The end of Le Pen?

PARIS — Seismic earthquakes are rare in France. Political earthquakes, rather more frequent.

Seven years after the rise of Emmanuel Macron transformed the country’s political landscape, last weekend’s parliamentary election has altered its features once again.

Beyond the headlines — the “defeat of the far right,” the “recovery of the left” — French politics are beginning to re-align on a more familiar left vs. right pattern. In the short term, a further splintering of allegiances has left the National Assembly with no obvious majority — or even a dominant minority — for the first time in the 60 years of the fifth republic.

The French, it seems, are going to learn how to be Belgians or Germans or Swiss and master the bizarre art of coalition-building.

One question stands out, however: Is the defeat of Marine Le Pen’s far right — for the third time in seven years — one loss too many? Put another way, having rejected the anti-European, pro-Russian Le Pen three times (or rather four times including her weak performance in 2012), are French voters ever likely to elect her?

I would say no. But there’s a powerful case on the other side.

The fact remains that France, having flirted with Le Pen in round one of the general election, dumped her brutally in round two for the third time since 2017. | Bertrand Guay/AFP via Getty Images

First, this was arguably not a defeat but part of another march toward victory. The far-right bloc in the National Assembly has increased from six seats in 2017 to 88 in 2022 and 143 last weekend.

The French system of public support for political parties is based on the number of votes they receive and how many seats they win. With its success, Le Pen’s National Rally has landed the kind of multi-million euro jackpot that used to go to more mainstream parties, meaning that money will no longer be a problem.

But the fact remains that France, having flirted with Le Pen in round one of the general election, dumped her brutally in round two for the third time since 2017.

This rebuff may prove more damaging than previous rejections. The National Rally entered the election claiming to be a transformed party, made more professional by two years of having a large bloc of deputies in the parliament, and more acceptable by excluding members with racist or radically conspiracist views.

Its campaign was co-led by a fresh and popular new face, National Rally President Jordan Bardella, who at the age of 28 has become a star of TikTok and a fluent performer on 24-hours news channels.

The party ultimately lost because over 200 candidates from left-wing and centrist parties withdrew after round one to permit tactical voting against far-right candidates in round two. But its loss was also due to the exposure of its pretension to be a serious, moderate party as a lie.

Scores of its candidates were unmasked — mostly by stories in regional media — as racists, antisemites, Putin-lovers and Covid-deniers. One was even found to have a criminal record for armed robbery.

Moreover, Bardella and Le Pen flip-flopped on their platform almost daily as the National Rally sought to appear socialist-interventionist to poorer voters, and liberal-anti-taxers to business and middle-class supporters. Bardella’s reputation as a political boy wonder was also undermined by a series of stumbling media performances.

He and Le Pen now have three years (and piles of money) to rebuild. The country will either drift, or mainstream parties will compromise to permit a government to emerge from the muddle of three almost equal-sized blocs of deputies in the National Assembly.

This is a landscape that favors both far-right and far-left populism.

Still, there are other reasons to believe Marine Le Pen will have an uphill task in the 2027 presidential election.

Last Sunday’s results suggest that the three-way, post-2017 division in French politics — radical left, Macronist centre and hard and far right — persists. But there were signs, in both this election and in the June European election, that the old, reformist, pro-European center left was undergoing a revival.

French election final results

Sure, it was far from the transformation achieved by Keir Starmer and the newly ruling Labour Party in the U.K. But the Socialists managed to more than double the number of deputies they have in the new assembly from 31 to 65, meaning they are now only marginally smaller than the hard-left, anti-capitalist, anti-European France Unbowed. And while the Socialists still lack a credible leader at the national level, several regional options exist.

The center-right, ex-Gaullist Les Républicains also had a good election, having refused to follow their leader, Eric Ciotti, into a dishonorable junior partnership with the far right. They emerged, including allies, with 68 deputies — slightly more than before.

So is this the beginning of a reconquest of the right-wing electorate by the successors of Charles De Gaulle, Jacques Chirac and Nicolas Sarkozy? Maybe. But they still suffer from a surfeit of wannabe leaders and no obvious 2027 candidate.

The post-Macron center also has a crowded field of presidential contenders — notably former PM Edouard Philippe (who had a bad election) and current PM Gabriel Attal (who had a good one).

Until Sunday’s outcome the media, especially abroad, seemed convinced that Le Pen was a near-certainty to win the presidency in 2027. If that drumbeat now resumes, it will have to contend with the fact that Le Pen was seriously damaged by her unexpected third place in the election. She can recover, but the 2027 presidential race is now wide open.

The French two-round system favors the consensual against the extreme. Confronted with a second-round choice between Le Pen and “almost anyone” (save the far left), she will likely be rejected again.

France is better off economically than many French people think. It’s also a healthier democracy than some French and foreign commentators believe.