French President Macron projected to lose grip on majority in Parliament, may seek coalition
President Emmanuel Macron is projected to lose his outright majority in the French parliament, which at a minimum would force him to compromise and rely on coalition partners to push forward his ambitious pro-business reforms.
The party headed by the 44-year-old centrist, who was re-elected in April, and his allies are set to win 200 – 260 seats out of 577 in the final ballot of Sunday’s legislative election, according to projections by five pollsters.
The second-largest group in parliament looks set to be Nupes, a leftist coalition led by Jean-Luc Melenchon, which is on track to get 149 – 200 lawmakers, according to the pollsters. The far-right National Rally is projected to get 60 – 102 seats, much better than expected. The center-right Republicans and their allies are set to get 60-80 seats.
At least 289 seats are needed for an absolute majority.
With no group of parties near an outright majority, Macron may be able to keep control of the executive branch but will have a hard time passing legislation, putting much of his second-term agenda at risk.
Macron could cobble together alliances on specific topics — his position on raising the retirement age is similar to that of the Republicans, for example. If that doesn’t work, he might also be tempted to use article 49.3 of the French constitution, which under certain conditions allows him to put a law in place even without approval from parliament.
“He won’t be able to lean on the extremes, whether it’s the far right or the far left, which will oppose pretty much systematically every proposition from the government,” said Lisa Thomas-Darbois, a specialist in French politics at the Paris-based Institut Montaigne.
