French Election: Thoughts and Reactions to First Round Results
July 1, 2024
London, UK. Monday morning, July 1st. The first round of the French election is over. Next up is the UK election on Thursday and then the second round of the French election on Sunday. Because of all of this action, I may be writing more this week - perhaps even more than once a day on occasion. Here’s what’s going on this morning in France.
The neo-fascist National Rally (RN) won less than a third of the vote in yesterday’s first round of elections for the National Assembly. The National Assembly is the lower house of France’s Parliament and is more similar to the UK’s House of Commons than the US’s House of Representatives, although its bicameralism owes more to the American version than the British. This is an important and dangerous shift in French politics. Media outlets are correctly reporting the results as dominant victory for RN, considering only a decade and half ago they were considered a fringe party.
However, the results appear to be lower than initially reported.1 The official results show that only 29.25% voted for RN, lower than the 33% in the polling.2 The left-wing New Popular Front (NPF) received 27.99% and President Macron’s centrist Ensemble coalition won 20.04% - both consistent with the polling. The Republicans got 6.57%, lower than the final 10% in the polling,3 but consistent with prior polling.
The results and the polling are sometimes difficult to read because of the number of political parties in France and the way various reporters combine results. And then there is the strange confluence of numbers we see. For example, RN was polling 33% in the last few days of the campaign. But those polls did not combine RN with smaller right wing parties. In the end, NR and its allies got 33% of the vote, but if we add those parties in the polling then NR plus allies were at 36% (which is what the very last poll by Ipsos did).
Nevertheless, the polling was consistent when considered as individual blocs: NR was going to get 33% of the vote; NPF 28% of the vote; Ensemble 20%; and Republicans 10%.4 The polling was correct for the latter two, but off by four points for RN. That means that there are four points missing. So if all of the results are consistent for the top four blocs with the polling except for RN, then where did those other votes go?
The answer is they went to other right-wing parties. The Union of the Right (UDX), which is not really more extreme than NR except that they do not pretend to moderate their views for electability, got 3.90% — far more than the 1% they were getting in the polling. All other right wing parties received 3.66% of the vote, also far higher than the 1% they were collectively polling.
This is not bad news for RN. Why? Because of the two-round system. While most of those minor right wing parties failed to make the 12.5% threshold in any of France’s 577 constituencies, those are all votes for RN in the second round.5 This explains why even with a lower than expected vote in the first round, RN is in a strong position to win at least a third, and perhaps more, seats in the National Assembly after next Sunday’s second round.6
Very few seats are typically won during the first round, which requires a candidate to receive over 50% of the vote. According to the official French returns, 76 seats were won outright yesterday: RN won 37, NPF won 32, Ensemble won 2, the Republicans won 1, UDX won 1, DVD (right wing) won 2, and EXD (far right) won 1. This means that 501 constituencies will vote in the second round on July 7th.
Historically, almost all constituencies see only two candidates in the second round. But that is not the case this year. Perhaps because of the high turnout (64.99% compared to 47.5% in the last election in 2022), in about 40% of these 501 constituencies will see more than two candidates. According to the New York Times, over 200 constituencies will have at least three candidates in the second round. In the last election, this occurred in only eight. Parties on the left and center are calling on their candidates who finished above the threshold but lower than another non-right candidate to drop out. As of late this morning, it’s not clear how well that is going to work. While there has been lack of discipline on the left in the past, NPF has been highly disciplined in the election so far. The parties in Ensemble are another question (and it is a question - they are relatively new and untested when it comes to political collaboration).
Over the next 24 hours we should know if and how many third-place finishers are dropping out. There are only six more days until the second round, and the campaign will be intense. RN parliamentary leader Jordan Bardella has been on television and the campaign trail telling voters that the party is mainstream and respects the values of the Republic. He’s been finishing speeches with “liberté, égalité, fraternité” — somewhat akin to a US politician saying “God bless America, but with even more significance. Liberté, égalité, fraternité is not just the French motto; it is a specific call-back to revolutionary values, an attempt by Bardella to place RN in the legitimate political legacy of the Republic. He has even got reporters repeating his claim that the party supports civil rights and equality, while downplaying the extreme nationalism and anti-immigration missions that are central to NR as a political party.7 The strategy is straight out of the fascist playbook on winning elections: make voters convince themselves they are not supporting an extreme party by pretending moderation. While it’s not out of the question that RN could win an outright majority on Sunday, it is clear that France has a significant fascist problem on its hands. And that is not good for democracy or Europe, let alone France.
If you read closely, you’ll see BBC and New York Times reporting that 33% is the amount that NR and other right wing parties got. However, the headlines continue to inaccurately say that NR won a third of the vote. It did not.
The NR plus other small right wing parties won 33% of the vote.
However, Republicans and their allies did get 10%.
For some reason, Republicans were almost always polled (or reported) with their allies unlike the the top three blocs.
The UXD won one seat outright yesterday and two seats were won by other minor right wing parties.
Minor left wing parties received less than the 4% they were polling and there were some other extreme right wing parties that got a few votes, but one of them - that only got 56,000 votes nationwide - voted actually won a seat outright yesterday.
I heard as much from one reporter on SkyNews this morning. SkyNews is a conservative news outlet, but that would not recognizable to an American audience. It is highly professional and deals intelligently with different viewpoints. It’s conservative like The Economist is conservative.