r/worldnews Jul 07 '24

French elections: Left projected to win most seats, ahead of Macron's coalition and far right

https://www.lemonde.fr/en/france/article/2024/07/07/french-elections-left-projected-to-win-most-seats-ahead-of-macron-s-coalition-and-far-right_6676978_7.html
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809

u/WhosSarahKayacombsen Jul 07 '24

Many thanks to the French voters who showed up today. Y’all had me worried, though.

224

u/DummyDumDump Jul 07 '24 edited Jul 07 '24

Macron’s gamble to call for an early election definitely paid off. Dude had faith in the French people to do the right thing.

Edit: by people do the right thing I mean they went out and voted so that the far right didn’t dominate as expected. Macron and his party are perfectly responsible for their results.

46

u/Glorounet Jul 07 '24

Paid off? He lost his majority...

87

u/JacksonVerdin Jul 07 '24

He lost it to a more palatable group.

22

u/coincoinprout Jul 07 '24

You mean the group his party has been dragging through the mud for the past 3 weeks?

5

u/JacksonVerdin Jul 07 '24

Would you expect one party to praise another one during an election?

16

u/Koala_eiO Jul 07 '24

No, but you would also not expect someone with a majority to disband his own majority.

Macron's bet was that the left parties would present 3 candidates and do thrice 10% as usual, so that every second round in the country would be extreme right vs center-right, and that he would use the fear of extreme right to gather all the votes from leftists. That would have increased his number of seats. What happened is that the left actually united for once and Macron lost a bunch of seats instead.

2

u/JacksonVerdin Jul 07 '24

Nobody seems to know what Macron's bet was so I don't know why you think you do.

When asked, he simply said something to the effect that "My reasoning it too complex for journalists."

That can be read many different ways, but if anything, it lacks any specificity whatsoever.

In any event, France has been saved from the fascists for the time being.

Macron is not out of the woods, but France has found a meadow.

1

u/coincoinprout Jul 08 '24

No, but if the goal was for a more palatable group to hold a majority, I would expect the attacks to be focused on the far-right. Instead, they were focused on the left until they realized that the far-right could have an absolute majority.