Live updates: Polls close in French election; forecasts suggest no party will win an outright majority
French voters returned to the polls Sunday for a second and final round of voting to elect representatives to the National Assembly, the country’s lower and main house of parliament, which has 577 seats.
The vote is of great importance for Prime Minister Emmanuel Macron, as the nationalist, anti-immigration Rassemblement National is set to do well and months of political deadlock are possible.
France’s 577 constituencies — one for each seat — cover the mainland and overseas departments and territories, as well as French citizens living abroad. France awards seats to candidates who receive the most votes in each district.
In the first round held a week ago, 76 legislative seats were won outright, with the rest of the races going to the second round, which will be held on Sunday.
Although any number of candidates can run in the first round in each district, there are specific thresholds to reach the second round of voting. In most cases, the two candidates with the most votes are elected in the second round, but sometimes there are three or even four candidates who have received votes equal to at least 12.5 percent of the registered voters in their district.
High voter participation led to more than 300 triple re-elections after the first round last week. But left-wing parties and Macron’s centrist coalition pulled more than 200 of their candidates out of the three-way race to avoid splitting the vote and preventing National Rally from winning an outright majority. That left fewer than 100 three-way races on Sunday.
Whoever gets the most votes in the second round wins the race.
In most of France, polls close at 6 p.m. local time (12 p.m. Eastern Time), although in some larger cities voting continues until 8 p.m.
The French Interior Ministry is expected to release initial results at 8 p.m. (2 p.m. Eastern Time), with national seat projections from the polls also expected around the same time.
If the Rassemblement National, which won the most votes in the first round, and its allies win a majority in the National Assembly, Mr. Macron would have little choice but to appoint a prime minister from the far-right party. That would put France’s domestic policies squarely in the hands of the far right and could disrupt Mr. Macron’s defense and foreign policies.
If a clear majority does not emerge, Macron has limited options to move forward.
He could try to form a new coalition, but that could be a challenge. The three main political blocs — the far right, the left-wing alliance and Macron’s centrist coalition — have radically different agendas and have in some cases expressed extreme hostility toward each other.
If a working majority cannot be formed, the country could be headed for months of political deadlock or unrest. Mr. Macron, who has ruled out stepping down, cannot call new parliamentary elections for another year.
One possibility being discussed by analysts is an interim government that would run the country’s day-to-day affairs until there is a political breakthrough, as has happened in Belgium. But this too would be a break with French tradition.
