Jordan Bardella, leader of France’s far-right National Rally (RN) and a potential candidate in next year’s presidential race, has called on voters to back what he called his party’s “common sense and order” campaign in the final round of municipal elections next week.
As the results of the first round of municipal elections became known on Sunday night, the anti-immigration RN party clung to the largest city it leads: Perpignan. Louis Aliot was re-elected in the first round as mayor of the city, which has a population of 121,000 and is close to the Spanish border.
The RN now hopes to also choose another city, for example the southern coastal city of Toulon, which will go to a second round. But any success in Toulon will depend on whether other parties unite to block the RN.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s radical left party, La France Insoumise (LFI), is also seeking to gain a foothold locally before Mélenchon is expected to make a fourth bid for France’s presidency next year. The party, which seeks to increase its number of local councillors, obtained good results in the north of France, in Lille and Roubaix, which will now go to the second round. Manuel Bompard, national coordinator of the LFI, said the party was willing to create an “anti-fascist front” with other left-wing parties to prevent RN from making progress.
French municipal elections are seen as a crucial test of the political temperature ahead of next year’s presidential election.
Voting for mayors and councilors in 35,000 towns, cities and villages across France focuses on local issues such as security, housing and waste collection and is very different from national elections.
But the two-round vote held on consecutive Sundays – particularly voting in large towns and cities – will be scrutinized for what it may reveal about party strategy and alliances in France’s increasingly fragmented political landscape ahead of the 2027 presidential race.
Emmanuel Macron’s two terms end next year and there is uncertainty over which candidates will run for president of the EU’s second-largest economy. Two years after Macron called early elections in 2024, parliament remains divided, without an absolute majority, divided between the left, the far right and the centrists.
After record turnout in the last 2020 local elections during the coronavirus pandemic, analysts were closely examining the races to assess a possible lack of voter participation.
According to estimates from various polling organizations, overall turnout was low: between 56% and 58.5%, compared to 63.55% in the equivalent 2014 elections.
“Apart from 2020, we have reached a historic low under the Fifth Republic (the political system since 1958),” François Kraus of the IFOP polling institute told Agence France-Presse.
“Public apathy is growing,” added Adélaïde Zulfikarpasic of the polling firm IPSOS BVA, stating that “this is not good news for our democracy.”
Historically, France’s major cities have been governed by center-left groups, including the socialists or Les Républicains. Green-led coalitions won major cities in the last municipal elections in 2020, including Lyon, but are under pressure as they try to maintain their gains.
In the northern port of Le Havre, Edouard Philippe, the former prime minister who intends to run as a center-right presidential candidate next year, had a strong result in the first round and will now face a second round. Philippe had suggested that if he did not win the city he has led since 2014, his candidacy for the presidency would be in doubt.
In a speech Sunday night, Philippe said he had “humility” and was there to “listen” to voters “neighborhood by neighborhood.”
Large cities such as Paris, Marseille and Lyon will go to a second round next Sunday.
Many mayoral candidates had distanced themselves from political parties, reflecting voters’ exasperation with politics and gridlock in parliament. A large number of mayors, especially in the villages, presented themselves as independents.
