France’s minority government survived twin no-confidence votes after pushing a new energy law through by decree, but the more consequential shift may be outside the chamber: a new poll indicates voters are now more inclined to block the hard left than the far right in runoffs, signaling a potential realignment of the country’s political guardrails.
The motions were filed by the far-right National Rally (RN) and the hard-left France Unbowed (LFI), underscoring how both fringes sought to capitalize on the government’s reliance on executive procedures. Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu’s administration, which lacks a majority in the National Assembly, had already weathered two similar challenges earlier this year after forcing a delayed budget through. The pattern points to a governing strategy that trades legislative consensus for procedural control, buying time but not necessarily stability.
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By adopting the energy legislation via decree and without granting the Assembly the final say, the government moved a key policy forward while deepening complaints from rivals about democratic short-circuiting. For the RN and LFI, the votes were an opportunity to cast the center as both weak and overreaching, even as their efforts again fell short.
Outside parliament, the political optics are shifting in ways that may matter more to the next election. An Elabe survey finds nearly two-thirds of respondents would vote for a rival party to keep LFI from power in a second-round contest, compared with 45% who say they would do the same to block the RN. It is a notable reversal of France’s recent past, when the far right was widely treated as the system’s red line and isolated by others in runoffs.
The findings suggest the RN is no longer seen as the country’s most toxic force by a critical mass of voters. That sentiment has been sharpened by the killing of far-right activist Quentin Deranque, 23, an incident that shocked France and turned public anger toward the far left. Authorities have placed seven people under formal investigation over the death, including an aide to an LFI politician. The suspects deny the allegations, prosecutors say.
RN leaders have moved swiftly to frame the tragedy as evidence of a broader threat of far-left violence, calling on rivals to erect a “sanitary cordon” around LFI akin to the cordon sanitaire long deployed against the far right. The Elabe polling suggests that call is gaining traction among voters, with the potential to scramble the calculus of two-round voting that has historically kept the RN at bay.
In practical terms, this matters in two ways. First, the RN is already the largest parliamentary party and is widely viewed as a credible contender in next year’s election. If rival parties and their voters no longer coalesce in the second round to stop RN candidates, the path to additional gains widens. Second, the left’s ability to serve as an anti-RN rallying point is fraying. Former president Francois Hollande has urged his Socialist Party to break with LFI, a sign of deep discomfort with the hard left’s leadership, tone and associations.
The left’s internal rupture is more than a branding problem; it risks weakening its two-round machinery. Historically, the center and left have traded withdrawals and tactical votes to block RN victories. If Socialists, Greens and other moderates hesitate to endorse LFI candidates in second rounds, or if they attract fewer transfers from centrist voters who once prioritized keeping the far right out, LFI could find itself isolated. Conversely, RN candidates could face less consolidated opposition, especially in districts where left and center voters are reluctant to back each other’s finalists.
The government’s decree on energy policy feeds into this broader reordering. For the center, governing by decree keeps the legislative agenda moving amid a hung parliament. But each such move carries a political cost, reinforcing the narrative pushed by RN and LFI that the establishment sidesteps popular will. Both flanks will attempt to translate that grievance into momentum on the trail, especially if the government is forced to repeat the tactic on other high-salience files.
For the RN, the moment offers a chance to recast itself as the party of order and democratic normalcy, rather than permanent protest. The party has long labored under allegations of racism and antisemitism and the stigma of extremist roots. Today’s climate—fueled by a shock crime story and disgust with parliamentary stalemate—allows RN leaders to argue they are the realistic alternative and that the true destabilizers sit on the far left. If that framing holds through next year, the long-standing “republican front” that once contained the RN could invert.
LFI, for its part, faces a dual test: legal proximity to a headline-grabbing case and political isolation within the opposition. While the suspects in Deranque’s killing deny the allegations, the association is damaging. And as prominent figures like Hollande push to sever ties with LFI, the hard-left movement must persuade a skeptical center-left that it remains a viable partner against the right—or accept a narrower lane that reduces its influence in runoffs. How LFI leaders respond rhetorically and organizationally will shape whether today’s polling crystallizes into a lasting disadvantage.
What to watch next: whether traditional runoff behaviors hold or continue to shift. Do centrist and left-wing voters still “lend” votes to whichever candidate is best placed to block the RN, or does that reflex weaken when the finalist is from LFI? Do parties formalize nonaggression pacts or withdrawals to defeat RN nominees, or does the emerging “sanitary cordon” target the hard left instead? Meanwhile, more no-confidence motions are likely as the government seeks to legislate without a majority, raising the odds that procedural fights remain central to the news cycle.
France enters the coming campaign year with the parliamentary math unresolved, the street still absorbing a political killing, and a delicate shift underway in the unwritten rules of its democracy. The government’s latest survival may mask a more consequential movement in the electorate: the centering of the far right as a normalized competitor and the hardening of skepticism toward the far left. If that dynamic endures, it will reshape candidate strategies, runoff alliances and, ultimately, who holds power after voters return to the polls.
By Abdiwahab Ahmed
Axadle Times international–Monitoring.
