The coalition led by left-wing populist Jean-Luc Mélenchon has 182 of the 589 seats in the National Assembly. The right-wing populists of Marine Le Pen, who were favored following the first round of voting, came in third place with 143 seats, behind the presidential alliance Ensemble with 168 seats. Prime Minister Gabriel Attal announced his resignation.
After the first forecasts were published on election night, Attal said that he would submit his resignation to President Emmanuel Macron on Monday. Macron’s centrist camp no longer has a majority in parliament. Macron can ask Attal and the government to remain in office on an interim basis to deal with day-to-day business. This was expected in view of the Olympic Games in Paris, which begin on July 26. The 34-year-old has only been in office since January. He is considered popular and unifying, but as the government camp’s leading candidate in the election campaign he was fighting a losing battle. Macron did not comment on election night.
Left parties thwarted Macron’s plan
Macron had called the election following the convincing victory of the right-wing populist Rassemblement National (RN) in the European elections in June in order to confirm the government majority (currently 250 seats). He apparently wanted to offer himself to voters – as he had done with his own election victories in 2017 and 2022 – as a bulwark once morest right-wing populism. The left-wing parties thwarted this plan by forging a joint alliance within a few days, which then came second behind the right-wing populist RN in the first round of voting on June 30. As a result, the left-wing alliance and the presidential camp made tactical agreements to prevent the election of RN candidates in the runoff on Sunday.
Shock in the right-wing populist camp was great
The shock in the right-wing populist camp, confident of victory, was great. Party leader Marine Le Pen spoke of a “postponed” victory for her party, the Rassemblement National. “The tide is rising. It has not risen high enough this time, but it is still rising and that is why our victory is only postponed,” she said on the TF1 television channel. Her party had only lost because of the tactical agreements of its opponents. RN leader Jordan Bardella warned that France was now falling into the clutches of the radical left. Bardella had hoped for an absolute majority for his party and had already seen himself as prime minister. All polls had predicted at least a relative majority for the RN in the new parliament.
Video: The results
The victorious left-wing alliance immediately made a claim to government. “The New Popular Front is ready to govern,” said the former head of the left-wing populist La France Insoumise (LFI), Jean-Luc Mélenchon. Socialist leader Olivier Faure spoke out explicitly once morest a possible “coalition” with the government camp. “The New Popular Front must take this new page of our history into its own hands,” he announced the implementation of a left-wing social and economic policy. For example, Macron’s pension reform is to be reversed. “It is time to tax the super-rich and their super-profits,” he declared.
Macron in key role
Despite its victory, the left is still far from a governing majority in the new National Assembly. In addition to its 181 seats, 13 seats are held by other left-wing candidates. The same applies to the presidential camp, which has so far been supported by the conservative Republicans. They have been decimated to 45 seats. Center politicians won six seats, while 15 seats went to right-wing politicians. Due to the confusing majority situation, observers still see President Macron in a key role.
Video: Senator Ollivier: French people don’t want right-wing extremists
Former President Francois Hollande made a parliamentary comeback in the election. However, he declared that he was “not a candidate” for the post of prime minister. “To be in a government, do you have to be a candidate to lead it? I am not,” Hollande said on the BMFTV television channel. However, he did hint at ambitions for a ministerial post. Hollande told the France 2 channel that his experience in foreign policy meant he might “be useful in protecting France’s interests.” Hollande won a central French constituency in the election, which he had already represented between 1988 and 1993 and from 1997 to 2012.
“The worst was avoided”
Internationally, the RN’s prevented election victory was positively commented on. “The worst was avoided,” Nils Schmid, foreign policy spokesman for the SPD parliamentary group, told the newspapers of the Funke Media Group. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz did not comment at first. “There is enthusiasm in Paris, disappointment in Moscow, relief in Kiev. In Warsaw, people are satisfied,” wrote Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk on the short message service X. Nikos Androulakis, chairman of the Greek socialist party PASOK, said that the French people had “built a wall once morest right-wing extremism, racism and intolerance and preserved the timeless principles of the French Republic: liberty, equality and fraternity.”
According to a press release, SPÖ leader Andreas Babler was delighted with the left-wing alliance’s surprising victory in France. “Contrary to all polls, today has shown once once more that the right can be stopped,” said Babler. “I am convinced that it is possible to prevent a right-wing government in Austria and to improve people’s living conditions once more with a SP-led government.”
Riots and clashes
Rallies on election night resulted in serious riots and clashes in Paris and other cities. In Paris, thousands of people gathered on the Place de la République in the center of the capital to celebrate the left-wing alliance’s victory in the early election. The police used tear gas once morest rampaging demonstrators. Wooden barricades were set on fire. In the center of Paris, a number of shops and banks had secured their windows with wooden boards on election day in anticipation of feared riots.
Clashes between anti-fascists and the police were also reported in Lille in northern France. Here, the police also used tear gas once morest the people. In Rennes in western France, according to media reports, 25 people were arrested following riot police used tear gas once morest left-wing demonstrators who had chanted, among other things, “Everyone hates the police.” In Nantes, a police officer was injured by a Molotov cocktail, according to a report in the local newspaper. Demonstrators threw fireworks at the security forces, who in turn used tear gas. In France’s second largest city, Marseille, large numbers of people also gathered in the city center to celebrate the left’s election victory. The police initially held back while the demonstrators shouted slogans once morest right-wing media.
