The map of France that scares Europe: this is how Le Pen's extreme right has devastated 9-J
French President Emmanuel Macron called legislative elections following the victory of the ultra National Rally party.
10 June, 2024 13:24The extreme right has won the European elections in five countries , including France, Italy and Belgium, founders of the European Union. And in others, like Germany, it has gone further than ever . The most representative case is that of France, where the ultra National Rally party (Rassemblement National , RN) has won a historic victory and has put Macronism on the ropes.
Last night, before knowing the final results, the French president, Emmanuel Macron, dissolved the National Assembly and called early legislative elections after Marine Le Pen's radical right party became the leading political force with 31.37% of the vote. the votes. That is, with double that of Macron's liberal coalition, which obtained just 15.20% and was almost in a tie with the Social Democrats.
"I cannot act as if nothing had happened," Macron said after the electoral debacle. He added: "The rise of nationalists and demagogues is a danger to our nation, and to Europe." These words contrast with an image (disseminated by the French press) that summarizes the overwhelming victory of the extreme right: that of the map of the Republic dyed in a single color.
Le Pen's team already claimed victory in the 2019 European Championships , but it did so with only one point more than Macron's proposal. Thus, these have been its best results in Europe for 40 years. With his victory he transfers the discontent of the French with Macronism to Brussels. And there are those who even see this result as the prelude to a victory for Le Pen in the 2027 presidential elections.
But the rise of RN, until recently a pariah party , not only represents a challenge to the agenda of the current liberal president, but also to the EU as a whole. The vote in the French country has an important weight in the European Parliament, since it has the second largest number of seats (79), behind Germany. And Le Pen will take no more and no less than 30 seats to Brussels.
The extreme right in France.
It is true that the pro-European majority (popular, social democrats, liberals and greens) has managed to hold their own and appears to be willing to reconfigure itself into the now traditional grand coalition. However, the advance of the extreme right will undoubtedly condition the legislature.
The ultra triumph
In Belgium and Austria the extreme right has also emerged as the leading force. The Belgian far-right party Vlaams Belang won with 14.6% of the votes , leaving the Flemish nationalist N-VA in second place with 14.1%. In Austria, with an ultra-conservative and anti-immigration discourse, the Freedom Party (FPÖ) has received the most votes.
Something similar has happened in Italy, where Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni was proclaimed the undisputed winner and, now, with her Brothers of Italy party, she will aspire to become the voice of the extreme right within the European Parliament, where she arrives with 24 seats. Without surprises to anyone, the Hungarian Prime Minister, Viktor Orbán , repeated as the favorite, although this time he did so with a slim majority, which indicates that his popularity is declining. Austria and Belgium
In Germany, the country with the greatest representation in the European Parliament, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) climbed to second position, while the party of Chancellor Olaf Scholz, and that of his main government partner, the Greens, have garnered disastrous results.
