Marine Le Pen's Far-Right National Rally Surges in Snap Election

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France’s far right has won the first round of voting in a snap election, followed closely by the left, as President Emmanuel Macron’s coalition is trounced. We go to Paris for an update as the far-right National Rally party of Marine Le Pen shocked the French establishment after winning the most votes in the first round of parliamentary elections on Sunday. A broad alliance of left-wing parties calling itself the New Popular Front came second, while President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist bloc fell to third place. Macron called the snap election after the National Rally won the most seats in last month’s vote for European Parliament, even though his own presidential term runs until 2027. A second round of voting on July 7 will decide the final makeup of the National Assembly, but if the National Rally wins outright, it will mark the first time the far right has governed in France since the Nazi occupation during World War II. “This decision was timed at a moment when the far right was at its strongest historical position in modern French political history, and they’ve capitalized on that,” says Harrison Stetler, an independent journalist and teacher based in Paris. He says that while the left has already committed to forming “a republican front against the far right,” Macron’s centrist forces have sent “mixed signals” on joining forces after a campaign in which they recklessly portrayed both the left and the right as equally dangerous to the country.


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