byi Amy Mek at RAIR Foundation USA
Jordan Bardella, the 28-year-old leader of the National Rally, criticized the “alliance of dishonor” for ignoring the people’s wishes and blamed Macron and Mélenchon for giving control of France to the radical left.
On Sunday evening, the polling stations closed for the second and decisive round of the French parliamentary elections. Despite the overwhelming support for Marine Le Pen’s National Rally, the left’s strategic maneuvers ensured they didn’t secure a majority.
The French election results created a rift between what the electorate voted for, and what they actually got. Although Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) secured the highest number of votes, it ended up with the third most seats. According to the French Interior Ministry, RN won over 8.7 million votes, accounting for 32.05% of the total vote. Combined with their electoral alliance partners from Eric Ciotti’s Les Républicains, who garnered nearly 1.4 million votes (5%), the right-wing bloc amassed over 10 million votes or 37.05%.
By contrast, the far-left New Popular Front alliance of communists, socialists, and environmentalists led by Jean-Luc Mélenchon received around 7 million votes (25.7%), and Emmanuel Macron’s neo-liberal centrist coalition received 6.3 million votes (23.15%).
However, despite RN receiving 1.7 million more votes than the New Popular Front, the left-wing alliance was awarded the most seats, projected by Le Monde at 182. Macron’s coalition won an estimated 168 seats, while RN and its partners were awarded only 143 seats.
This significant discrepancy between vote share and seat allocation stems from a…
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