After strong first-round showings that prompted National Rally (RN) leader Jordan Bardella to hail an “historic victory,” the party’s momentum was dented by the results of the second round of France’s municipal elections. Despite polls still putting the RN ahead for next year’s presidential vote, the party failed to translate earlier gains into major wins on Sunday.
The RN will govern dozens of municipalities but fell short of expectations. Research director Luc Rouban of Sciences Po called the second round “a true string of disasters” for the RN, especially in coveted cities such as Marseille, Toulon and Nîmes. He said the so-called “republican front”—temporary coalitions formed to block the far right—continued to operate in some places.
Context and procedure
Nearly 35,000 communes held votes on party lists. A list needs an absolute majority to win a mayoralty; most contests were decided in the first round, but about 1,500 municipalities went to runoffs. Lists that received at least 10% in the first round could compete again.
Barriers and personalities
The RN’s struggles come amid uncertainty around other key figures. Marine Le Pen, former party leader and daughter of Jean-Marie Le Pen, is barred from public office for five years after a corruption conviction; an appeals court will rule in July on whether the ban stands. Meanwhile, President Emmanuel Macron cannot seek a third consecutive term, opening the field for new contenders.
What the mainstream right and left showed
Anne-Charlene Bezzina, a constitutional law lecturer at the University of Rouen, said results signal a partial return to familiar patterns: long-established parties such as the Republicans (LR) and the Socialist Party (PS) remain deeply embedded in local politics. She warned, however, that local results don’t directly map onto national trends and noted that traditional parties are weakening in rural areas. Voter turnout was 57%, a low not seen since 1958 aside from the pandemic vote in 2020.
The left’s experiment falters
Left-wing France Unbowed (LFI) hoped to position itself as the main candidate-provider for a united left against the RN but underperformed. Pierre Allorant of the University of Orléans said pacts between LFI, the PS and the Greens often backfired: where alliances were hastily formed after the first round, those joint lists tended to lose. The PS managed to win some key contests where it stood alone or without an explicit pact with LFI, notably in Paris, where Emmanuel Grégoire will succeed outgoing mayor Anne Hidalgo.
LFI’s leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon remains a liability for some voters after controversial remarks widely seen as antisemitic; some polls even show voters view LFI as more anti-democratic than the RN. Given France’s fragmented party landscape, Allorant said the RN currently appears as the “only coherent bloc,” complicating efforts by other movements to unite around a single strong presidential candidate for 2027.
Shifts on the center-right
Rouban argued the municipal vote did not deliver the breakthrough the RN sought. The party had hoped to lead a broader right-wing alliance with LR, but LR rejected that alignment and instead collaborated with center-right partners such as Horizons and MoDem to defeat left-wing lists in cities like Toulouse and Clermont-Ferrand. This repositioning has allowed LR to reclaim leadership of the center and center-right space.
That dynamic benefits Edouard Philippe, the founder of Horizons and reelected mayor of Le Havre, who has already announced a presidential bid and is viewed as one of the favorites for 2027. His success illustrates how local victories and cross-party cooperation on the center-right can reshape national prospects.
What this means for 2027
– The RN remains a growing force nationally, but its municipal performance shows limits: it can win local posts but struggled to capture prominent cities it had targeted.
– Traditional parties (LR, PS) continue to wield local influence, and tactical alliances—especially on the center-right—can blunt RN advances.
– The left’s fragmentation, and LFI’s weak standing with some voters, undermine the prospect of a united leftic challenger in 2027.
– The center-right consolidation around figures like Edouard Philippe gives the non-RN field a potential strong candidate to rally around, but whether other parties can unite remains uncertain.
– Low turnout and rural erosion of traditional party support keep the national picture fluid; the RN may still be the steady gainer, but progress could be slower and more contested than early spectacles suggested.
In short, municipal results complicate a simple narrative of RN ascendancy: the party is a significant player, but local politics showed continued resistance from established parties and coalition tactics that could influence how competitors approach the 2027 presidential contest.
This article was originally published in German.