Independent centrist Emmanuel Macron will face anti-EU, anti-immigration candidate Marine Le Pen in the French presidential run-off duel on May 7, according to initial estimates after Sunday’s hotly contested first round.
If Macron tops the first round – his score two hours after polls closed was estimated at 23.9 percent, 2.2 points up on the populist Le Pen, according to estimates by the Ipsos firm – it would somewhat salvage France’s reputation in Europe after the Europhobe Le Pen had topped polls for months before figures tightened down the stretch.
If he doesn’t, Europhiles will have to be content with the fact that the other Europhobe in this race, the far-leftist Jean-Luc Mélenchon, monsieur momentum in the final days, did not advance to a showdown with Le Pen that would have spelled almost certain existential crisis for the European Union.
Le Pen matches her father’s achievement in 2002, when National Front founder Jean-Marie Le Pen shocked the country by making the run-off with 16.86 percent of the vote. But the younger Le Pen’s performance, far from a surprise, is a radically different exploit. Initial estimates show she has reached the second round with nearly five points more than Le Pen père scored 15 years ago and with a much higher estimated voter turnout.
Moreover, the senior Le Pen found himself pitted against incumbent president, former prime minister, and former Paris mayor Jacques Chirac in the 2002 run-off, eventually losing by a landslide 82.2 percent to 17.7 percent.
This time, Marine Le Pen faces a neophyte politician in the 39-year-old Macron.
The latter served as an Élysée Palace advisor and economy minister under unpopular outgoing Socialist President François Hollande, but he has never been elected to any post.
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