Seen from abroad. The domination of the RN, “make no mistake, it’s historic”
“There are two giant screens, colored light beams and music played at a high level,” describes the BBC in his live devoted to the first round of the French legislative elections. As the journalist of Time Valérie de Graffenried, the British media spends the evening live from Henin Baumont (Pas de Calais), where 700 activists from the National Rally (RN) are expected to celebrate their party’s results. But also those of Marine Le Pen.
The candidate beaten by Emmanuel Macron in the last presidential election has in fact just been re-elected in the first round in her constituency of Pas-de-Calais, she announced to applause shortly after 8 p.m. The French “rendered a final verdict and confirmed their aspiration for change”declared the president of the far-right party, Jordan Bardella, from the Wagram room in Paris.
Credited with 33 to 35% of the votes cast, the RN and its allies can already consider “a strong relative majority, or even an absolute majority at the end of the second round next Sunday”explain The weather.
According to the live broadcast of the German newspaper The Time, the victory of the National Rally (which could obtain between 240 and 310 seats in the future National Assembly according to initial projections) “was expected”But for the foreign press, it is still important. “Make no mistake, this is historicspecifies the BBC: The National Rally had never won the first round of legislative elections before. And as pointed out Politico Europe, the extreme right “has never been so close to power and to forming a cohabitation government, with Macron as president.”
A first “since Vichy France?”
“Until now, it was unthinkable that a far-right government could come to power in France., remember CNN. In the past, opposition parties made ‘marriages of convenience’ with the majority in order to prevent the RN – formerly called the National Front – from coming to power.” Now, Jordan Bardella, 28, president of the far-right party, could become “the youngest Prime Minister in Europe in almost 200 years”. Emmanuel Macron thus risks having to share power “with the first far-right government since Vichy France”, even underlines the American daily Wall Street Journal.
“There is now no longer any shame in voting for a party renamed by (Marine Le Pen) in 2018 ‘National Rally’”, explained The Spectator even before the announcement of the results of the first round. Thanks to the strategy of “de-demonization” Established year after year by Marine Le Pen, the party unites.A political party had never been so well named,” even says the British conservative weekly.
A statement confirmed by various reports in the foreign press. In Provins, in Seine-et-Marne, The Mirror tells how he became almost banal to vote for the far-right party. “‘We should try the RN, we’ve never tried it.’ People say this calmly, as if they were choosing pasta at the supermarket. ‘Ah, look, this brown macaroni, it’s something new. We’ve never tried it yet.’”
Same story on the side of The Vanguardia, who went to Aisne, where the extreme right “conquers ever-wider territories and social classes”. “When I was young, I was a socialist activist and I even went out at night to put up posters,” “Bernard, a 79-year-old retired teacher, explains to the Spanish newspaper.I voted for François Mitterrand and even once for Mélenchon. Now I have moved to the RN.”
In Toulon, The Washington Post has met Charley Lenzini, 89, who has always voted for the Socialist Party but was preparing to give his ballot to the far-right party for the first time. “If someone comes to France to eat because they are starving, that is understandable, he explained. But allowing him to take his father, his grandfather and his cousins is not normal.”
