How the French Election Results Unfolded (2024)

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France is facing a hung parliament after elections: Here’s what happened.

With all but three of the 577 National Assembly seats left to be called, numbers compiled by The New York Times using data from the Interior Ministry confirm earlier projections showing that no single party or bloc will win a majority.

The left-wing New Popular Front, which came together just last month with the goal of keeping the National Rally from power, won 177 seats, compared with 148 for President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist bloc, known as Ensemble. The National Rally trailed with 142.

The results came as a shock to many in France, where the National Rally had emerged as the top performer in the first round of voting last week.

The New Popular Front appeared to have capitalized on its recent momentum and fears that the far-right party was a threat to French democratic values and institutions. Its supporters took to the streets of Paris on Sunday night to celebrate, although some in France were fearful of what the far left would bring: The largest party in the alliance, France Unbowed, is known for its incendiary far-left politics.

Here’s what else to know:

• High turnout: Voter participation at 5 p.m. local time was the highest in over two decades, at nearly 60 percent, the Interior Ministry said. That was much higher than during the previous legislative elections in 2022, when the participation rate at the same time was about 38 percent.

• Far right defiant: Jordan Bardella, the president of the National Rally, acknowledged that his party had fallen short of expectations but noted that it had captured its highest ever number of seats in the National Assembly. “Unfortunately,” Mr. Bardella told supporters in Paris, “dangerous electoral deals” made by Mr. Macron’s allies and the left had “deprived” the country of a far-right government.

• Macron weakened: Mr. Macron, who has three more years in office, called the elections last month in a risky gamble. His office said on Sunday that the French president was “taking note of the results of the legislative elections as they come in.” “The President will ensure that the sovereign choice of the French people is respected,” it said in a statement.

• Security concerns: The French authorities had deployed about 30,000 security forces around the country amid fears of potential unrest. In the cities of Rennes and Nantes, protesters threw fireworks and bottles toward riot police officers, who responded by firing tear gas, the Agence France-Presse news agency reported, adding that about 30 people had been arrested in Rennes. At Place de la République in Paris, where thousands of people had gathered, police officers also used tear gas and some protesters threw objects at them.

The National Rally is defiant after a disappointing result.

Still, with almost all of the 577 National Assembly seats left to be called, the National Rally had amassed 142 seats, the most of any single party. It was also winning about 37 percent of the votes nationally, the most of any party.

“This evening, an old world has fallen,” Mr. Bardella said. “Nothing can stop a people who have started to hope again.”

Marine Le Pen, the party’s leader and the daughter of its founder, also sought to put the result in a wider context. “The tide is rising,” she said. “It didn’t rise high enough this time, but it’s still rising. And as a result, our victory, in reality, is only delayed.”

The National Rally’s leaders argued that many of France’s problems stemmed from immigration and had campaigned on a plan for “national preference,” under which certain jobs, social benefits, schooling and health care would be reserved for citizens rather than immigrants.

The New Popular Front coalition of four left-wing parties came together quickly last month in a bid to present a united front and keep the National Rally from winning a majority after President Emmanuel Macron called the snap election.

Results in the western region of La Sarthe illustrated the challenge for National Rally supporters in overcoming a bitter defeat. The party had won a plurality of votes in four of five constituencies there last week, but fell short of the absolute majority required to avoid a runoff. In the second round of voting on Sunday, no National Rally candidate was elected for any of the five seats.

“It’s a shame,” said Felix Aubry, a student and the campaign manager for one of the National Rally candidates, François Fèvre. “It’s crazy to see this massive shift in votes.” He described the recent alliance of left-wing parties as “unnatural” and tried to put a positive spin on the National Rally’s progress.

“The National Rally has still made a very big breakthrough, so it’s still historic,” he said, adding, “When you see all the things that have been put in place to block it, it’s huge.”

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The left united to keep the far right from power. The strategy appeared to work.

The alliance includes four left-wing parties: Communists, Socialists, Greens and the far-left party, France Unbowed. While many in France cheered what appeared to be a loss for the far right, others were fearful of what the far left might bring.

Last week, after the first vote in a two-round election, the coalition withdrew more than 130 of its candidates from three-way races in which the far right had a chance of winning — and pushed their supporters to vote strategically against far-right candidates.

The strategy appeared to have worked.

Despite the apparent win for the left, the polls showed that no party or alliance got an absolute majority that would make it the likely choice to form a government.

Still, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, founder of France Unbowed, a pugnacious and divisive figure, quickly declared that his party was not willing to negotiate to form a coalition government. Instead, he demanded that the left-wing alliance be given the reins to govern so it could implement its “entire program.”

Olivier Faure, leader of the Socialist Party, also said the alliance would not negotiate to form coalition government.

“That would betray the vote of French people and prolong the Macronist program,” he said.

Some voters consider France Unbowed, which has members who have been accused of antisemitism, to be at least as dangerous as the far right. And some economists have worried about the alliance’s spending plans at a time when France is already mired in debt.

The far-left’s proposed platform includes raising France’s monthly minimum wage, lowering the legal retirement age from 64 to 60, building one million new affordable housing units in five years and freezing the prices of basic necessities including food, energy and gas. The state would also pay households all costs associated with their children’s education, including meals at cafeterias, transportation and extracurricular activities.

Instead of drastically cutting immigration, as the far right had promised, the coalition pledged to make the asylum process more generous and smooth.

The New Popular Front has pledged to come up with the tens of billions of euros needed to pay for its programs by taxing wealthy individuals.

“It’s time to tax the super rich and the super profits,” said Mr. Faure to cheers Sunday night.

If tasked by President Emmanuel Macron to form a government, it is unclear who among the coalition’s leaders would be put forward as prime minister.

During the frantic four-week election campaign, the leaders of three of the four parties insisted they would not be led by Mr. Mélenchon.

At a time when attacks on and threats against French Jews have spiked, Mr. Mélenchon has been repeatedly accused of fanning antisemitism.

His fiery approach to politics and his unwavering pro-Palestinian views in the aftermath of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel were largely to blame for a breakup of the four groups last year after months of strained relations over other issues.

Mr. Mélenchon has refused to call Hamas a terrorist organization and vehemently denounced Israel’s military operation in Gaza as “genocide.” He also labeled a large demonstration against antisemitism, attended by two former French presidents, a rendezvous for “the friends of unconditional support of the massacre.”

The situation has also gotten tense in Paris at Place de la République, where police officers used tear gas and protesters threw objects at them.

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Supporters of France’s left-wing alliance celebrate, while jeering the far right.

“It’s a true relief,” Hugo Salomo, 31, said of the election projections. “We didn’t vote for the left just to block off the right. The left has awakened, and we’ve shown that the extreme right is not an inevitability. We’ve shown that something else is possible.”

Others in the crowd saw the projections as a repudiation of the National Rally’s reputation for racism and its anti-immigration policies. Mr. Bardella had promised to reduce immigration and to reserve jobs, social benefits, schooling and health care for French citizens.

Margot Cullens, a 24-year-old social worker who works with refugees, said: “It’s a huge shame of France that people always say that immigrants are always the problem.”

A crowd cheered and chanted for Marine Tondelier, the secretary general of the Green Party, which is part of the New Popular Front, when she appeared at her party’s headquarters in Paris.

“The night is going to be long, it was important for me to start it with you. Tonight, there is a high chance the Popular Front is first,” she said, adding: “Tonight the people have won.”

Martin Planqué, 25, a manager in the entertainment industry, said the result “shows that France does not want to be racist,” adding that “it shows that France wants to see hope in the future.”

At the Place de la République in central Paris, another crowd chanted, “Siamo Tutti Anti Fascisti” — an Italian phrase that translates to “We are all anti-fascists.”

France’s campaign season was marred by racist attacks and violent acts.

Gérald Darmanin, France’s interior minister, said on Friday that more than 50 people — including candidates, their substitutes or supporters — had been “physically assaulted” during the campaign. One of them was Prisca Thevenot, the government spokeswoman, who was putting up campaign posters in her constituency just outside Paris.

Stories of racist attacks have circulated widely online and in the media.

One television news program filmed a couple who supported the National Rally hurling insults at a Black neighbor, telling her to “go to the doghouse.”

A television host of North African descent revealed a racist letter he had received at his home. A bakery in Avignon was set on fire and covered in hom*ophobic and racist tags.

Since the snap election campaign began last month, Fatma Bouvet de la Maisonneuve, a psychiatrist who has a practice in the Parisian suburb of Montrouge, said she had been overwhelmed by new clients, with as many as two calling a day and some even arriving unannounced to her office.

“These are people who are very scared,” said Ms. Bouvet de la Maisonneuve, whose practice specializes in the effects of racism on mental health. “They are scared for their children. They are worried about being attacked.”

She said that her clients with dual citizenship were frightened by the policies of the far-right National Rally. The party has announced that, if elected, it would limit people with dual passports from holding positions considered sensitive, like running the secret service or a power plant. (The early projections on Sunday indicated that the National Rally would fall short of expectations.)

“They are fearful for their jobs,” said Ms. Bouvet de la Maisonneuve, who is French Tunisian. “The civil servants are very scared that the law will be hardened and applied across the spectrum.”

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In a speech at the prime minister’s residence in Paris, Attal, whom Macron appointed just six months ago, praised French voters for preventing the “extremes” on the left or right from securing an absolute majority. But he acknowledged that “our country is experiencing an unprecedented political situation,” only weeks before the world’s eyes turn to Paris for the Summer Olympics.

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Gridlock? Instability? Without an absolute majority, France’s way forward is unclear.

“Without an absolute majority, the government will be at the mercy of opposition parties banding together” to topple it, said Dominique Rousseau, an emeritus professor of public law at the Panthéon-Sorbonne University in Paris.

The projections suggested that the National Assembly, France’s lower house of Parliament, will be roughly divided into three main blocs with conflicting agendas and, in some cases, deep animosity toward one another.

Pollster projections released Sunday night after polls closed in the final round of legislative elections indicated that a group of left-wing parties called the New Popular Front would win the most seats, followed by Mr. Macron’s centrist alliance and the nationalist, anti-immigration National Rally. It was not clear whether the centrists or the right-wing National Rally would be the second-largest bloc.

As it stands, none of the three major blocs appears able to work with the others. Each could try to cobble together a working majority with the smattering of smaller parties or independent lawmakers that will take up the rest of the lower house’s seats. But their ability to do so is uncertain.

“French political culture is not conducive to compromise,” said Samy Benzina, a public law professor at the University of Poitiers, noting that France’s institutions are normally designed to produce “clear majorities that can govern on their own.”

A scenario in which no party successfully secures an absolute majority — at least 289 of the lower house’s 577 seats — is not unprecedented in France. That is exactly what happened during the last legislative elections, in 2022. Mr. Macron still managed to put together functioning governments that have successfully passed bills over the past two years.

But that was only because Mr. Macron’s centrist coalition was large enough — with about 250 seats — and the parties opposed to him were too divided to pose a consistent threat. When it wasn’t, Mr. Macron’s government came dangerously close to falling.

This time, Mr. Macron’s options appear far more limited.

His centrist coalition cannot govern on its own. And few smaller parties — even more moderate ones on the left or the right — are eager to be associated with Mr. Macron, who is deeply unpopular and has three years remaining in his term.

The National Rally has already said it would govern only if it had an absolute majority, or if it was just short of one and thought it could strike a deal with enough other lawmakers to bridge the gap. Marine Le Pen, the party’s longtime leader, told French radio last week that it would not agree “just to be sitting in a minister’s seat without being able to do anything,” which she said would be “the worst betrayal” of the party’s voters.

On Sunday, a leader from one of the parties in the left-wing New Popular Front, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, said he would not enter into negotiations with Mr. Macron’s coalition to form a government together.

Some analysts and politicians have suggested the possibility of a broad, “rainbow” coalition of lawmakers, agreeing on a limited number of key issues and stretching from the Greens to more moderate conservatives. But several political leaders have already ruled that out.

Another possibility is a caretaker government of politically neutral experts that handles day-to-day business until there is a political breakthrough. This, too, would be a departure from French tradition.

France has a robust civil service that could run things for a time without a government. But the Summer Olympics are just weeks away, and Parliament usually approves a budget in the fall. Some analysts believe that Mr. Macron’s position will become so untenable he will have to resign, but he has said he won’t.

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The left-wing New Popular Front exceeded expectations. Who’s in it?

Mr. Macron decided to force the election for the National Assembly, the lower house of Parliament, because of an embarrassing defeat last month to Ms. Le Pen’s party in a European parliamentary election.

The left-wing group of parties, which had only broken up months before over personal and policy disagreements, responded by reuniting. Despite its rushed beginnings, the New Popular Front came in second in the first round of voting last week, just five percentage points behind the National Rally and its allies. Mr. Macron’s centrist Renaissance party and its allies came a distant third.

But many in France fear elements of the left as well, particularly because the largest party in the alliance, France Unbowed, is known for its incendiary far-left politics. Some members are also accused of antisemitism, particularly the pugnacious and divisive Jean-Luc Mélenchon, a longtime leftist leader and the founder of France Unbowed.

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Bardella was referring to the move by centrist and left-wing parties to pull over 200 candidates from three-way runoffs after the first round of voting to avoid splitting their vote, and to lower the National Rally’s chances of getting an absolute majority. He said Macron had “pushed the country into uncertainty and instability.”

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The authorities have significantly tightened security in Paris ahead of the election results. Armed soldiers are patrolling near Place de la République, where a large gathering is expected tonight. Police trucks are also parked blocks from the square, where some protesters have already started to gather.

Macron’s rivals say they’ll fix the economy, but economists are skeptical.

A two-year streak of high inflation has left low- and middle-income French families struggling to pay for basics like energy, gas and food, while wages, in some cases, have failed to keep pace. Polls show that worries over “purchasing power” were a top concern of voters, alongside immigration and security. In the first round, blue-collar workers turned out in droves to vote for the National Rally, which is promising to help households and curb immigration. The New Popular Front came in second with promises to raise wages and lower the retirement age.

Left unclear is how the parties will pay for their pledges. Economists say many of the funding proposals are not credible, raising risks for a heavily indebted France.

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Who are the key players in France’s election?

Here’s a look at the key players in the runoff election.

Renaissance

This is Mr. Macron’s party, which up until the election held the most seats in the National Assembly together with its allies — though for the past two years, it has not had an absolute majority. Its election campaign has been led by the prime minister, Gabriel Attal, who has essentially run on the government’s record — lowering taxes and unemployment, tightening immigration rules and maintaining strong support for the European Union and Ukrainian defense. Renaissance and its allies came in a distant third in the first round, and are projected to lose many seats in Sunday’s election.

National Rally

The country’s far-right, nationalist party has been led for the past two years by Jordan Bardella, 28. But its true leader is Marine Le Pen, the daughter of the party’s founder. The National Rally believes that many of country’s problems, from overspending to crime, stem from immigration. If his party wins an absolute majority, Mr. Bardella has promised to cut immigration, give the police more funding and power to fight crime, and begin to put in effect its long-held ideology of “national preference” — reserving jobs, social benefits, schooling and health care for French citizens, not immigrants. The party has also focused on voters’ thinning wallets and promised to lower taxes on energy of all kinds.

The National Rally and its allies, a splinter group from the more mainstream conservative party, won about 33 percent of the popular vote in the election’s first round last week, and polls show they are poised to win the most seats in the vote on Sunday, though perhaps not a majority.

New Popular Front

This coalition of four left-wing parties came together quickly after the election was called to present a united front. Members of the same parties were in a similar coalition that formed in 2022 and unraveled last year — the communists, socialists and greens, along with members of the far-left party France Unbowed. The group has no official leader, and has sidelined the divisive founder of France Unbowed, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who has been widely accused of antisemitism.

Among the coalition’s promises are raising the minimum wage, lowering the legal retirement age to 60 and making the asylum process smoother and more generous. The New Popular Front got 28 percent of the vote last week, and it has since sharpened its focus on blocking the National Rally from getting elected with a majority. To do this, it withdrew more than 130 candidates who were in three-way runoffs, and instructed its supporters to vote for the remaining candidate who was not with the far right.

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What happens on election night in France, and what comes next.

France’s 577 electoral districts — one for each seat — cover the mainland and overseas departments and territories, as well as French citizens living abroad. France awards seats to candidates who get the most ballots in each district.

In the first round held a week ago, 76 legislative seats were won outright. The rest of the races went to runoffs, which are being held on Sunday.

While any number of candidates can compete in the first round in each district, there were specific thresholds to reach the second round of voting.In most cases the runoff will feature the top two vote-getters, but some might feature three or even four candidates who received votes equal to at least 12.5 percent of registered voters in their districts.

High voter participation led to more than 300 three-way runoffs after the first round last week. But left-wing parties and Mr. Macron’s centrist coalition pulled more than 200 of their candidates out of three-way races in order to avoid splitting the vote and to help prevent National Rally from winning an absolute majority. That left fewer than 100 three-way races remaining on Sunday.

The recipient of the most votes in the runoff wins the race.

Polls will close at 6 p.m. local time (12 p.m. Eastern) in most of France — although voting will stay open until 8 p.m. in some larger cities.

France’s Interior Ministry is expected to start publishing initial results at 8 p.m. (2 p.m. Eastern) and nationwide seat projections by polling institutes are expected at around the same time.

If the National Rally, which won the most votes in the first round, and its allies win a majority in the National Assembly, Mr. Macron would have little choice but to appoint a prime minister from the far-right party. That would put France’s domestic policy squarely in the hands of the far right, and could disrupt Mr. Macron’s defense and foreign policies.

If no clear majority emerges, Mr. Macron will have limited options in terms of how to proceed.

He could try to build a new coalition, but that might be challenging. The three main political blocs — the far right, the left-wing alliance and Mr. Macron’s centrist coalition — have radically different agendas and, in some cases, have expressed extreme animosity toward each other.

If no working majority can be cobbled together, the country could be headed for months of political deadlock or turmoil. Mr. Macron, who has ruled out resigning, cannot call new legislative elections for another year.

One possibility being discussed by analysts is having a caretaker government that handles the day-to-day business of running the country until there is a political breakthrough, as has happened in Belgium. But this, too, would be a departure from French tradition.