French parties unite behind Macron, against Le Pen
PARIS — France’s established parties are rallying around the man who helped shut them out of the presidential runoff, maverick centrist Emmanuel Macron — an alliance of convenience aimed at keeping farright Marine Le Pen out of the Elysee Palace.
Support for Macron also poured in Monday from the seat of the European Union, as well as from German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Jewish and Muslim groups troubled by Le Pen’s nationalist vision.
European stock markets surged, and France’s main index hit its highest level since early 2008 as investors gambled that the rise of populism around the world — and its associated unpredictability in policymaking — may have peaked.
It is now up to French voters to decide whether to entrust him with this nuclear-armed nation in the May 7 presidential runoff. Polls consider him the front-runner, but that’s no guarantee that the French will come together to stop Le Pen the way they stopped her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, from reaching the presidency in 2002.
Politicians on the moderate left and right, including French President Francois Hollande and the losing Socialist and Republican party candidates in Sunday’s first-round vote, maneuvered Monday to block Le Pen’s path to power.
In a solemn address from the Elysee Palace, Hollande said he would vote for Macron, his former economy minister, because Le Pen represents “both the danger of the isolation of France and of rupture with the European Union.”
Hollande said the far right would “deeply divide France” at a time when the terror threat requires solidarity.
Voters narrowed the French presidential field from 11 to two in Sunday’s first round, and losers from across the spectrum called on their supporters to choose Macron in round two. Only the defeated farleft candidate, Jean-Luc Melenchon, pointedly refused to back Macron.
The contest is widely seen as a litmus test for the populist wave that last year prompted Britain to vote to leave the European Union and U.S. voters to elect Donald Trump president.
Le Pen, meanwhile, is hoping to peel away voters historically opposed to her National Front Party, long tainted by racism and antiSemitism. On Monday, she took a step in that direction, announcing she was temporarily stepping down as party leader, a move that appeared to be aimed at drawing a wider range of potential voters.
For voters, choosing from inside the system is no longer an option. Angry voters rejected the two mainstream parties that have alternated power for decades in favor of Le Pen and the untested Macron, who has never held elected office.
Macron’s optimistic vision of a tolerant France and a united Europe with open borders is a stark contrast with Le Pen’s inwardlooking “French-first” platform that calls for closed borders, tougher security, less immigration and dropping the shared euro currency to return to the franc.
Le Pen went on the offensive against Macron in her first public comments Monday. “He is a hysterical, radical ‘Europeanist.’ He is for total open borders. He says there is no such thing as French culture,” she said.