{"id":477815,"date":"2026-03-16T00:58:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-16T00:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/477815\/"},"modified":"2026-03-16T00:58:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-16T00:58:12","slug":"first-round-of-french-local-elections-sees-strong-showing-for-national-rally-and-lfi-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/477815\/","title":{"rendered":"First-round of French local elections sees strong showing for National Rally and LFI | France"},"content":{"rendered":"

The first-round of the French municipal elections have seen a strong showing for Marine Le Pen\u2019s<\/a> far-right the National Rally (RN), as well as for Jean-Luc M\u00e9lenchon<\/a>\u2019s radical left, with both parties likely to increase their local presence ahead of next year\u2019s French presidential race.<\/p>\n

The French local elections<\/a>, which now go to a final round runoff on 22 March, are seen as a crucial test of the political temperature before next year\u2019s presidential election. Emmanuel Macron<\/a>\u2019s two terms in office come to an end in spring 2027 and there is uncertainty about who will next lead the EU\u2019s second-largest economy.<\/p>\n

For years, French local mayors and councillors \u2013 particularly in large cities \u2013 have been dominated by the historic, traditional parties: Socialists on the left and Les R\u00e9publicains on the right.<\/p>\n

The first-round results on Sunday showed a significant increase in votes in certain towns and large cities for the radical left La France<\/a> Insoumise (LFI), whose leader M\u00e9lenchon is expected to make a fourth bid for president next year. The LFI, which has not historically had a large local presence, scored high in the north, in the town of Roubaix, where it could win the mayor\u2019s position. It also had significant scores in cities including Toulouse, Lille and Limoges, having mobilised young voters.<\/p>\n

Anti-immigrationRN, which has traditionally fared less well in local elections, also celebrated scoring symbolically high in the first round alongside its allies.<\/p>\n

In France\u2019s second biggest city, Marseille,<\/a> Franck Allisio, the RN candidate who ran a campaign based on bringing \u201corder\u201d to the streets amid drug gang crime, scored level with the incumbent leftwing mayor, Beno\u00eet Payan, at about 35.4%, projections showed. There will now be a tense final-round runoff.<\/p>\n

Allisio said: \u201cThe wind of change is blowing over Marseille \u2026 This is more than a score, it\u2019s a promise that tomorrow Marseille becomes the new French example.\u201d<\/p>\n

Much in Marseille will now depend on whether Payan\u2019s left coalition, which includes the Socialists and Greens, could form an agreement with the LFI to try to hold the RN back. The LFI reached the second round on around 12%, as did the traditional right\u2019s candidate, similarly on 12%.<\/p>\n

The RN held on to the mayorship of Perpignan<\/a>, near the Spanish border, which, with a population of 121,000, is the largest city the party has run in the past 20 years.<\/p>\n

But the RN also scored high in the south in Toulon and Carcassonne, which will face run-offs. In Nice, France\u2019s fifth biggest city, \u00c9ric Ciotti<\/a>, who quit as leader of the traditional right\u2019s party, Les R\u00e9publicains (LR), to join forces with Le Pen in 2024, scored high and is hoping to win the city from his bitter rival and one-time rightwing ally, Christian Estrosi. The RN would describe the win of a major French city \u2013 such as Nice \u2013 as a stepping stone to the presidency next year.<\/p>\n

In Paris, Emmanuel Gr\u00e9goire, the mayoral candidate for a left coalition including Socialists and Greens, was in the lead ahead of the rightwing former culture minister Rachida Dati<\/a>, projections showed. Paris, which has been run by the left for 25 years, will now face a second-round runoff.<\/p>\n

Sophia Chikirou, the LFI candidate, also made it to the final round in Paris, as did the centrist Pierre-Yves Bournazel.<\/p>\n

Chikirou said: \u201cWe exist, our voices count.\u201d Her party wanted to stop the right from winning Paris, she said, adding she was open to forming an \u201canti-fascist front\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u00c9douard Philippe, the former prime minister, who intends to run as a centre-right presidential candidate next year, had a strong first-round score in the northern port of Le Havre and will now face a final round.<\/p>\n

In Lyon, the Green mayor Gr\u00e9gory Doucet scored higher than was predicted against Jean-Michel Aulas, the former head of Olympique Lyonnais football club,<\/a> who is running for the right. There will now be a second-round runoff.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The first-round of the French municipal elections have seen a strong showing for Marine Le Pen\u2019s far-right the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":477816,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":["post-477815","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477815","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=477815"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477815\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/477816"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=477815"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=477815"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=477815"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}