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France's far-right National Front takes center stage in today's election

 
National Front leader Marine Le Pen has declared her party “the first party of France.”
National Front leader Marine Le Pen has declared her party “the first party of France.”
Published Dec. 13, 2015

PARIS — In the 40 years that Joseph Camus has been voting in France, he never considered supporting the far-right National Front party — until now.

Frustrated by the government's failure to revive a moribund economy, fearful of rising immigration from the Middle East and North Africa, and convinced that recent terrorist attacks in Paris won't be the last, Camus says he has lost all faith in the country's mainstream leaders, some of whom have been in politics as long as he has been voting.

So when the National Front's charismatic leader, Marine Le Pen, held a campaign rally in Paris last week, Camus took his place among the boisterous, flag-waving crowd.

"I always voted to the right, to the left, but it doesn't do any good," said Camus, who runs a small, family-owned demolition company. "Maybe when they know there is another party, they will reform the country."

Other new supporters in the room included blue-collar workers and bourgeois suburbanites, recent university graduates and retirees.

Once regarded as a radical fringe party, the National Front has been riding a wave of anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim and anti-establishment sentiment and has made steady gains in recent years. It won the lead position heading into the second round of regional elections today.

When the ballots were counted after the first round last weekend, the party was ahead of its mainstream rivals in six of 13 mainland France regions, with nearly 28 percent of the national vote. Savoring the moment, Le Pen declared to her supporters: "The National Front is now, without doubt, the first party of France."

That, though, may be an exaggeration. The National Front came in less than 1 percentage point ahead of the center-right Republicans of former President Nicolas Sarkozy and just 4 points ahead of President Francois Hollande's governing Socialists.

It may be difficult for Le Pen's party to sustain its electoral gains in the decisive second round. The Socialist Party withdrew its candidates for some regional councils so that its supporters might cast ballots for the Republicans and prevent a National Front victory.

Recent polls had Le Pen trailing her center-right rival in the traditionally Socialist northern region known as Nord-Pas-De-Calais-Picardie, where the National Front won more than 40 percent of the vote in the first round.

Regardless of the outcome, however, analysts say the National Front has sealed its place in the French political mainstream.