France’s far-right won a landslide victory in Sunday’s parliamentary elections, almost increasing the number of its members and consolidating the party’s rise from the margins to the ruling opposition. Since taking office in 2011, leader Marine Le Pen has sought to rid the National Front – now called the National Rally (RN) – of the anti-Semitic image she gained under her father’s nearly 40-year leadership. former paratrooper Jean-Marie Le Pen. With 42 percent of the vote in the April presidential election, Le Pen had already taken advantage of the general frustration with President Emanuel Macron and identified anger across the country over the rising cost of living and the decline of many rural communities. On Sunday, he went one step further. According to estimates, Lepen’s party will win between 85 and 90 seats, from just two in 2012 and eight in 2017, which could make it the second largest party in parliament. The big pollsters last week counted only 25-50 seats. “We have achieved our three goals: to make Emanuel Macron president of a minority, without control of power, and to continue the political reshuffle necessary for democratic renewal,” a triumphant Le Pen told reporters after her re-election in northern France. the promise. to be a respectable opposition. “And the formation of a determined opposition group against the deconstructors from above, the Macronists and the Noupes from below,” he said, referring to the left-wing coalition, which should become the largest opposition bloc in parliament, but whose main far left party, La France Insoumise, is set to win fewer seats than the RN. Sunday’s result killed a “republican front” of voters from all walks of life who had rallied behind a ruling candidate to prevent the far right from advancing. He also vindicated Le Pen’s strategy to reshape the party’s image, and also refused to join forces with nationalist politician Eric Zemour after the presidential vote. While in terms of seats, Lepen’s party will be behind the left wing, it will allow the RN to have much more weight in parliament. It will be able, for example, to vote no-confidence against the government, send bills to France’s highest constitutional courts, chair parliamentary committees and have much more time to speak in the National Assembly. “We are facing a democratic shock due to a very strong breach by the Rassemblement National,” Finance Minister Bruno Lemerre told France 2 television.
