Emmanuel Macron calls for “a big block” against Marine Le Pen. The Popular Front is there. Socialists too. But the news is that the Republicans, even those who had separated from Eric Ciotti and who had not signed an agreement with Le Pen, will not give any indication of their vote. The “republican front” therefore falls apart, losing the Gaullists who are now closer to Bardella than to Mélenchon’s communists.
The French system, as we know, is particular. The election of theNational Assembly It happens through a single-member constituency system: in each single constituency the candidates of the various parties fight for that single seat in parliament, only those who obtain more than 50% of the votes are elected in the first round, otherwise there is a run-off. So what happens?
They are called desistance pacts: if, for example, a Le Pen candidate, a Macronian candidate and a leftist candidate were to go to the ballot, one of the Macronian candidates and the Popular Front candidate would give up running and support the other in order to try to prevent the election of the right-wing candidate. The far left has already announced that in the constituencies where their candidate comes in third, the candidacy “will be withdrawn” because “our instructions are simple, direct and clear: not one vote, not one seat more for the RN”. More or less along the same lines also Emmanuel Macronwho calls for “a large, clearly Democratic and Republican bloc for the second round.” Ensemble for the Republic, the presidential coalition, in fact asked the candidates who came third to abandon “in favor of the candidates capable of beating the Rassemblement National”. “Faced with the threat of a victory for the far right, we ask all political forces to act responsibly and do the same,” we read in the statement, because everything” in Rn, “their values, its history, they pose an unacceptable threat that we must fight against.”
The famous “republican bloc”, which in the past prevented Le Pen’s father from winning the presidential elections and which was also repeated against “the extreme right” represented by his daughter Marine, this time however may not hold up everywhere. There will certainly be places where Lepenians, Macronians and the left are competing for the position. Never Gaullists they seem to have already withdrawn from the “national pact” and this frees up a part of that 10% of votes that could end up with Le Pen. It is not yet clear, however, whether Les Républicains will also decide to withdraw their candidate in the event of a “triangulation” to “favor” the lepenists.
“This result is a huge success – said Eric Ciotti – Through their vote, the French have expressed their desire to change and of alternation. The historic union we built with Jordan Bardella put an end to long years of inaction on the right.” For this reason, Ciotti invites “all Republicans to follow the path I have opened, Republicans must participate in the victory of the entire right”.