Has Le Pen's far right reached its electoral ceiling?
The municipal elections call into question the growth of the far-right party, and the socialists accuse the radical left of being a "burden" on the progressive bloc.
ParisThe leader of the National Rally (RN), Marine Le Pen, He made no comment on the election results on Sunday night.Only the party president, Jordan Bardella, spoke—very briefly—to celebrate the increase in the number of mayoralties. "It's the biggest gain" in the party's history. "Never before have the RN and its allies held so many elected positions in France," stated Bardella, the party's future presidential candidate if the courts uphold Le Pen's disqualification. Despite his words, neither Bardella's lackluster tone, nor Le Pen's silence, nor the overall atmosphere suggested a night of electoral victory. While the advance of the far right is undeniable, especially in the southeast of the country, the situation remains somewhat different. (Northern Catalonia and Occitania are the new fiefdoms of the RN) And in some northern areas, the majority of the municipalities it has won are in rural areas, in towns or small cities. National Rally only managed to win in one city with more than 100,000 inhabitants, Perpignan, where it already governed. And it secured Nice, where Éric Ciotti, leader of the UDR (Union of the Right), Le Pen's ally, won.
In contrast, the RN lost in cities where it expected to win or had a chance of doing so, such as Marseille, Toulouse, and Nîmes. In Paris, its candidate didn't even make it to the second round. The results show the failure of the far right in the urban vote. Le Pen, despite her efforts, is unable to penetrate the major cities. This is not anecdotal because it demonstrates that the far right has reached an electoral ceiling that it is, for now, unable to break. And it raises doubts about its ability to win a presidential election.
A setback for the presidential race
The second round of the municipal elections "has confirmed the geographical strongholds of the far-right party, but also - and above all - has illustrated the sociological limits of its growth," the newspaper argues. Le MondeThe weakness of Le Pen and Bardella's parties in the cities could hinder their arrival at the Élysée Palace, although other variables come into play in the presidential race.
Le Pen has offered little self-criticism, but some members of the far right are admitting the setback. National Rally (RN) deputy Lauren Jacobelli acknowledged "disappointments" in some cities, attributing the poor results to the refusal of many right-wing candidates to form an alliance with the far right in the second round. "It's the dumbest right wing in the world. They preferred to let a communist win in Nîmes and a former socialist win in Toulon rather than support RN candidates," Jacobelli stated.
On the left, the big loser is La France Insoumise (LFI), the radical left-wing party led by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, which opted as an electoral strategy to run its own candidates, without joining the joint candidacies of the other left-wing parties (Socialists, etc.). The momentum the insubordinate party gained in the first round did not translate into electoral success in the second. LFI only managed to win in six municipalities with more than 3,500 inhabitants.
Failure of the left-wing alliance
If the municipal elections were a test for the 2027 presidential elections, the alliance between the left-wing parties and La France Insoumise (LFI) seems to have little future. In most of the municipalities where LFI had allied with the left in the second round, the electoral failure was evident. This is the case in municipalities like Toulouse, Limoges, Clermont-Ferrand, and Brest, where the united left, with LFI, lost despite having victory within reach.
"La France Insoumise is causing losses," declared the Secretary General of the Socialist Party, Pierre Jouvet. The Socialist leader, Olivier Faure, was equally forceful, accusing Mélenchon of being "a burden" on the left. The tension between LFI and the Socialists has been evident for months and suggests that an alliance for the presidential elections is unlikely.
The right wing, victorious
Looking at the municipal election results, the big winner is the right wing, which has won 1,240 mayoralties out of all municipalities with more than 3,500 inhabitants, while the left wing obtained 802, the center 589, the far right 61, and the left is... well, it's important to note that in France, traditional parties like Les Républicains (the traditional right wing) or the Socialists have much stronger territorial presence than newer parties like La France Insoumise or Rénaixen (President Macron's party). And there are a good number of mayors, especially in small municipalities, without political affiliation. Among the most resounding defeats of these elections is that of former center-right Prime Minister François Bayrou, who had held the mayorship of Pau, in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, for 12 years. The residents decided not to renew their trust. However, former center-right prime minister Édouard Philippe, a presidential hopeful, has retained his position as mayor of Le Havre, a town in Normandy.