French voters face a decisive choice on July 7 in the runoff of snap parliamentary elections that could see the country’s first far-right government since the World War II Nazi occupation — or no majority emerging at all.
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00:00A far-right anti-immigrant party has come out on top of France's historic parliamentary
00:05elections, but this is only the first round.
00:09The decisive second-round runoff is Sunday.
00:12Marine Le Pen's national rally is on track to have the most seats in the next French
00:16parliament.
00:17However, we'll only find out Sunday if she has an absolute majority and can form a new
00:22government.
00:23So, centrist President Emmanuel Macron will stay president for the next three years, but
00:28he will be very weakened, both domestically and on the world stage.
00:32And his decision to call these snap elections is looking like a massive political miscalculation.
00:38Many voters see Macron as out of touch with their concerns, particularly their economic
00:42concerns, and as part of a kind of arrogant Parisian elite.
00:47Marine Le Pen has tapped into that frustration, notably by blaming immigrants for many of
00:51France's problems.
00:53Her party would scale back rights of people with immigrant backgrounds.
00:58And that has a lot of her rivals concerned.
01:01They see this as a threat to human rights and to France's democratic ideals.
01:07This could have implications beyond France.
01:10If Macron has to share power with the far right, that's a system called cohabitation
01:15in France, where you have the president and prime minister from opposing political camps.
01:20And that could have implications such as the far-right prime minister might want to halt
01:25France's support for Ukraine, or derail Macron's efforts to fight climate change, or even erect
01:31new borders within Europe.
01:33Few scenarios are possible on Sunday.
01:36One is that the far-right gets an absolute majority, and then they get to name a prime
01:40minister.
01:41Another is that no party has an absolute majority, but the far-right has the most seats in parliament.
01:46At that point, Macron could name a prime minister from the far-right national rally, or they
01:52could have some kind of technocratic government, where they try to come up with people to run
01:57the government who are not part of any party.
01:59However, either situation is likely to lead to long legislative gridlock, and it will
02:04make it very hard for Macron or France to pass any new policy.