Marine Le Pen’s new gentleness is leading the candidate into the second round – just under five percentage points behind incumbent Macron. It will be a tight race, comment observers. Now the President must use the two weeks until the decision – and finally start to mobilize his voters.
“Now we’re going to show the little one,” says the elderly gentleman in my favorite café in the very conservative 7th arrondissement of Paris in the morning, while holding on to his red wine. It’s nine o’clock and he’s about to go to the polling station with his wife. The little one, no doubt who he means by that: Emmanuel Macron, who is physically not even as small as Sarkozy. But he is young, just 44 – and many on the right found that too young in 2017.
That he recently gained a lot of respect because he was the only one in Europe who still spoke to Putin at all – given. That the numbers, whether on the job market or in terms of growth, were very good until Corona came – also a gift. Here in the heart of the city, with a clear view of the Eiffel Tower, people are so wealthy anyway that they are not afraid of increased gas prices. Only if the champagne becomes more expensive, that would be annoying.
If you feel the prices, go vote
But there are other people who could decide this choice anyway: It is the so-called little people that Marine Le Pen had his eyes on. The commuters, who until a week ago paid well over two euros per liter – Macron had recently enforced an immediate 15 cent discount at gas stations, the state paid this very steep election gift. It is the workers who receive the minimum wage and who have difficulty making a living from it. They are those who were already standing at the roundabouts of the republic as yellow vests before the pandemic, because life was simply tight, every month anew.
It’s the French on the periphery, all over the country. You seem to have been waiting for this moment. Looking at the turnout map, it seems as if Parisians have preferred to soak up the sun in the Jardin de Luxembourg or the other parks – or have even gone on Easter vacation. In Marine Le Pen’s strongholds, however, people went to vote – the highest participations were measured in the Var in Provence or in the poor north-east, heartland of the Rassemblement National and thus of Le Pen.
The gentle Le Pen is attracting new voters
Also striking: A particularly large number of young people did not choose Macron. But either Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the Bernie Sanders of France, who promised them the moon and then a little class warfare – and thus got 20 percent of the votes. And they voted for Marine Le Pen. As if she were a completely normal politician and not a right-wing populist – and that’s really a small sensation for which she is solely responsible, because this image change was her plan.
The image change summarized: She broke away from her father, then in 2018 renamed the Front National to Rassemblement National. No more front, merger, that sounds a lot softer. Exit from the EU, Frexit, she buried everything. She was close to the people, no more sharp attacks, she let Éric Zemmour, her ultra-right competitor, who had fear on his side, make them. Le Pen snuggled through. No debates held, but spoken to voters.
And that made her eligible, not only for her core constituency, the ultra-right migrated to Zemmour – maybe that’s good news, there aren’t that many after all: Zemmour only achieved just under 7 percent. But Le Pen was able to collect the others, the disgruntled, the left behind, who think Macron is out of touch and those who believe that someone else has to do it in France now that Sarkozy, Hollande and Macron have been tried.
Most losers for Macron
Also noteworthy: how clearly the French put the old parties on their feet. Valérie Pécresse, candidate of the Républicains, who provided the president for decades with Sarkozy and Chirac, ends up under five percent. Anne Hidalgo, mayor of Paris and Socialist candidate, venerable Mitterand party, ends up below two percent.
Hidalgo, Pécresse, Yadot from the Greens and even Mélenchon – they are all now calling for Macron to be elected, “Le Pen should not get any votes from his voters,” says the ultra-left Mélenchon, for example. Only Zemmour wants to choose his enemy Le Pen, a curious move.
Macron now has to admit that his tactics didn’t quite work: he wanted to sit it out and save himself the election campaign. He only did one big event, but he also had a lot to do. First the final decisions on the pandemic, then Ukraine – he spoke to Vladimir Putin on the phone almost every day.
Macron has it in his hands
Now he will do more: more events, more meetings with voters, more explanations of his politics. Also in a direct duel: On the evening of April 20th there will probably be a television debate, Macron versus Le Pen. In 2017 the candidate was so weak that it surprised, even shocked the nation. Macron had been fresh, charismatic and determined, while Le Pen had seemed jittery and grumpy. She probably won’t make that mistake again now that she thinks she’s so close to her goal. And yet for the first time she has to say specifically what she wants – and how she wants to pay for all the benefits.
That gets exciting again: because the French are as informed as they are critical. Everyone has an opinion on politics, trained at the local bar counter or by talking to the neighbors, and so all suggestions and ideas are scrutinized by the voters – and found good or bad, possible or a campaign lie. France remains the cradle of democracy after all.
This is Macron’s chance. Because he could already prove himself. Many liked it and some didn’t. Macron is not loved. But he is respected. Le Pen has yet to prove what she can do. And one can have doubts that the French want to wake up with a President Le Pen on Monday in two weeks – in this biggest crisis in Europe for very, very many years.