How Nationalists Made Giant First Step in France

Political prognosticators are still reeling after the big leap forward by nationalist conservatives in the first stage of France's parliamentary elections.

Throughout the world, they wondered just how a party that not very long ago was widely painted as "fascist" and "racist"— the lineal heirs to the Vichy government that ruled Nazi-occupied France from 1940-45 — could emerge on the precipice of winning a majority in parliament and thus securing the position of prime minister.

In what was almost universally considered the biggest win anywhere in the world for the conservatives characterized as "nationalist" or "populist," the National Rally (RN) Party, led by three-time presidential candidate Marine Le Pen, topped races for the 577-seat parliament with 33% of the vote. RN was followed by the Popular Front — a coalition of the left that included socialists, greens, and communists — with 28%, and French President Emmanuel Macron's centrist coalition in a third at 20%.

Under France's complex election rules, any candidate that receives over 12.5% of the vote in races for the National Assembly will meet in the second round of voting July 7. The top vote-getter will go to parliament.

While Macron's centrist and the left are already making deals to defer to one another and thwart the RN candidates, the RN will likely gain close to the 289 seats if its 33% showing Sunday holds up in the runoffs next week. The turnout for voting Sunday was 59.9% — the highest for a parliamentary election in four decades.

"It's the result of a coherent and long-term inoculation strategy, meaning to make voting for the RN mainstream and assuaging voters' fears of the RN," Swiss public relations expert Louis Perron, author of the critically-acclaimed book "Beat the Incumbent," told Newsmax.

"This started with Marine Le Pen taking over from her father [Jean-Marie Le Pen, once fined for calling the Holocaust a "detail of history"] and renaming the party and courting women voters," Perron added. "The very last step in the process was Le Pen openly courting Jewish voters, which would have been unimaginable only years ago."

Perron also gave credit to Jordan Bardella, the 28-year-old spokesman for the party, and certain prime ministers should the RN secure a majority next Sunday.

In his words, "Bardella himself is a fascinating messenger. Can the RN be so racist as is being said if they nominate someone as their leader and top candidate who has parents with immigration roots?"

Along with its cleaned-up image, the RN was boosted by growing voter anger over the estimated 300-400,000 illegal immigrants in France. Bardella hit this hard, vowing to fight a "cultural battle" to amend the constitution to provide "national preference" for citizens over foreigners for social benefits, end birthright citizenship for people born in France to foreign parents (which has existed in France since 1515), and make it easier to shut down mosques, ban Muslim veils and "burkini" (swim clothing that covers one's entire body), and make deportation easier.

Bardella and the RN completely turned off talk of their party leading France out of the European Union and entirely removed from their platform a plank calling for an exit from NATO.

Although many traditional Catholics identify with the RN, Le Pen and Bardella want no changes in France's liberal abortion law. Moreover, both are considered friendly to the LGBTQ+ community and include members in RN positions.

In Perron's words, "The process of changing the RN's image is a great example for what I write about in chapter four of my book 'Beat the Incumbent,' which is about selling change to voters and making voters comfortable with voting for change.

"It's no longer 2002 when voters were in shock that Jean-Marie Le Pen qualified for the second round of voting in the presidential election and almost all other parties coalesced to block him," he continued. "Instead of blocking the RN, Macron effectively paved the way for it. Voters can now try out an RN-led government without much risk while Macron is still there as president and checks and balances in case they go overboard."

John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. For more of his reports, Go Here Now.