World
French National Assembly election: What’s at stake and what to expect?
French voters will cast their ballots on Sunday in the first of two rounds to elect 577 members of the National Assembly, as country looks set to enter a new political era.
The elections come after French President Emmanuel Macron called for a snap vote triggered by a crushing defeat to Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally (NR) party at the European Parliament elections on June 9.
Polls suggest the coming elections will confirm the trend. NR leads strongly with 36 percent of the vote, followed by left-wing bloc Nouveau Front Populaire (NFP) at 28.5 percent, trailed by Macron’s centrist alliance – Ensemble – with 21 percent.
If the results echo the polls, Macron might have to cohabitate with an antagonistic prime minister, regardless of who is elected.
How do the French elections work?
Voting opens at 06:00 GMT and is expected to end at 16:00 GMT in most of the country, but polling stations in Paris and other major cities will stay open until 18:00 GMT.
To win a majority in the National Assembly, a party or alliance needs 289 seats — just over the halfway mark in the House. Macron’s outgoing coalition fell short of that number, limiting its ability to push through its legislative agenda.
For the verdict on any of the 577 seats to be called on Sunday, July 30, two conditions need to be met. First, the voter turnout needs to be at least 25 percent. Second, a candidate needs to win an absolute majority of votes cast.
In a multiparty system like France’s, that typically means that many, if not most, contests go to a second round of voting – scheduled this time for July 7.
Only those candidates who secure at least 12.5 percent of the vote in the first round can stand in the second round, effectively narrowing the field of contestants.
Why is this election so different?
Traditionally, National Assembly elections are held straight after the presidential vote, and so reflect the same popular mood. The result is a prime minister from the same political party as the president, who then can implement policies with a strong mandate.
But those power dynamics have now shifted and for the first time in 22 years, France will have a state of cohabitation: a deeply unpopular president ruling alongside a government elected in as a vote of dissatisfaction against Macron himself.
“It will mark the beginning of a new way of governing and the end of the presidential agenda,” said Emmanuel Dupuy, president of the Institute for European Perspective and Security Studies, a think tank on diplomacy and political analysis. “Macronism has already almost collapsed and it will exit the election totally wiped out,” he said.
How did we get here?
Macron first came to power in 2017 riding a wave of support, as he pledged to create a centrist bloc, lacing the moderate left and right together. But it didn’t take long before his language started sounding too aloof to the ears of people in the suburbs – he got the nickname Jupiter. His economic reforms were too right wing to liberals who had previously backed him; and his way of governing was seen as too despotic by many right and left voters.
Now, the election could mark an end to Jupiter’s solo show, as France looks set to enter a new political era.
“He runs the country like a CEO of a company,” said Samantha de Bendern, associate fellow at Chatham House. “But a country is not a company and he failed to build alliances with partners – Macron is a loner,” de Bendern said.
One of the starkest signals of his isolation was the Yellow Vest movement – a period of violent protests in 2018. What started as workers on lower-middle incomes infuriated by planned increases in diesel taxes snowballed into a wider movement against the president’s perceived bias in favour of the elite. His second mandate was marked by a highly contested bill in 2023 to raise the country’s retirement by two years which turned into another huge domestic challenge as he faced widespread opposition.
And while he won a second mandate in 2022 – in good measure by scaring, rather than attracting, voters over the prospect of the far right taking over the presidency – the tactic seems to have tired many. “There is a feeling of anger – people are fed up with showing this scare for Le Pen while being forced to vote for Macron to keep out the far right,” de Bendern said.
What is Le Pen’s ‘dediabolisation’?
Meanwhile, Le Pen has meticulously crafted a so-called dediabolisation – de-demonisation – strategy over the past two decades, aimed at broadening the party’s base while tempering its radical discourse to distance itself from many references that had made the NR too toxic to several voters.
The party has long been associated with notorious racists, and xenophobic and anti-Semitic slurs. Her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, once convicted of hate speech for saying that Nazi gas chambers were “a detail of history”, was expelled from the party in 2015. Le Pen convinced the moderate right instead that she was not a threat to democracy and conquered areas traditionally close to the far left, especially in the Communist Party, promising social welfare policies and tight restrictions on migrants.
“Many [by voting NR] are expressing their opposition to a system that they feel is depriving them of what they deserve in favour of people, mostly foreigners, who are getting benefits that are not due,” said Baptiste Roger-Lacan, historian and political analyst with a focus on far-right parties in Europe.
Today, the party’s candidate to be the country’s prime minister is Jordan Bardella, an impeccably dressed 28-year-old man who looks like a mix between a Wolf of Wall Street and Superman’s alter ego Clark Kent. Yet he comes from the suburbs and speaks to his tens of thousands of followers not just on the street but also on TikTok. He has no experience in governance.
On the other side, far to centre-left parties have united under the New Popular Front. Its most vocal cause has been its support for the Palestinian cause amid the war in Gaza, a position that has earned the grouping popularity among young voters and the Muslim community.
By contrast, the NR has firmly supported Israel condemning “pogroms on Israeli soil” and attacking the leader of the far-left La France Insoumise party, Jean-Luc Melenchon, for failing to call the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel “terrorism” – something that has caused friction within the bloc itself.
What would a far-right win mean?
The most serious repercussion of a win for the NR is going to be on the domestic front. While the party now says anti-Semitism is a problem of the left-wing party, it has shifted its focus against migrants and Muslims. France is home to Europe’s biggest Muslim community, with families settled there for several generations.
While Bardella did not specify what “specific legislation” he would push for to fight “Islamist ideologies”, he said in the past the party would work to ban the wearing of the Islamic headscarf in public spaces and to make it easier to close mosques.
The RN has also made its top priority the adoption of stringent border controls, the scrapping of birthright citizenship – a practice that for centuries has been granting citizenship to those born in France to foreign parents – and the introduction via constitutional referendum of the “national preference”, a system by which someone would be excluded benefits from social security rights unless with a French passport.
“Clearly the NR is still xenophobic so any foreigner has something to lose, any foreigner who has not a European heritage would have to lose something if the NR were to be elected,” Roger-Lacan said.
And what about foreign policy?
With his eyes on power, Bardella has been softening or reversing some of the party’s traditional positions. He made a U-turn on Ukraine saying he was committed to keep providing military support to Kyiv, while pushing back against critics’ allegations of some party members’ links to the Kremlin.
Still, considering Macron’s unwavering stance on Ukraine and France’s role as a pillar of the European Union, a Bardella-led government not committed as much to the European project, would mark a shift.
During a news conference on Monday, Bardella said he opposes sending French troops and weaponry capable of striking targets on Russian soil.
“He is in a phase where is trying to reassure the non-NR electorate, and possibly future EU partners, but clearly the party gaining power would add a lot of tension between France and the rest of the EU,” said Roger-Lacan, who is also former deputy editor-in-chief at the think tank Le Grand Continent.
Unlike Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who had transitioned towards more Atlantic, pro-NATO, pro-EU positions years before her election victory in 2022, Roger-Lacan explains, the NR’s conversion “sounds extremely contextual”.
Still, should the far right win the elections, observers note, it could end up abstaining from creating too much tremor, should it win the elections, as the group is playing the long game. It’s ultimate goal: capturing the presidency in 2027.
FIFA’s on-field officials for the World Cup will insist on keeping matches moving by taking rule changes designed to limit time-wasting seriously, the sport’s governing body said Sunday with the start of the 48-team tournament now less than two weeks away.
Also among the points of emphasis for referees and officials: a commitment to issuing red cards to any player who covers his mouth while talking to an opponent in a “confrontational situation,” FIFA said.
“We are continuing on trying to achieve an objective, which is to eliminate from matches — as much as possible — the disruption of the tempo of the match,” said Pierluigi Collina, FIFA chief refereeing officer and chair of the referees committee.
Other issues that referees will be mindful of during the tournament:
— If a player leaves the field of play after being angered by an official’s decision, a red card can be issued.
— To speed up play, referees can institute a five-second visual countdown on goal kicks and throw-ins. If the goal kick is not taken before the end of that countdown, a corner kick will be awarded to the opposing team. If the throw-in is not executed by the end of the five-second count, a throw-in for the opponents will be the reward. It’s along the same lines of the so-called eight-second goalkeeper rule that has been in place for some time to release the ball after making a save.
— Players getting subbed off must leave the field within 10 seconds, except for special situations such as ones involving injuries or a security issue.
— The protocol for Video Assistant Referee, or VAR, is being clarified in certain areas. VAR can be used to check when red cards are issued following a clearly incorrect second yellow card, or when cards are issued in the case of mistaken identity. Incorrectly awarded corner kicks can also be checked by VAR, FIFA said.
Players covering their mouth with a hand, arm or shirt will be given red cards if referees deem it not to be a friendly conversation, FIFA said. Conversations that are not confrontational but still have players shielding their mouths from public view will continue to be permitted without penalty.
“Confrontational … a completely different story,” Collina said.
There has also been a clarification on VAR protocol “regarding clear offenses committed by the attacking team before the ball is in play at a corner kick or free kick” that directly impacts goals, penalty kicks or sanctions.
VAR can be used in those moments and “if the referee determines that an offense occurred before the ball was in play, the appropriate disciplinary action will be taken.”
But all the emphasis on speedy play won’t necessarily mean quicker matches. There will be three-minute water breaks midway through each half of every match, FIFA said.
___
AP World Cup: https://apnews.com/hub/fifa-world-cup
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
Hezbollah has begun unleashing “game changing” waves of “lethal” nighttime drones against Israel, a defense expert warns, with the attacks contributing to casualties, defense breaches and plunging parts of the border region into chaos, according to reports.
Escalating deployments by Hezbollah had also prompted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to convene an emergency security meeting on May 30 following a surprise Hezbollah strike, amid reports of “utter chaos” as Israeli forces scrambled to respond.
“These nighttime drones are the very small Category 1 and Category 2 drones,” defense expert and Draganfly CEO Cameron Chell told Fox News Digital.
“They are generally used by squads on the ground to go and conduct tactical lethal missions or surveillance missions right in theater immediately. What they are able to do is use thermal sensors to be able to fly at night and use heat signatures to spot IDF troops,” he said.
ISRAEL SAYS IT IS STRIKING HEZBOLLAH TARGETS IN LEBANON
Rockets are launched from Lebanon towards Israel amid escalating tensions between Hezbollah and Israel, as seen from the Israeli side of the border. (Gil Eliyahu/Reuters)
“Hezbollah now has nighttime capabilities, which is game changing,” Chell added.
“What you will see is an escalation of the use of drones and the innovation of asymmetric warfare in that particular area by Hezbollah,” he warned.
Chell’s comments came amid reports of makeshift defenses with nets being deployed against the backdrop of a significant shift in the conflict.
Israeli soldiers have resorted to buying commercial fishing and soccer nets to entangle the incoming aerial threats, according to reports.
“This means that there is a whole other set of countermeasures that the IDF has to put in place, whether it is electronic jamming, net guns or the use of netting just to put in front of installations or in front of vehicles to try to stop the final impact of the drone if it is a strike drone,” Chell added.
HEZBOLLAH DISARMAMENT DEADLOCK RISKS CIVIL WAR, ANALYSTS SAY, AS US PREPARES FOR ISRAEL–LEBANON TALKS
Smoke rises following a projectile attack amid ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel near Shlomi in northern Israel on Oct. 19, 2024. (Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters)
“The IDF will have to change a lot of their tactics regarding their ability to move around and conduct operations at night. Now they will have to factor in the fact that Hezbollah has nighttime capabilities to at least do observation using thermal cameras, as well as strike capabilities.”
Netanyahu called a meeting with top officials following an intense Hezbollah rocket and drone blitz that caught the military off guard on Saturday.
According to a report by Channel 13, the Israeli army was surprised by the scale of the fire as well as Hezbollah’s decision to shift its operational policy in response to the expansion of Israel’s ground operations beyond the Litani River.
IDF SOLDIERS ACCUSE UN PEACEKEEPERS OF ENABLING HEZBOLLAH TERRORISTS AMID INCREASING CEASE-FIRE VIOLATIONS
Hezbollah terrorists holding rifles are shown in this image. A “terrorist network” funded and operated by Hezbollah and Iran was foiled in the United Arab Emirates, according to a report. (Fadel Itani/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Reports from the ground described “utter chaos” in parts of the north. While rockets were said to have hit the cities, Hezbollah simultaneously launched waves of drone strikes.
Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem has also touted the militant group’s drone capabilities, calling them an effective weapon against Israeli forces operating near and inside southern Lebanon.
Netanyahu has also described Hezbollah’s drone capabilities as a major threat given the difficulty in detecting them.
“Hezbollah have got a supply line or supply chain of some sort set up,” Chell added before stating that they are not “using stuff that is groundbreaking; this is very old technology and tactics that they are using.”
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
“That said, somebody is making the equipment available to Hezbollah — whether it is coming via Iran, China, Russia, Afghanistan or the black market, someone is getting enough product and feeding it into their supply chains,” Chell warned.
Published on •Updated
At Frankfurt am Main’s central station, Deutsche Bahn also warns passengers on board the trains about pickpockets. Travellers leaving the station are confronted with the misery of drug addicts who congregate in Kaiserstrasse and the surrounding streets, whether they like it or not. Police are usually on the scene, but from the outside little seems to have changed in recent years.
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
And the figures on violence at Germany’s railway stations are causing headaches for many officials. Since this weekend the federal police have stepped up their presence at stations in ten major German cities. Yet when it comes to crime at stations, Frankfurt does not sit at the top of the list.
The stations particularly affected by crime in 2025 were the central station in Leipzig, with 859 violent offences, the central station in Dortmund with 735 and the central station in Berlin with 654.
Most recently, the fatal attack on a conductor on a regional train in Rhineland-Palatinate last February caused widespread shock. It was followed by a debate about the scale of attacks on Deutsche Bahn staff.
Expert: “No railway station in Germany is a no-go area”
In total, according to police statistics, 27,800 violent offences were committed at railway stations last year. These included 980 recorded knife attacks and more than 2,200 registered sexual offences. Some 5,660 acts of violence were directed against federal police officers. According to the police, the suspected perpetrators were significantly more often non-Germans than Germans.
Criminologist Dirk Baier does describe stations as “hotspots of crime”. But in an interview with WELT the expert also explains that violence at stations is particularly visible precisely because the police presence there is higher and because it is reported on more frequently. “From my point of view there is no major station in Germany that is a no-go area.”
Indeed, directly opposite Frankfurt’s central station many people – including families and women – have no difficulty doing their shopping in the chemists and the supermarket.
Police officers at stations instead of at border controls
The deputy leader of the CDU group in the Bundestag, Günter Krings, wants to improve public safety at stations through technical measures such as more cameras, while at the same time relieving pressure on police officers. Discussions on this are currently taking place within the coalition parties.
The AfD describes Germany’s railway stations as “spaces of fear” and is calling for tougher sentences, more consistent deportations and an increased police presence.
However, the Greens’ domestic policy spokesman, Marcel Emmerich, believes that while video surveillance can be useful, it cannot replace officers on the ground. The government, he says, is deploying thousands of federal police officers for “expensive, pointless and unlawful border controls” instead of strengthening their presence at stations.
Weapons and alcohol bans at stations
As the Süddeutsche Zeitung reports, weapons bans now apply from Friday to Sunday at Munich’s central station and the Ostbahnhof in the Bavarian capital, as well as at the main stations in Nuremberg, Regensburg and Rosenheim. This means that knives and dangerous tools may not be carried there at weekends. According to SZ, officers can stop, question and search people even without a specific reason.
An alcohol ban has been in force at Cologne’s central station (Hbf) since April; it now also applies to the stations in Bonn, Düsseldorf, Duisburg, Essen, Dortmund and Münster.
Deutsche Bahn has domiciliary rights at its stations and can therefore enforce its own rules there, such as an alcohol ban.
Violence at railway stations is by no means solely a German phenomenon, as the recent knife attack in Winterthur in Switzerland shows.
-
World5 seconds ago
FIFA says match tempo, and limiting time-wasting, will be point of emphasis at World Cup
-
News7 minutes agoVideo: Another Night of Violent Protests Outside a Newark ICE Detention Center
-
Lifestyle40 minutes agoTrump floats MAGA rally instead of concert after musicians drop out of Freedom 250
-
Technology52 minutes agoAMD’s new pitch: our old tech is so good you should just keep using it
-
World55 minutes agoHezbollah’s ‘game changing’ night-hunting weapon punches through Israel’s defenses: expert
-
Politics1 hour agoHasan Piker says UK has barred him, trashes ‘unbelievable…power’ of pro-Israel groups
-
Health1 hour agoQuitting smoking could offer a major benefit beyond heart and lung health, study finds
-
Sports1 hour agoRoman Reigns domesticates Jacob Fatu to retain World Heavyweight Championship at WWE Clash in Italy
