In France’s legislative elections of 2022, the far-right Rassemblement National (RN) secured 18.7% of votes, an all-time high for the party that was formerly known as the Front National. In the presidential elections, Marine Le Pen secured roughly 13 million votes, a far cry from the 5.5 million her father Jean Marie Le Pen received in 2002. The legislative tally resulted in the party securing 89 seats in the National Assembly (Assemblée nationale – the lower house of the French Parliament), an 81-seat increase over the 8 seats it previously held. This historic result was built on the back of high levels of abstention, high levels of “negative voting” against incumbent President Emmanuel Macron and his Renaissance party, and the waning of the so-called “Republican Front” which used to unify mainstream parties and voters against the French far-right.
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