France goes to the polls on Sunday for the first round of legislative elections that President Emmanuel Macron unexpectedly called this month, a gamble that has plunged the country into uncertainty about its future.
Voters elect 577 representatives to the National Assembly, the country’s lower and more important house of parliament, which will determine the future of Mr Macron’s second term.
A new majority of MPs opposed to Mr Macron will force him to appoint a political opponent as prime minister, radically altering France’s domestic policy and disrupting foreign policy. In the absence of a clear majority, the country could experience unrest or political deadlock. Mr Macron, who refused to resign, could not call new legislative elections for another year.
France’s nationalist anti-immigrant National Rally party is expected to dominate the race. A broad alliance of left-wing parties could be second. Mr Macron’s centrist Renaissance Party and its allies are expected to lose many seats.
Most polls will close at 6pm local time on Sunday, or until 8pm in major cities. National vote projections provided by polling agencies, based on early results, are expected after 8pm and are generally reliable. The official results, published by the Ministry of Home Affairs, will come in the evening.
Here’s what you want.
Voting takes place in two rounds, and participation is expected to be high.
France’s 577 electoral districts – one for each seat – cover the mainland, overseas departments and territories, and French citizens living abroad. In each district, the seat is awarded to the candidate who receives the most votes.
Any number of candidates can compete in the first round in each district, but there is a certain threshold to reach the second round, which will be held a week later, on July 7.
In most cases, the runoff features the top two vote getters, and whoever wins the most votes in the runoff wins the race. But there are exceptions.
Candidates who get more than 50 percent of the votes in the first round win outright, if the votes are at least a quarter of the registered voters in the district. And runoffs in some districts could feature three or even four candidates if they can get the same number of votes as at least 12.5 percent of registered voters.
Both scenarios have been rare in recent years, but are more likely if voter turnout is low, as expected on Sunday. Most polling agencies expect voter participation to exceed 60 percent in the first round, compared to 47.5 percent in 2022.
French legislative elections usually occur just weeks after the presidential race and usually favor whichever party recently won the presidency, making the election less likely to attract voters who feel the outcome is predetermined.
But the stakes are higher this time.
A surging far right, a strong left-wing alliance and a shrinking center are shown.
The goal for each party and its allies is to get enough seats to form a working majority. If no one does, France could face months of political chaos or gridlock.
But if control of the National Assembly returns to Mr Macron’s opposition, he will be forced to choose a prime minister and cabinet of a different political party, which will then control domestic policy. The president traditionally retains control over foreign policy and defense matters in these scenarios, but the Constitution does not always provide clear guidelines.
The National Rally has a comfortable lead in the latest opinion polls, with the support of about 36 percent of voters. After decades on the fringes, the anti-immigrant, euroskeptic far-right has never come close to the French government, which would be a surprising development in a country that has been at the heart of the European project. The National Rally prime minister could clash with Mr Macron over issues like France’s contribution to the EU budget or support for Ukraine in its war against Russia.
The alliance of the Socialist Party, Greens, Communists and France’s hard-left Unbowed Party has polled in second place, with around 29 percent support, and believes it has a chance to overcome the far-right and form its own government. The alliance wants to undo some of what Mr Macron’s government has done over the past seven years, such as raising the legal retirement age. It also wants to restore corporate tax cuts and tax cuts for the wealthy in order to increase social spending, and get minimum wage increases.
For Mr Macron’s centrist party and its allies, the contest is an uphill battle. The polls put him in third place, with about 20 percent, and most predict he will lose most of the 250 seats he holds. Several of Mr Macron’s political allies are running – leaders of other centrist parties, some of his own ministers and even the prime minister – and defeat for anyone would be a blow.
The results of the first round can give an imperfect sense of where voters will go.
In 2022, Mr Macron’s centrist coalition and the left were neck and neck in the first round of voting, ahead of all other parties, with about a quarter of the vote each. A week later, both sides were still ahead of the competition – but Mr Macron’s coalition won almost 250 seats, and the left won less than 150.
In other words, while the first round of voting is an indicator of what the final result is, it is not a perfect predictor.
One way to analyze the first round is to look at voting trends nationwide: What percentage of the vote did each party get across the country? This is a good way to see if the polls accurately predict the general popularity of each party, and to see which forces have momentum for the final weeks of the campaign.
But the national voting percentage obscures the fact that the French legislative elections are, in essence, 577 separate races, and each seat is decided only after the second round.
the prospects of each party depends on how many candidate runoffs are in – the more they reach, the stronger the probability of the party coming ahead on July 7. What kind of matchups they will face will also become clear.
And a lot happens between the two rounds. Voters whose preferred candidate doesn’t make it to the runoff will go elsewhere, or just stay home.
Parties will issue local or national voting recommendations to try to influence the outcome. In the past, parties across the spectrum have often asked their members to vote strategically against the right, but that tactic has broken down.
Candidates can decide to withdraw from the third or fourth race if they are worried about splitting the vote; several left-wing parties have announced that they will support their candidates.
There is also a new week of campaign – more than enough time for gaffes, missteps or twists that can change the course of any race.
