President Emmanuel Macron said Monday he was confident the French would make the right choice in snap elections he called after his centrist alliance was beaten by the far right in EU elections.
President Emmanuel Macron said Monday he was confident the French would make the right choice in snap elections he called after his centrist alliance was beaten by the far right in EU elections.
«I am confident in the capacity of the French people to make the right choice for themselves and for future generations. My sole ambition is to be useful to our country that I love so much,» he said on X.
France will go to the polls to vote for a new National Assembly on 30 June, with a second round on 7 July, Macron announced late Sunday.
Macron’s stunning announcement came after EU election projections showed the far-right National Rally (RN) had scored more than double the votes of his centrist alliance in the French vote.
«The extreme gamble,» wrote daily Liberation in the front-page headline of its Monday edition.In his address to the nation, Macron noted that in total far-right parties in France had won almost 40 percent of the vote.»It is a situation to which I cannot resign myself… I cannot act as if nothing had happened,» Macron added.
The presidential camp now just has three weeks to make up ground on the RN in a short but intense burst of campaigning before France hosts the Paris Olympics in July and August.
With turnout in the European elections projected in France at just over 52 percent, Macron’s allies will be hoping to attract voters who stayed at home to block the far right.
In a best-case scenario for Macron, his centrist alliance would recover the absolute majority it lost in 2022 legislative elections and give new impetus to the remaining three years of his presidential mandate.
The nightmare outcome for him would be the RN winning a majority. That would likely see its leader Jordan Bardella, a protege of three-time presidential candidate Marine Le Pen, become prime minister in an uncomfortable «cohabitation».
