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French presidential race tightens, with far-right challenger trailing Macron

PARIS – President Emmanuel Macron seems ready to confront far-right nationalism Marine Le Pen in an increasingly narrow battle for re-election, opinion polls show ahead of Sunday’s first round of voting.

French voters will choose from 12 candidates, and the two candidates with the most votes will face off against each other in a second round two weeks later, on April 24.

Polls suggest that the most likely outcome would be the 2017 elections being held, when Macron beat Le Pen, by 66% to 33%, in the second round.

Macron leads in opinion polls in both rounds of voting. Voting companies Ipsos and Sopra Steria Thursday put Macron firmly in the lead with 26.5% of the vote – but Le Pen is behind, with 23% and narrowing the gap. He was 16 percentage points behind Macron in early March.

A poll on Friday from the research company Elabe margins show increasingly tighter margins with Macron at 26% in the first round and Le Pen one point behind at 25%.

Analysts have described French voters as volatile and unpredictable, with resentment towards the ruling political class in Paris strongly felt by both right and left voters. Low voter turnout is widely expected.

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If Le Pen makes it to the second round, her chances of winning are real and appear to be increasing: Elabe’s poll on Friday gave Macron a slight lead in the second round with 51%.

Her party, formerly the National Front and now known as the National Assembly, has sought to soften its image and appear more moderate.

As former Prime Minister Manuel Valls put it in an op-ed newspaper: “Marine Le Pen may be elected President of the Republic. It is now one o’clock to midnight. ”

Philippe Marlière, professor of European politics at Central University London, said: “There is a large degree of frustration and anger towards Macron as the incumbent president. “According to some, he is doing well with the economy, but not everyone in France agrees with that, especially the worse people who have abandoned Macron.”

Le Pen has won support by focusing on the cost of living. But her second round pass is not guaranteed, and Ipsos said on Wednesday she may face a challenge from the radical leftist candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who won 16.5 percent of the votes in the first round on Thursday. He is running for the third president and supports populism yellow vest protest movement.

Macron is vulnerable on the left: Mélenchon’s supporters may be so motivated by their distaste for the incumbent’s economic reforms that they added to Le Pen’s vote in the second round.

A challenge discussed many words far right television personality Eric Zemmour Le Pen failed in his bid for president, in large part due to his long-standing support for Russian President Vladimir Putin and some radical anti-immigration proposals. Zemmour even initially said that he was opposed to accepting Ukrainian refugees in France after the war began, though he downplayed his stance by saying that Ukrainians with families in France could be consider.

Thursday’s poll put Zemmour with just 8.5% of the vote in the first round, with right-wing voters leaving him for Le Pen.

Jean-Marc Folliet, 66, a French businessman living in the western suburbs of Paris, is one advocate Le Pen can count on.

“I made a decision a few months ago. I will definitely vote for Marine Le Pen. She blew her chances in the last presidential election with a lousy debate,” he told NBC News. “Le Pen changed her image and demonstrated her resilience and experience.”

Folliet, who calls himself a “hard conservative” and holds Eurosceptic views, said he was tempted by Zemmour’s outspokenness but lost interest when his poll figures we decrease.

He said: “Marine Le Pen is back and will definitely face Macron in the second round. It will be very close and even if she doesn’t win, her strong showing will impact the next parliamentary elections.”

Macron has urged supporters not to believe in his polling lead and desperately avoid any complacency among liberal and centre-right voters, telling supporters in Paris last week that the threat of extremism is now greater than in recent years and even in recent months. He admitted in a French TV interview this week that he hasn’t done enough to stem the rise of the left.

Currently, those who say they plan to vote for Le Pen and Zemmour combined are more than the six left-wing candidates. People may have voted tactically against far-right candidates in the past – but this time around, that could change.

In 2002, Jacques Chirac won a resounding 82% victory over Jean-Marie Le Pen, Marine’s father, in a wave of protests against his hardline anti-immigration views.

Marlière said: “The people on the left voted unanimously for him, not because they wanted to support him but an anti-fascist vote to stop the far right.

“This anti-fascist reaction now seems to be fading because if Le Pen makes it to the second round it will be the third time a far-right candidate has made it to the second round,” he said.

“And some people might say, ‘We’re tired of doing that, every time we vote for the conservative, liberal candidate, what does he do? He doesn’t listen to us. ‘”

Armelle De Oliveira contribute.

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