemble.

• VICTORY OF THE LEF: In the event of a majority, even a relative one, of the Popular Front (France Insoumise, Ps, PCF and ecologists), the doors of government would be opened to a left-wing prime minister. So far, the leaders of the coalition parties have tried hard to convince voters, who are largely reluctant to appoint Jean-Luc Mélenchon, that the prime ministerial candidate will be a moderate. The candidate who has emerged most strongly is François Ruffin, also from La France Insoumise but not as divisive a personality as Mélenchon. On the hypothesis of Emmanuel Macron’s resignation, repeatedly advanced by Marine Le Pen in the event of a defeat of the government majority, the Elysée has taken a position, with the assurance that the president will remain in office until the end of his mandate, in May 2027. Finally, there are no indications – nor precedents in France – of a “technical” government, a hypothesis advanced by some commentators in the event of total ungovernability, given the impossibility of dissolving Parliament again before a year after the last dissolution (June 9).

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