LF: France's far right are crushed in elections: Marine AND Marion Le Pen both lose their bids for power as their National Front party is routed in regional vote

Title: France's far right are crushed in elections: Marine AND Marion Le Pen both lose their bids for power as their National Front party is routed in regional vote
Source: Daily Mail Online
URL Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art ... ing-power-two-key-regions.html
Published: Dec 14, 2015
Author: Peter Allen In Paris for MailOnline and
Post Date: 2015-12-14 08:53:44 by cranky
Keywords: None
Views: 1010
Comments: 27

France’s far-right National Front has failed to win a single region in Sunday's elections, forcing leader Marine Le Pen to abandon her bid to become president in 2017.

Ms Le Pen had hoped to make a dramatic breakthrough at the polls by taking advantage of the nation’s heightened fear of uncontrolled immigration and terrorism, following the Paris attacks that left 130 people dead.

But instead she was left with only the ‘total eradication’ of the left to celebrate, the result of a last-minute tactical voting drive to keep the far-right out of power

Despite the National Front's loss, France's political leaders warned that action must be taken in order to prevent its rise in the future.

Marine Le Pen (pictured delivering a post-result speech) lost out to Republican candidate Xavier Bertrand in the northern Nord-Pas-de-Calais-Picardia region, as her party failed to take a single region

Marion Marechal-Le Pen, 26, also lost to her Republican rival in the southern Provence-Alpes-Cote d'Azur region

Ms Le Pen pledged to keep fighting to expand voter support for the National Front (FN), choosing to take their victory in the first round as a positive sign.

She said that in the weeks ahead she will ‘rally all the French, of all origins, who want to take part with us'.

Nothing can stop us now. Election after election, the rise of the nationalist tide is inescapable.

Marine Le Pen, leader of France's National Front

‘Nothing can stop us now ’ she announced, to cheering supporters. 'Election after election, the rise of the nationalist tide is inescapable'

She thanked her ‘patriotic voters’, and added: ‘Congratulations, too, for having thrown off the indecent slogans, the campaigns of calumny of defamation that were decided upon in the gilded palaces of the Republic.’

She also celebrated the ‘total eradication’ of the left - President Hollande’s Socialists - which had controlled all but one of France’s regions before this vote but lost several.

The Socialists pulled their candidates out of the race before the second round in two of the FN's key regions, encouraging their voters to instead cast their ballots for Republican candidates to keep out the FN.

Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy expressed pride in his right-wing Republican’s electoral comeback in Sunday’s elections, but warned that his party should take heed of the high support for the anti-immigration FN in the first round.

Nicolas Sarkozy, former French president and president of the right-wing Les Republicains party, delivers a speech on Sunday night warning that his party must take heed of the FN's support in the first round

Marine Le Pen pledged to keep fighting to expand voter support for the National Front, choosing to take their victory in the first round as a positive sign

French Prime Minister Manuel Valls delivers a speech in which he said 'there is no place for relief or triumphalism' and that 'the danger posed by the far-right has not gone away'

‘We are proud…of the results,’ he told supporters.

But he added: ‘We must now take the time to debate the fundamentals of great questions that are anguishing the French.’

The danger posed by the far-right has not gone away, far from it.

Prime Minister Manuel Valls

French Prime Minister Manuel Valls also said that the anti-immigrant party's high score should force the government to listen.

'Tonight, there is no place for relief or triumphalism,' Mr Valls said, speaking on Sunday. 'The danger posed by the far-right has not gone away, far from it.'

Exit polls indicated that both Marine Le Pen and her 26-year-old niece Marion Marechal-Le Pen lost in their regions, following the Socialists' anti-FN drive.

Republican candidate Xavier Bertrand beat Marine Le Pen in the Nord-Pas-de-Calais-Picardia region with 57.5 per cent of the vote compared to her 42.5 per cent, according to the Ifop Fiducial poll.

Meanwhile, Marion took 45 per cent in the southern Provence-Alpes-Cote d'Azur region, according to exit polls, compared to the Republican Christian Estrosi's 55 per cent.

Xavier Bertrand, who beat Marine Le Pen in the northern Nord-Pas-de-Calais-Picardia region, reacts after hearing the second round results

Corsica nationalist party candidate Gilles Simeoni (right) reacts during the announcement of the second round of French regional elections

French Socialist Party supporters react after the announcement of the first results of the second round of the French regional elections at the headquarters of the PS candidate for the Ile-de-France region in Paris

President Francois Hollande's Socialists, who had all but one of France's 13 regions leading into the elections, have lost several after withdrawing candidates in key regions for the FN

Marion had been projected as the 'poster girl' for the FN and the natural successor to her grandfather Jean-Marie Le Pen, who led the FN from its foundation in 1972 until 2011.

Here the French gave a lesson of rallying together, courage. Here we stopped the progression of the National Front.

Republican Xavier Bertrand

The result will come as a huge blow for Ms Le Pen, who had hoped to use the regional elections as a springboard for her 2017 presidential bid.

Overall, out of 13 regions, the Republicans and their conservative allies have won seven and the ruling Socialists and their allies five, with Corsica going to Corsican nationalists.

Mr Bertrand, who beat Marine Le Pen in her home region, thanked leftist voters for supporting him and keeping the anti-immigrant FN from power.

'Here the French gave a lesson of rallying together, courage,' he said, after the results emerged.

'Here we stopped the progression of the National Front,' he said, to the sound of boos from Ms Le Pen's supporters.

Marion Marechal-Le Pen (centre) is surrounded by staff members and journalists as she arrives to deliver a speech after the results in the second-round regional elections in Marseille

Marion, 26, had been hailed as the National Front 'poster girl' and the natural successor to her grandfather Jean-Marie Le Pen who led the party from its foundation in 1972 until 2011

Marine Le Pen (centre) leaves after delivering a speech following the announcement of results in the second round of French regional elections in Henin-Beaumont

Republican Christian Estrosi (right), who defeated Marion Le Pen in the Provence-Alpes-Cote d'Azur region, party members Eric Ciotti (left) and Maud Fontenoy (centre) react after results in the second-round regional elections in Nice

The battle to keep Marine Le Pen's party out of power dramatically drove up Sunday's turnout.

Turnout figures were 7 per cent higher than for the previous regional elections in 2010, with 50.4 per cent of those eligible to vote casting ballots by 5pm (4pm GMT), three hours before polls closed in big cities.

The second-round turnout at the same time five years ago was 43.4 per cent.

Candidates battled to the last minute to lure out the nearly 50 per cent who failed to vote in the December 6 first round, because their votes were vital.

France's FN accused tactical voters seeking to block its path to power in two key regions of 'intellectual terrorism'.

The far-right party was focusing on the link between uncontrolled immigration and terrorism as it tried to secure a launchpad for its leader, Marine Le Pen, to become president in 2017.

They won six of 13 regions in last weekend's first round, benefitting from security fears in the wake of the Paris terrorist attacks on November 13.

But the governing Socialist Party - which came just third in the first round - withdrew its candidates from two key regions and urged supporters to back former president Nicolas Sarkozy's conservative Republicans.

The FN technically became the most popular party in France last week, winning 28 per cent of the nationwide vote. Pictured left: Marine Le Pen, right, casting her vote today in Henin-Beaumont: left, Marion Marechal-Le Pen during a campaign meeting, on December 7

This will likely have played a key role in Marine's loss tonight, in the northern Nord-Pas-de-Calais-Picardia region.

The area includes the port of Calais, where up to 5,000 migrants are currently sleeping rough as they try to get to Britain, where they will claim asylum or disappear into the black economy.

But the Socialists feared that some of their supporters might stay home rather than go and vote for the party of Sarkozy, who is widely despised by the left.

The question of who would take final victory in this crucial election is one that split the French population going into the voting on Sunday.

'For me, she is going to win,' said voter Evelyne Risselin in Le Pen's electoral home base Henin-Beaumont.

'Maybe it will make all those politicians stop and think.'

Political analyst Joel Gombin, a specialist on the far-right, said: 'The only thing that is certain is that it will be a very tight race.'

Marine Le Pen leaves a booth before casting her vote at a polling station during the second round of the regional elections in Henin-Beaumont

Marion Marechal-Le Pen leaves the city hall after voting during the second round of 2015 French regional election in Carpentras, southern France

Marine Le Pen cast her ballot in the northern city of Henin-Beaumont, one of 11 run by the FN.

'Voters should not be treated like children, nor be terrorised,' Ms Le Pen told reporters after casting her vote.

The far-right leader denounced 'this giant campaign of insults, slander, fear' by her rivals during a bitter campaign.

Socialist Prime Minister Manuel Valls has called the FN a 'scam' that 'fools the French' and a divisive party that could 'lead to civil war'.

President Francois Hollande cast his vote early this morning, urging fellow Socialists to do everything possible to keep the FN out of power.

The run-offs were seen as a testing ground for all three front-runners for the 2017 presidential elections, the Socialists' Hollande, ex-president Sarkozy and Le Pen.

The FN has never managed any constituency larger than a few small and medium-sized towns, and winning a region would have been an enormous boost to Le Pen's presidential bid.

But despite efforts by Marine to soften the party's image, it is still associated with its racist and anti-Semitic roots.

French President Francois Hollande speaks with supporters as he leaves the polling station after casting his ballot in the second-round of the regional elections in Tulle

French Prime Minister Manuel Valls (left) prepares to vote in the second-round regional elections in Evry

Nicolas Sarkozy, former French president and current head of the Les Republicains political party, casts his ballot during the second-round regional elections in Paris

Marine said the tactical voting was 'undemocratic' and accused opponents of 'intellectual terrorism' in seeking to block her party's path to power.

She has threatened to sue the government over the situation in Calais, adding that she will 'make the government's life a misery, every day, every week'.

The FN technically became the most popular party in France last week, winning 28 per cent of the nationwide vote, one point ahead of the Republicans and their electoral allies.

But commentators have argued that this was a protest vote against the disastrous economic performance of the Socialists, and the weak opposition led by Mr Sarkozy.

It has topped EU and local polls for two years, bolstering Ms Le Pen's claim that it is now 'the first party of France'.

It controls at least 10 towns and Ms Le Pen has reaped the rewards of her efforts to 'de-demonise' the party bequeathed by her father Jean-Marie Le Pen.

The FN has been criticised for its xenophobic agenda, and particularly its stigmatising of immigrants and some five million Muslims who are French citizens.

Socialist Prime Minister Manuel Valls said the FN wanted to return France to the 'wars of religion', and should be stopped at all costs.

Even Mr Sarkozy, who is well known for his equally reactionary views on immigration and Islam, said the FN 'would create chaos' if it was given control of a region.

Rather than let FN win two regions, the Socialists piled on to support the Republican candidate from Sarkozy's party.

I wonder if Labor in Britain has also been reduced to supporting Conservatives in upcoming elections, to stave off the UKIP from rising.

What the Socialists did was the equivalent of Hillary Clinton pulling out of the general election after having been nominated, and telling the Democrats to all go out and vote for Rubio, to prevent Trump from winning.

I remember the parties did that once to defeat David Duke when he was running. He won the primary. His own party told everybody to go vote for the other guy, who was an indicted criminal, to prevent Duke from winning.

That the Socialists had to go that far in France to stop the FN shows you the degree to which they fear the FN. This happened before, when Jospin was eliminated and Jean-Marie Le Pen was the candidate against Chirac. Chirac had various ethics issues, and the Left sure didn't love him, but it was a "Vote for the Crook - It's Important" moment, and the Socialists and Communists all came out to vote with the center right to put Chirac back on the throne for 5 more years, in order to stop Le Pen.

Maybe it tells you that Socialists in France are now marginal for the forseeable future and that the real future of politics in France belongs to Sarkozy's Republicans and to the FN.

France has always been a center-right country. Socialists have only won the Presidency twice: Mitterand and Hollande.

The National Front is more statist than the Republicans, and naturally draws from the Socialists. They're nationalist socialists, the FN. The French as a whole are not blind to the implications of that. The Socialists, for their part, are internationalists, as are the Republicans. The FN are the nationalists...nationalist socialists...it's only a couple of letters off.

Not sure about that but I do wonder what Hollande and the Socialists expect in return for throwing the election to Sarkozy.

There are three kinds of people in the world: those that can add and those that can't

They don't expect anything. They view the Republicans as their enemy, but the Front National as the embodiment of evil.

To use a parallel that isn't far off, the Soviets viewed the British Empire as their ideological enemy. Stalin particularly loathed Churchill. And we know that before the war the British nearly went to war with the USSR over Finland, and that Churchill spoke of a campaign to bring down the Soviet Unions. There was no love lost.

But when Hitler invaded, and the Soviet Union was fighting for its life, they allied with the British, and the British were happy to have the ally. For if Britain had had to face Hitler all alone, it was only a matter of time. And likewise the Soviet Union. The two adversaries needed each other against an enemy that was much worse than either was to each other.

The Republicans and the Socialists and the Communists all have in common that they view the FN as Nazis, or at best, Fascists, and none of them wants to see the FN - THAT element of French society - win and wield power. It is "unacceptable".

The Socialists and Republicans view the FN's as a flash in the pan that arose from the terror strikes, and that will subside with time.

Unfortunately (from their perspective), they had to lose this election to stop it, but the Socialists are still there, as socialist as ever, and they will be going after the Republicans everywhere.

For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:6-8)

But when Hitler invaded, and the Soviet Union was fighting for its life, they allied with the British, and the British were happy to have the ally.

There are three kinds of people in the world: those that can add and those that can't

I was in Louisiana at the time and remember very well what happened. Louisiana has an open election for Governor, and then a runoff if no one gets 50%. Duke, Buddy Roemer, and Edwin Edwards, all ended up with about 1/3 of the vote. Roemer, however, was by a slight margin number 3 and was out. It was odd and a bit of a shame, as he was probably the best candidate. He was a conservative Democrat who became a Republican. He was a previous governor who alienated many people, though, with his stark measures to balance the budget.

Everybody knew Edwards was a crook, but many people acknowledged he was a "good" crook for Louisiana. What Duke was also very obvious.

So you had the Democratic crook, and the Republican White Supremacist in the runoff. I don't think Republicans were coaxed to vote for Edwards. Most Southerners were still Democrats at the the time. And blacks (about 30% of the State), showed up en masse to register and vote for Edwards. In the end, Duke got about the same vote he got in the initial election -- 1/3.

Obama has played at being a president while enjoying the perks â€¦ golf, insanely expensive vacations at tax-payer expense. He has ignored the responsibilities of the job; no plans, no budgets, no alternatives â€¦ just finger pointing; making him a complete failure as a president

Which goes to proove the French like to be the recipients of terrorism and shiria law.

That it HAPPENS to work as a bilingual pun (it actually works as a pun in French too) is, I am sure, merely a coincidence.

And when the Republicans derail Trump and either Hillary or some open borders Republican wins the Presidency, will you agree that that proves the Americans like to be the recipients of terrorism and shariah law?

There are three kinds of people in the world: those that can add and those that can't

The political results of LePen is an ominous precusor to any TRUMP victory in America. I guess those who cast a vote in America for the GOP/DEM Party will enjoy their vote for either Bush/Clinton as preordained by the elite.

It proves that Americans are stupid enough to like the vaudeville acts of politicians working to bring terrorism and shariah upon us.

As imposed inch by inch through repeated compromise with the guerilla army they have allowed to immigrate into their country. We're doing the same God damned thing.

I haven't seen the French compromise much. They banned the hijab and the burka. They've made judicial decisions that nullify Muslim pre-marital virginity guarantees. Some areas have even made a point of serving only pork in schools on certain days, to force assimilation.

With your ability to create evasive grammatical constructions, you could have a great future in politics.

>They've made judicial decisions that nullify Muslim pre-marital virginity guarantees.

And that's still wack. They made a hypothetically virginal religion of females less available since you can't divorce them over that reason.

France is very militant about not permitting the sexual restraints of Muslim or Christian religion to have any legal force in France, even if by an oblique angle.

French courts will not enforce contracts that pertain to purity. Privacy in sexual matters is a fundamental right in France, and that means that the right to enforce contracts is superseded when the subject of the contract pertains to pledges of sexual purity.

Most of the French are secular non-believers. Religion is tolerated, but when religious precepts interfere with the principles of the French conception of freedom and rights, the religious precepts must stand aside. That is how the French look at it. The liberty principles of the French Republic supersede the traditions that come from mythical figures like Mohammed and Jesus or Moses. That's the way the French look at it, if pressed. The Christians don't press them. The Muslims do.

meanwhile french dudes are ok with their girls being with thousands of men.. they dont marry them either