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Right-wing tsunami in France – Macron loses parliamentary majority
French President Emmanuel Macron lost his parliamentary majority on Monday after huge electoral gains from a newly formed left-wing alliance and a rebound from the far right, in a stunning blow to his plans for major reforms in his second term, The Times of Israel reports.
The result of Sunday s second round of elections has left French politics in turmoil, with the prospect of a crippled legislature or messy coalitions with Macron forced to seek new allies.
Macron, 44, is now also in danger of being distracted by domestic problems as he aims to play a prominent role in ending the Russian invasion of Ukraine and as a key statesman in the EU.
Macron s "Together" coalition will still be the largest party in the next Assemblée Nationale. But with 245 seats, according to the full results of the Interior Ministry released in the early hours of Monday, she is well short of the 289 seats needed for a majority in the 577-member chamber.
Marine Le Pen s National Rally party made huge gains and will send 89 MPs to the new parliament, compared to eight in the previous parliament. This makes the party the largest right-wing force in parliament, ahead of the traditional right-wing Republicans (LR).
Le Pen, who lost to Macron in the presidential election, was re-elected as an MP in her stronghold of Hénin-Beaumont, in northern France.
Macron s adventure has come to an end," Le Pen said. The group of National Rally lawmakers "will be by far the largest in the history of our political family."
Acting National Rally Chairman Jordan Bardella likened his party s display to a "tsunami." “Tonight s message is that the French people have made Emmanuel Macron a minority president,” he said on TF1 television.
The new left-wing coalition NUPES under 70-year-old hard-left figurehead Jean-Luc Melenchon won 135 seats, according to an AFP count based on results published by the ministry.
The coalition, formed in May after the left split before the April presidential election, unites socialists, the hard left, communists and greens.
Melenchon called Sunday s results "above all an electoral failure" for Macron.
“The presidential party is totally crushed and there will be no majority” in parliament, he told cheering supporters in Paris.
A prominent MP from Melenchon s party, Alexis Corbiere, said the result meant Macron s plan to raise France s retirement age to 65 had "sunk".
Failure for Macron
“This situation poses a risk to our country, given the challenges we face,” Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne said in a televised statement, vowing: “We will work towards a working majority from tomorrow.”
The result put a serious damper on Macron s victory in the presidential election in April, when he became the first French president to win a second term in more than two decades.
"It s a turning point for his image of invincibility," said Bruno Cautres, a researcher at Sciences Po s Center for Political Research.
The daily Le Monde headlined on its website: “Macron is at risk of political paralysis”, while the daily Le Figaro said the results raised the specter of a “stillborn new mandate”.
Macron had hoped to usher in his second term with an ambitious program of tax cuts, social security reform and raising the retirement age. That is now all in jeopardy.
“This will make reform more difficult… It will be much more difficult to govern,” said Dominique Rousseau, a law professor at the Pantheon-Sorbonne University in Paris.
“The blow,” headlined the left-wing Liberation on Monday, adding that the results marked the “fall” of Macron s way of governing.
There could now be weeks of political deadlock as the president tries to reach out to new parties.
The most likely option would be an alliance with the Republicans, the traditional party of the French right, which has 61 MPs.
However, LR chairman Christian Jacob made it clear that there would be no easy partnership and said his party intended to "remain in opposition".
Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire denied that France would be ungovernable, but admitted that "a lot of imagination" would be needed from the ruling party in an "unprecedented situation".
Macron had called on voters last week to give his coalition a "solid majority", adding that "nothing would be worse than adding French disorder to the disorder in the world".
Another blow was that key ministers who ran for election would lose their jobs by agreeing to resign if they fail to win seats.
Health Minister Brigitte Bourguignon, Maritime Affairs Minister Justine Benin and Environment Minister Amelie de Montchalin - a mainstay of Macron s government in recent years - have all lost and will now leave the government.
Two of Macron s other close allies, Speaker of Parliament Richard Ferrand and former Home Secretary Christophe Castaner, both acknowledged defeat in the battle for their seats.
Source: dissident.one
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