The director general of Ifop Frédéric Dabi and political scientist Jean-Philippe Dubrulle analyze the third week of the Ifop-Fiducial real-time presidential poll for Paris Match, LCI and Sud Radio.
An “air hole” for Emmanuel Macron, candidate in suspense
On Friday January 28, Emmanuel Macron reached his lowest score since the start of the Rolling Ifop-Fiducial for Paris Match, LCI and Sud Radio: with 24% of voting intentions in the first round, the outgoing president recorded a decline of two points since the 10 January (26% at that time), after a marked drop to 24.5% throughout the rest of the week. At a time when the “master of the clocks” dilates time before officially announcing his candidacy for his own succession, this “air hole” in the voting intentions coincides with several worrying signals for the current tenant of the Élysée: the continued mobilization of teachers, the decline in French confidence in the management of the health crisis and above all the incursion of the theme of purchasing power into the political debate since the announced increases in the cost of energy. Thus, compared to January 10, Emmanuel Macron has fallen significantly in his strength segments: -8 points among those aged 65 and over, -9 among executives and higher intellectual professions, -7 among the most qualified and -6 among the wealthy categories. Even more alarming, the outgoing president’s “victory prognosis” has dropped: given the winner by 35% of voters two weeks ago, only 27% are betting on his coronation on April 24. Even if it is only one indicator among others, this symbol could constitute a dark omen…
Uncertainty still hovers over the second round when Zemmour regains color
The waltz of the voting intention curves of Valérie Pécresse and Marine Le Pen never ends: of the two contenders for accession to the second round against Emmanuel Macron, none manages to stand out clearly. However, Marine Le Pen has maintained a variable geometry advantage since last week, ahead of the Republican candidate by 0.5 to 2 points, while Valérie Pécresse’s campaign seems “becalmed”, without dynamics reflected in the intentions of vote. Two other advantages are emerging in favor of the candidate of the National Rally: the fact that she is carrying out the best campaign this week (for 40% of voters, a first place she never reached during the 2017 campaign) and its resilience in the face of the continued rise of Éric Zemmour, all despite the rallying of RN executives to the candidate-polemicist. Because if it were necessary to designate a great beneficiary of this week of Rolling, it would undoubtedly be the leader of Reconquest: +1.5 points in seven days, i.e. an almost total compensation for the fall recorded after his remarks on the place of disabled children at school. Thus, the “wild primary” of the right is still not resolved: with Éric Zemmour at the same distance from Valérie Pécresse as that of Marine Le Pen, uncertainty remains the key word of the poster for the second round.
After the “evaporated” left, the “breathless” left?
While the previous week had constituted a sequence favorable to Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the “immersive meeting” effect seems to have subsided: the candidate of La France Insoumise has oscillated in recent days between 10 and 9% of voting intentions, to settle at 9.5% this Friday. But although the dynamics expected in the ranks of Melenchon have not started in a clear way, the deputy of Bouches-du-Rhône remains despite everything, and for a long time, the best placed within a weakened and atomized left. Its competitors, for their part, suffer from voting intentions as low as sluggish: 5 to 5.5% for Yannick Jadot, between 3 and 4% for rivals Anne Hidalgo and Christiane Taubira, all on the eve of the results of the Popular primary, which could reshuffle the cards… or not. In the meantime, the two socialist muses find themselves hounded, even overtaken by a third thief who leads his boat out of the casting disputes on the left: Fabien Roussel of the Communist Party, credited with 3% of the voting intentions.
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