French election

A flurry of early projections and exit polls showed incumbent Macron came first with 28.1-29.5% of the vote, followed by Le Pen on 23.3-24.4%. The surging cost ...

Le Pen, seen as economically left-wing despite being very much affiliated with the far fight in France, has been highly focused on the cost of living. Support for Macron had jumped following Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine and his mediation efforts earlier this year. Most of the mainstream candidates that failed to make the runoff immediately backed Macron after the exit polls came in, with Mélenchon telling his supporters there "must not be one single vote for Le Pen in the second round." But it's an issue that his opponent Le Pen, who heads up the anti-immigration National Rally party — leveraged significantly in her campaign. A flurry of early projections and exit polls showed incumbent Macron came first with 28.1-29.5% of the vote, followed by Le Pen on 23.3-24.4%. The different projections showed different tallies but all pointed toward a runoff between Macron and Le Pen in two weeks' time, with the gap between the two not as tight as some political analysts had been predicting. French leader Emmanuel Macron and his far-right rival Marine Le Pen topped the first round of presidential elections on Sunday, according to exit polls, and are set to face off in the final vote on April 24.

As in 2017 and 2002, debate over whether leftwing voters should back centrist, stay home or not vote at all.

A Harris Interactive study examined possible second-round intentions to vote in a runoff between Macron and Le Pen. It found 34% of Mélenchon voters would vote for Macron and 21% Le Pen, but 45% would abstain or spoil their vote. Only 8% of Éric Zemmour voters would support Macron and 84% Le Pen, and only 8% would abstain. A key campaign moment in the next two weeks will be a debate between Macron, 44, and Le Pen, 53, which could sway undecided voters. I don’t want Emmanuel Macron and I don’t want Marine Le Pen. For me they’re the same.” “I think I will not vote in the second round,” he said. Many will be asking themselves whether to select what they consider the least bad option between the centrist Emmanuel Macron or far-right Marine Le Pen, or stay at home and not vote at all.

President Macron and the far-right leader Le Pen ahead after first round of French presidential vote, projections show.

Who next holds the Elysee Palace will depend on how those who backed Macron and Le Pen’s rivals cast their ballots. He acknowledged disagreements with Le Pen, but said Macron was a worse choice. Huski believes the gap between the estimated votes of Le Pen and Macron makes the former a weaker challenger than she imagined for the second round. “I intend without waiting to sew back up the tears that a torn-apart France suffers,” she told supporters, who chanted: “We will win!” The runoff “will be a choice of civilisation,” Le Pen added on stage in Paris. French President Emmanuel Macron and far-right leader Marine Le Pen have come out on top of France’s first-round presidential election, qualifying for the April 24 runoff, according to initial projections. President Emmanuel Macron and the far-right leader Marine Le Pen progress to second round of French presidential election, projections show.

French polling agencies suggest President Emmanuel Macron and challenger Marine Le Pen have qualified for a presidential election run-off on April 24, ...

In 2017, Macron trounced Le Pen by a landslide to become France's youngest modern president. In the 27-member European Union, only France has a nuclear arsenal and a United Nations Security Council veto. It might also not be cheered in the Kremlin: Macron has strongly backed sanctions on Russia, while Le Pen has worried publicly about their impact on French living standards. He vowed to "implement the project of progress, of French and European openness and independence we have advocated for." Pécresse said she would vote for Macron in the run-off. Incumbent Emmanuel Macron will face far-right nationalist Marine Le Pen in a winner-take-all run-off for the French presidency.

PARIS — France's incumbent leader Emmanuel Macron and far-right challenger Marine Le Pen are heading for an April 24 presidential election runoff, ...

During the next two weeks he (Macron) will have to pay more attention to what is happening in France, take a diplomatic break,” said Adrien Thierry, a 23-year old supporter. Article content Article content To cheers of supporters chanting “We will win! Article content Article content

Macron and Le Pen will advance to a presidential runoff on April 24 with strong echoes of their last face-off in the 2017 election.

Mr. Macron has accused Ms. Le Pen of pushing an extremist manifesto of racist, ruinous policies. To beat Ms. Le Pen in the runoff, Mr. Macron must pick apart her years-long rebranding effort to make herself seem less extreme, a makeover that has even highlighted her love of cats. Ms. Pécresse said she would vote for Mr. Macron in the runoff. Polling agency projections put both Mr. Macron and Ms. Le Pen on course to improve their 2017 first-round showings, highlighting how French politics have become increasingly polarized. The runoff campaign is likely to be far more confrontational than Round 1, which was largely overshadowed by the war in Ukraine. Mr. Mélenchon, addressing supporters who sometimes shed tears, repeatedly said: “We must not give one vote to Mrs. Le Pen.” Ms. Le Pen is promising seismic shifts for France – both domestically and internationally – if elected as the country’s first woman president. Mr. Macron for months had looked like a shoo-in to become France’s first president in 20 years to win a second term. Mr. Macron also is a firm supporter of NATO and of close collaboration among the European Union’s 27 members. He vowed to “implement the project of progress, of French and European openness and independence we have advocated for.” Mr. Mélenchon was credited with about 20 per cent support. Yet some of her defeated rivals were so alarmed by the possibility of Ms. Le Pen beating Mr. Macron that they urged their supporters Sunday to shift their second-round votes to the incumbent.

The euro, French stocks and even Italian bonds are among assets that have come under pressure as polls narrowed dramatically between President Emmanuel Macron ...

She has abandoned the idea of Frexit, or a French exit of the European Union similar to the U.K.’s. It would be bad for business and hurt the image of France with foreign investors.” A strong showing in both of these could see the euro slide below parity against the dollar for the first time in two decades, according to Nomura Holdings Inc. strategists, though that remains an extreme scenario. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. strategists say the implications of a Le Pen victory would be bigger for Europe than for France alone, given Macron has looked to advance European integration. A late surge by Le Pen, the National Rally candidate, has thrust French political risk onto the radar of markets once again. But Le Pen, whose touring of towns and villages has focused on topics such as inflation, has got investors hedging for an upset.

Follow the latest updates as polls predict a tight first round finish between the president, Emmanuel Macron, and Marine Le Pen, from the far-right National ...

But there will be no certainty about what it all means until the first projections when polls close at 8pm - these are not, by the way, exit polls, but estimations based on actual votes cast in a representative selection of polling stations nationwide. Exactly a month ago, on 10 March, Emmanuel Macron - buoyed by a rally-round-the-flag effect following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine - stood at about 30% and Marine Le Pen at about 18%, according to the Guardian’s election tracker. It’s hard to say at this stage who this might benefit. On the other hand, some of the detail in those midday turnout figures could be ringing a few alarm bells in the president’s camp: abstention looks to be higher in the Paris region, which was heavily pro-Macron in the last elections in 2017, whereas turnout in some areas that voted predminantly for Le Pen five years ago seems to be significantly higher. A low turnout is widely believed to be bad news for the far-right leader, because it could be a sign that her supporters, who often fail to show up on voting day in the kind of numbers that the polls predicted, may again be staying away. On average, the latest polls put the two on 26% and 23% respectively, a difference that is equivalent to many polling organisations’ margin of error.