A crushing blow for Emmanuel Macron’s centrist alliance
A big turnout for Le Pen’s hard right makes clear the president’s gamble backfired spectacularly
A DRAMATIC NEW era began in France on June 30th when Marine Le Pen’s hard-right party took a massive lead in first-round voting for the lower house of parliament. Her National Rally (RN) has never been so close to governing France. Official results showed that the RN had secured 33.2% of the vote. IPSOS, a pollster, estimated that, as France now heads to a final run-off vote on July 7th, this puts it on course to win 230-280 seats in the 577-seat National Assembly, up from 88, and become easily the biggest group in parliament. A result at the upper end of that range would put the RN in touching distance of an overall majority of 289.
Explore more
The threat to free speech in Germany
One of the freest countries in the world takes a hammer to its own reputation
Europe’s streets are alive with the sound of protests
An arc of discontent runs through Serbia and Turkey
Young men in Spain love the hardline Vox
They find the rough populism of the hard right appealing
Power is being monopolised in Ukraine
Critics say the presidency is becoming too mighty, and making mistakes
Trump’s Ukraine ceasefire is slipping away
The American president increasingly looks like Russia’s willing dupe
Russia continues to rain down death on Ukrainian cities
Soldiers can hold the line, but drones and missiles are killing civilians