France election yields stinging rebuke for Macron

The second round of parliamentary elections in France held June 19 established two key facts.

President Macron’s party suffered a stinging rebuke. For the first time since France went to five-year terms for its president and held parliamentary elections after the presidential elections, the president’s party failed to win a majority. It got 245 seats, 44 seats less than a majority. It was clear that Macron won the presidential elections only because French voters didn’t want fascist Marine Le Pen, his rival in the runoff vote, to be president.

His party’s left-wing opponents, united in a coalition called NUPES, won 131 seats — the way the government counted them — and 142 seats the way NUPES tallied them.

The second key fact is that the fascist National Rally (RN), formerly named the National Front (FN), got 89 seats, 80 seats more than it had in the last parliament.

The General Confederation of Labor (CGT), the oldest and most militant trade union confederation in France, explains this startling gain for the RN, by pointing out that Macron’s party gave no support to nonmember candidates running against an RN candidate. Macron’s party had the position that it was opposed to both the “extremes,” those of the “left” from NUPES and those of the “right” from RN.

The CGT took the opportunity in its comments on the parliamentary elections to say it supports any improvement in the wages and social benefits for workers.