Now the Rassemblement National movement has made a major breakthrough in the National Assembly. It has increased its number of seats tenfold to 89 since the parliamentary elections, greatly overshadowing the far-right performance of the far-right movement with 35 seats in 1986 and placing the party and Le Pen at the center of daily politics in France. Although a further 200 seats were required by the majority to control the 577-member assembly, the strong result confused expectations even of Lepen’s own party, which tended to perform poorly in both legislatures and gives more voice affect the agenda on issues such as immigration or security. As Lepen came closer than ever to the presidency in the second round against centrist Emanuel Macron in April, the result also marks the culmination of her quest to rid the anti-immigrant, Eurosceptic party founded by her father of racism. . picture. “This puts Le Pen back in the game,” said Pascal Perrineau, a professor at Science Po University. “She will be very present in the discussions and will be the leader of the opposition.” By itself, the RN will not be able to promote policies. The challenge for the next five years will be to show that it is a constructive party in parliament rather than a marginal protest movement, Perrineau added.

				You see a snapshot of an interactive graphic.  This is most likely due to the fact that you are offline or that JavaScript is disabled in your browser.

But the RN’s appearance made him the main runner-up in the Macron’s Ensemble (Together) bloc, although the Nupes alliance of left-wing and green parties led by Jean-Luc Mélenchon has more MPs, with 131 seats. Macron, meanwhile, did not have a majority. With just eight seats after the 2017 election, Le Pen had said the party would be happy with a few dozen this time. The focus was on Melanson’s most aggressive campaign, which targeted Macron’s unpopular policies, such as his plan to raise the retirement age. However, years of growing support outside its traditional bastions in the industrial north and around Marseilles and the high turnout boosted the RN. He also endorsed the ten-year-old reform of Le Pen’s party to focus not only on immigration and crime but also on economic issues, making it home to many disenfranchised voters. “We are on the verge of becoming a ruling party,” said new RN MP Edwige Diaz © Thibaud Moritz / AFP / Getty Images “It’s no coincidence,” said Edwige Diaz, a 34 – year – old woman who won a RN seat in the Gironde apartment near Bordeaux, which is littered with picturesque vineyards but plagued by poverty. “We are slowly consolidating our local presence.” Diaz added: “Down [Marine’s father] Jean-Marie Le Pen, the National Front was a protest party. Subsequently, under Marine Le Pen, the Rassemblement National developed into a serious opposition party. “Now we are on the verge of becoming a governing party.” In previous elections, a “Republican front” where voters rallied behind candidates likely to defeat the far right had thwarted such revelations. That hypothesis remained stable in the second round of the April presidential election, with left-wing voters eventually backing Macron. However, he collapsed in Sunday’s legislative vote, with voters fueled by anti-Macron sentiment in some cases reluctant to back his candidates against RN rivals or preferring to abstain, according to opinion polls and analysts. Macron voters also failed to support Nupes’s candidates in the constituencies where they faced a run-off against RN. “There is no longer any form of democratic front at the local level,” said Mathieu Gallard, director of research at the Ipsos poll. “You have three camps that do not unite to form a blockade.”

				You see a snapshot of an interactive graphic.  This is most likely due to the fact that you are offline or that JavaScript is disabled in your browser.

At a party on election night for the Melanson bloc, some beat Macron for failing to call on his constituents to help defeat Le Pen. “He owes us his election in 2017, he owes us his re-election in 2022 and when we were able to support RN, they refused to [call to vote for us] “And even worse: we were crushed,” said Green politician Julien Bayou. The results also show Le Pen’s success in blurring traditional political lines. One-third of voters who supported the Red-Green Nupes alliance in the first round of voting voted for the Macron’s Ensemble in the second round, according to a Harris Interactive poll, but nearly a quarter of them chose to support RN candidates. The unexpected increase in seats also alleviates the financial problems that have plagued the movement for some time due to the refusal of French banks to lend to itself or the party. In 2014, they were forced to turn to a Russian bank for financing, and Le Pen’s latest presidential campaign was supported by a personal loan from a Hungarian bank close to Viktor Orban. The French parties receive money based on the number of votes they won in the first round of parliamentary elections, as well as 37,000 euros for each member of parliament who is elected. The RN can expect to receive about 10 million euros a year for the five-year term – an unprecedented amount that party officials said would allow it not only to pay off its debts, but also to hire more staff and professionalize its parliament. presence. Le Pen, which won in its northern Pas-de-Calais constituency, is already pushing for as much influence as possible, challenging Mélenchon’s left-wing alliance to chair the National Assembly’s crucial economic committee, a position reserved for the opposition. In a speech, she hailed the result despite the “highly unfair” electoral system and promised to promote the party’s concerns about immigration and security in the assembly. “The new faces you will discover, who are full of enthusiasm and life, are at the forefront of the new political elite who will take responsibility for this country when Macron’s adventure ends,” he said. Additional mention by Akila Quinio