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What exactly is Marine Le Pen’s stance on Russia and Vladimir Putin?
Marine Le Pen’s feedback in an interview in early February this yr had been significantly forthright: “I don’t consider AT ALL that Russia needs to invade Ukraine,” she stated.
The remarks had been additionally slightly unlucky, given that hardly a fortnight later Vladimir Putin despatched hundreds of troops, amassed on Ukraine’s border, into the nation.
Russian bombardments have since flattened cities and cities, and there have been a number of stories of Russian troopers murdering, torturing and raping civilians.
The challenger to Emmanuel Macron in subsequent Sunday’s French presidential run-off stated just lately that she finds critics’ accusations that she is just too near Moscow tantamount to a “significantly unfair trial”, insisting she has solely ever “defended France’s pursuits”.
Nevertheless, the candidate from the far-right has brazenly expressed her admiration for the Russian chief previously and has persistently defended Moscow’s overseas coverage.
2017: ‘I help Putin’s insurance policies’
In an unprecedented transfer, in March 2017 the Russian president met with a candidate for the French presidency in Moscow within the run-up to the race for the Elysée that spring.
The assembly between Vladimir Putin and Marine Le Pen on the Kremlin reignited fears of Russian help for far-right teams in Europe.
The then “Entrance Nationwide” candidate had already sought get together financing from a Russian financial institution — the mortgage remains to be being paid off — and repeated her intention to carry rapidly EU sanctions imposed on Russia following its annexation of Crimea.
In an interview with the BBC, Le Pen tied her political colors firmly to the mast, citing as her inspirations the newly elected US president in addition to the Russian chief.
“The massive political traces that I rise up for are the massive traces which Mr Trump stands up for, which Mr Putin stands up for,” she stated.
Le Pen additionally blamed tensions with the West firmly on the US and NATO, which she accused of arming nations on Russia’s border.
“Ukraine is a part of Russia’s sphere of affect, it is a reality,” she stated. “In the event you’re making an attempt to say that Russia poses a navy hazard to European nations, I believe you are mistaken in your evaluation.”
France ought to go away NATO’s allied command, she argued. “NATO was created exactly to combat the USSR. At present there isn’t any USSR.”
Russia, Le Pen went on, did not “need to be handled with prejudice”, because it “hasn’t led any campaigns in opposition to European nations, or in opposition to the US”.
US intelligence and an official investigation concluded that Russia interfered with the 2016 US presidential election with the intention of boosting Trump’s candidacy. For a number of years Moscow has additionally been accused of interference and spreading disinformation in European elections.
“Russia goes broadly in the fitting route,” Le Pen replied within the 2017 interview when requested whether or not Putin had carried out extra hurt than good, citing his intervention in Syria which was “optimistic for the safety of the world”.
“What I discover is that Vladimir Putin’s authorities should at the very least please the Russians sufficient to be re-elected recurrently within the nation’s elections,” she stated.
Elections in Russia since Putin got here to energy have recurrently been criticised by human rights teams and worldwide organisations as being neither free nor honest, whereas outstanding opponents of the president have been barred from standing.
‘There was no invasion of Crimea!’
The earlier month, in February 2017, Marine Le Pen was requested about her admiration and respect for Vladimir Putin.
“The Russian nation is a good nation, it has made its alternative whether or not we prefer it or not. Is Russia a hazard to France? Reply: no. Ought to Russia be an ally for France? Reply: sure. Similar factor for the USA,” she instructed CNN.
Le Pen clashed with interviewer Christiane Amanpour over Ukraine’s “Maidan Revolution” and Russia’s subsequent annexation of Crimea in 2014.
“There was a coup d’état in Ukraine,” she stated. “There was an settlement between totally different nations, and the subsequent day, this settlement was damaged, and a sure variety of folks took energy.”
The Maidan protests adopted President Yanukovych’s sudden determination to ditch a political and free commerce settlement with the European Union authorised by Ukraine’s parliament, underneath strain from Moscow. After lethal protests in February 2014, the president fled the nation and was formally faraway from workplace by the parliament.
Russia responded by sending forces to annex Crimea, and backing separatists in jap Ukraine.
“However there was no invasion of Crimea! Hear, it’s important to cease speaking nonsense!” Le Pen instructed CNN within the 2017 interview.
“Crimea was Russian. Okay? Crimea has all the time been Russian… It was given by the Soviet Union… The inhabitants feels Russian. The inhabitants is Russian. The inhabitants determined by a crushing majority to return to Russia’s bosom.”
The 2014 referendum in Crimea, when folks voted to rejoin Russia, was not recognised by most nations. A UN Normal Meeting decision was handed by a big majority declaring the vote invalid and affirming Ukraine’s territorial integrity.
2022: ‘Russia has no want to invade Ukraine’
In February this yr, Marine Le Pen was interviewed once more by the BBC, at a time when Russia had spent months increase troops on Ukraine’s borders. US intelligence and President Joe Biden had warned months earlier that Putin supposed to invade.
However the presidential candidate, as soon as once more operating for the Elysée underneath the “Rassemblement Nationwide” (“Nationwide Rally”) banner, repeated that she needed to see Russia as an ally of France.
As in 2017, she blamed NATO navy strain for the tensions between Moscow and the West.
“At present the USA is pushing Ukraine to hitch NATO with the intention of deploying armed forces on Russia’s border, so the Russians are retaliating, placing forces at their borders with Ukraine,” she stated.
“I defend the sovereignty of all nations, subsequently I defend the sovereignty of Ukraine. However… I don’t consider AT ALL that Russia needs to invade Ukraine,” Le Pen stated, when pushed on how she would reply if Moscow did ship within the troops.
She wouldn’t be drawn on whether or not sanctions must be imposed within the occasion of an invasion. “I do not assume Russia has the least want to invade Ukraine. But when it did so, naturally I might defend Ukraine’s sovereignty, simply as I defend the sovereignty of France,” she repeated.
‘An alliance with Russia’
Russia is barely talked about within the 13-page part on defence that kinds a part of Marine Le Pen’s presidential manifesto.
The candidate confirms that taking France out of NATO’s navy command construction can be a precedence. A brand new relationship can be sought with the USA which “doesn’t all the time behave like an ally of France”. Her authorities would finish joint weapons programmes with Germany.
In distinction, Moscow is as soon as extra thought of an essential future associate.
“An alliance might be sought with Russia on some important subjects: European safety which may’t exist with out her, the wrestle in opposition to terrorism which she has assured with extra consistency than all different powers, the convergence of the remedy of huge regional dossiers affecting France (jap Mediterranean, North and central Africa, the Gulf/Center East and Asia specifically),” the manifesto says.
“Le Pen doesn’t specify what navy threats France faces, and barely mentions Russia. This maybe displays the paradox of her relationship with Vladimir Putin,” says a report for the think-tank the Centre for European Reform (CER) on what a Le Pen presidency would imply for Europe.
What has Le Pen stated since Russia invaded Ukraine?
There’s little doubt that Marine Le Pen was considerably wrong-footed by Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24.
This month she has modified a few of her remarks on Vladimir Putin, renouncing any navy “entente” with Moscow.
On April 4 she talked of “struggle crimes” in Ukraine after the invention of the our bodies of a whole bunch of civilians within the Kyiv area. However on the finish of March, Le Pen refused to class Putin as a “struggle felony” as a result of “you do not negotiate peace by insulting one of many two events”.
The far-right candidate stays against an vitality embargo in opposition to Moscow, due to the possible impression on French folks’s shopper spending energy.
Talking on France’s Europe 1 radio just a few days earlier than the primary spherical of the election, she criticised EU sanctions — which included a ban on Russian coal imports — as being designed to “shield the pursuits of the monetary markets and the true profiteers from the struggle”. “All these sanctions have the results of hitting our firms and personal people,” she added.
The presidential challenger has stated she is able to ship “parts of defence” to Ukraine — understood to imply non-lethal arms — however not heavy weapons which she argues would make France a “co-belligerent” on the facet of Ukraine in opposition to Russia.
Outlining her diplomatic technique on April 13, she referred to as for a “strategic rapprochement” between NATO and Russia, as soon as the struggle in Ukraine was “resolved by a peace treaty”.
“Le Pen and her get together colleagues within the European Parliament have persistently opposed sanctions on Russia. Throughout this yr’s marketing campaign, despite the fact that she has criticised the invasion of Ukraine, she has additionally stated that Putin might develop into an ally of France once more if the struggle ended,” says the CER report.
“If Le Pen had been elected, there’s a danger that she would veto sanctions or solely apply them weakly, and France’s relations with most of its allies and companions can be shaken.”
new video loaded: Reaching Rural Voters in North Carolina After Hurricane Helene
transcript
transcript
Reaching Rural Voters in North Carolina After Hurricane Helene
Ahead of Election Day, canvassers knocked on voters’ doors in Ashe County in storm-ravaged Western North Carolina.
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“What we know is that North Carolina is a dead heat right now. So the margin of victory is going to come from rural voters. You’ve got to get to where people are at, and this is rugged mountain turf. So sometimes the bridge is out to access the home, and you’ve got to go down and across the creek and up the other side to find out if the voter’s there. Sometimes, we’ve hit addresses where the house is gone and we’re finding people in tents.” “Hello, hello. Hi, my name is Bailey and this is Ibi. We’re from Down Home North Carolina. How did you, how did you do in the storm? It looks kind of hard around here.” Yeah, the water was up past these trees when it — and you see what happened to the car.” “And have you made plans to vote? Are you going to vote?” “I was actually able to go last Monday, so I did. Yeah, I was able to get in.” “Did your housemates also vote already as well?” “So they still need too. So trust me, I’m pushing on them. And my son, who’s in Greensboro, to make sure he gets in.” “Ashe County, it wouldn’t be where you would traditionally expect political efforts to be active at this phase in the campaign because it is so heavily a Republican county. And yet, we know every vote counts the same. So we’re really motivated to make sure that we end up with representatives all up and down who represent working-class people and are going to do what’s required to help rebuild Western North Carolina.”
Recent episodes in 2024 Elections
JERUSALEM—The devastating wars launched by Russia’s authoritarian leader Vladimir Putin against Ukraine and the Hamas terrorist movement against Israel are raising uncomfortable questions for President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris about their alleged lack of resolve toward an Israeli victory over the Islamic Republic of Iran-backed proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah.
Fox News Digital turned to experts on the Mideast and Russia for their reflections on the different war strategies embraced by Biden and Harris with respect to Ukraine and Israel.
“The strategic behavior of the United States toward Ukraine and Israel differs substantially,” David Wurmser, a former senior adviser for nonproliferation and Middle East strategy for former Vice President Dick Cheney, told Fox News Digital.
“There has never been any indication that the United States affords Russia any legitimacy to its reasons for invasion. While a cease-fire in place may be sought, there is no indulgence of Russia’s ostensible grievances or demands,” Wurmser said, adding, “In contrast, regarding the Palestinians, the October 7 attack was blasted as a horror and Israel’s immediate defense was accepted, but the thrust of U.S. policy almost immediately and certainly with ever greater intensity was that a legitimate grievance underlies Palestinian claims and led to these events.”
HAMAS ADMITS ‘PAINFUL, DISTRESSING’ LOSSES AFTER ISRAELI VIDEO SHOWS TERRORIST SINWAR MOMENTS BEFORE HIS DEATH
President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris walk to an event on gun violence in the East Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 26, 2024. (SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)
While many Mideast experts see the effort to establish a Palestinian state as a failed project, the Biden-Harris administration has embraced Palestinian demands and sought to push Israel to accept a two-state solution before the Oct. 7 Hamas invasion and after Hamas massacred nearly 1,200 people in Israel.
The language of Biden and Harris towards Ukraine and Israel also shows a disconnect. In September, after Russian missiles killed more than 50 during an attack on a training facility and hospital, Biden said, “Make no mistake: Russia will not prevail in this war. The people of Ukraine will prevail. And on this tragic day, and every day, the United States stands with them.”
Vice President Kamala Harris shakes hands with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during the Summit on peace in Ukraine, in Obbürgen near Lucerne, Switzerland, on Saturday, June 15, 2024. (Alessandro della Valle/Keystone via AP)
Terminology that advances victory is largely shunned by Biden and Harris when discussing Israel’s ground wars against Hamas and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Biden and Harris went as far as to threaten Israel with punitive measures if the Jewish state invaded the last stronghold of Hamas in the city of Rafah. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyhau called their bluff and defeated Hamas in Rafah, including the elimination of its terrorist leader Yahya Sinwar last month.
French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Biden announced last month during a discussion of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s Victory Plan “their resolve to continue supporting Ukraine in its efforts to secure a just and lasting peace.” In the same statement, the western world leaders stressed “ending the war in Gaza,” a message to Israel that it recoil from its anti-terrorism war.
NETANYAHU SIGNALS TEHRAN’S NUCLEAR PROGRAM COULD BE NEXT TARGET AS IRAN PLANS FUTURE ATTACK
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu conducts a security assessment at the air force HQ at the Kirya Base in Tel Aviv with the Minister of Defense, the Chief of Staff, the head of Mossad and the head of Shin Bet. (Israeli Prime Minister’s office)
Israel Defense Forces have not rooted out all Hamas terrorists in the Gaza Strip and Hamas’ leadership insists on continuing its war to obliterate the Jewish state.
The juxtaposition of U.S. policies and language toward the prosecution of wars in Ukraine and in Gaza and Lebanon has revolved around blunting Israel’s paths to victory and its efforts to re-establish deterrence, argue critics of the Biden-Harris school of thought. Ukraine has not experienced the same offensive war restrictions from Biden and Harris, argue experts.
Wurmser noted that “Ukraine is not facing an incessant attempt from the first days of the Ukraine war of self-defense to stop the war in a way that allows its enemy to consolidate its gains and pocket a victory. Only recently has the United States begun to indicate the preference for, but did not impose material pressure on yet, Ukraine to move toward a cease-fire. Not so with Israel. From the first week of the war, the United States [has tried] to restrain Israel and press it towards a cease-fire.”
Israel Defense Forces soldiers are battling terrorists in the vital Netzarim Corridor in Gaza. (IDF Spokesman’s Unit)
He continued, “From the start of the Hezbollah attack on Israel on October 8, the United States pressed Israel to minimize its response and move to a cease-fire. After the Houthis blockaded Israel’s southern port in late October 2023, sent missiles and drones into Israeli cities and attacked Israeli and world shipping, the United States pushed Israel to defer to the United States to guarantee its interests—which it then failed to do. After missiles and drones were sent by Iraqi militias in November 2023 into Israeli cities and ports, the United States similarly urged Israeli passivity but failed to provide Israel security.”
Iran’s regime supports and funds the Houthi movment in Yemen and pro-Iran Iraqi militias.
US DEPLOYS ADDITIONAL MILITARY FORCES TO MIDDLE EAST AMID INTENSIFYING REGIONAL TENSIONS: PENTAGON
Biden and Harris have, however, imposed a restriction on Ukraine’s use of long-range missiles. Zelenskyy appealed to the White House, in a late September meeting, that Biden and Harris increase Ukraine’s leverage to defeat Russia by lifting the ban on long-range missiles that can strike Russian territory. Key Republican lawmakers also urged Biden and Harris to permit Ukraine to use the U.S. long-range missile systems.
Former U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency officer Rebekah Koffler told Fox New Digital that the “Biden-Harris Team has been trying to appease Iran by trying to micromanage Israel’s war fighting campaign, in which Israel is working to eliminate the existential threat. This incompetent approach — constantly pressuring Netanyahu to do a cease-fire, not letting him finish the job — is inviting escalation from Iran. Iran is emboldened, having witnessed that Biden-Harris don’t have Israel’s back. Iran has gotten so out of control that they’ve targeted Netanyahu’s home – think about that. The Ayatollahs clearly feel that Biden-Harris are on their side.”
Battalion 120 Territorial Defense takes part in training exercises near the Belarus border as the war between Russia and Ukraine has been going on for the last two years in Chernobyl, Ukraine, on March 16, 2024. (Photo by Gian Marco Benedetto/Anadolu via Getty Images)
The Islamic Republic of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei taunted the U.S. and the Jewish state with a “tooth-breaking” response to the actions of both countries on Saturday. Iran’s regime vowed to launch a third attack on Israel in response to Israel’s Oct. 26 attack on Iran, which targeted critical military infrastructure. That attack from Israel came in response to a wave of 200-some missiles launched from Iran into Israel on Oct. 1.
The U.S. State Department referred Fox News Digital to the White House for a comment. The White House and the Harris campaign declined to respond to Fox News Digital press queries.
Fox News’ Anders Hagstrom contributed to this report.
A constitutional amendment more than two centuries old determines the choice of winner in case of a draw.
Kamala Harris and Donald Trump are fighting down to the last vote to gain the upper hand in tomorrow’s election. There’s a remote possibility that the US poll could end in a draw, however.
This concerns the machinery of the US Electoral College, the winner-takes-all system that determines which presidential candidate will win the White House.
The Electoral College comprises 538 votes, distributed in varying proportions among the fifty states plus the District of Columbia. A tie between two presidential candidates is therefore theoretically possible.
Harris and Trump could each receive 269 electoral votes, resulting in a complete draw scenario, with both candidates unable to achieve the majority of electoral votes required to become president.
Similar stalemates have occurred twice in US history, in 1800 and 1824.
What happened when there was a tie in the past?
In the 1800 election, Thomas Jefferson’s Democratic-Republicans defeated the incumbent Federalist President John Adams.
At that time, presidential candidates had a “running mate” from a different state, similar to today’s candidates for vice president. The electors had to cast two votes each: the candidate with the most votes would become president, while the candidate with the second-most votes would become vice president.
However, the Democratic-Republicans did not coordinate well, resulting in their candidate for president (Jefferson) receiving the same number of votes as their candidate for vice president (Aaron Burr).
The election was therefore decided by the House of Representatives using a one-state, one-vote rule after a long deadlock that nearly resulted in a military confrontation, as Sanford Levinson, a professor at the University of Texas Law School, has noted.
For this reason, the 12th Amendment was introduced, which still regulates the election of the US president. It clarifies that electors “shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice President,” to avoid any possible tie between candidates from the same party.
However, there remains the possibility that no candidate receives a majority of the total number of electors appointed—currently, that crucial threshold is 270.
This actually happened in 1824, when Andrew Jackson received 99 votes, John Quincy Adams 84, William Crawford 41, and Henry Clay 37. All of these candidates were from the same Democratic-Republican political party, which was split into regional factions.
The 12th Amendment states that in such cases, the House of Representatives shall immediately choose the president by ballot from the top three choices of the electors. Votes are taken by state, with each state having one vote and a simple majority required.
This means that Wyoming, the smallest state in the US with fewer than 600,000 people, would have the same say in choosing a new president as California, which has almost 40 million residents (even though Wyoming appoints only three electors and California 54).
Additionally, the choice of the new president would depend on the composition of the House of Representatives, which is set to be voted on in parallel with the presidential elections.
ADVERTISEMENTHow likely is a tie?
While a tie is unlikely, it is still a possibility to consider, with various scenarios outlined by the website 270toWin.
One scenario is that Trump wins Pennsylvania and Georgia, while Harris secures victories in Wisconsin, Michigan, Arizona, Nevada, and one electoral vote in Nebraska, which alongside Maine is the only state that splits its allocation of electors.
Another scenario, even more unlikely, is that Harris wins all the states Biden won, plus North Carolina, which current polls indicate could go to Republicans. If Trump then reclaims Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, and also wins Nevada for the first time, the outcome would be a 269-269 tie.
This would trigger a “contingent election,” with the House of Representatives tasked with deciding the US president for the first time in two centuries, requiring a simple majority of 26 states to elect the new commander-in-chief.
ADVERTISEMENTWith the country sharply divided, newly sworn-in US congress members would face immense pressure and, in some cases, might have to choose between backing their party candidate or the one who received the most popular votes in their own state (there is no requirement for state delegations to honour the winner of their state’s vote).
This situation would likely unfold on 6 January, right after Congress determines that no candidate has a majority, according to an analysis by the Congressional Research Service.
Even more surprisingly, the tie scenario could lead to cohabitation between a Republican president and a Democratic vice president or vice versa.
Indeed, according to the 12th Amendment, in the event of no majority, the US vice president is chosen by the Senate from the two candidates with the highest number of electoral votes, with each senator entitled to one vote (the US Senate has 100 members, with each state electing two).
ADVERTISEMENTFinally, the Senate could select a vice president even if the House is deadlocked in the election of the president. So, if a president is not selected by Inauguration Day, 2o January, the newly chosen vice president would serve as acting president. This is a scenario that no one in the US can envision as of today.
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