2024 French Legislative Election

An early legislative election was held in France on 30 June 2024, with a second round to be held on 7 July, to choose all 577 members of the 17th National Assembly of the French Fifth Republic. The election follows the dissolution of the National Assembly by President Emmanuel Macron, who decided to call a snap election in the aftermath of the 2024 European Parliament election in France in which the opposition National Rally made substantial gains against his L'Europe Ensemble list. The latter lost a considerable number of seats compared to the 2019 parliamentary election.

The legislative election features four main blocs: Ensemble, the coalition of pro-Macron forces including Renaissance, the Democratic Movement, and Horizons; the New Popular Front (NFP), bringing together the main parties of the left, including La France Insoumise, the Socialist Party, The Ecologists, and the French Communist Party; the National Rally (RN), which also jointly supported several dozen candidates backed by Éric Ciotti of The Republicans (LR) in addition to its own candidates; and the vast majority of other LR candidates, who were supported by the national investiture committee of the party.

Pre-election opinion polls suggested that high turnout and the level of tripolarisation of the electorate between Ensemble, the New Popular Front, and the National Rally could lead to an unprecedented number of three-way runoffs in the second round of the election. Analysts also noted that the consolidation of the electorate behind these three main political forces could also result in total institutional deadlock after the elections in the event that no bloc has the votes to secure support from an absolute majority of the National Assembly, which could force Macron to call a second snap election as soon as a year after the 2024 election.

According to provisional results, the RN and their allies secured the largest share of the vote in the first round with 33.15% of the vote, followed by the parties of the New Popular Front with 28.14%, those of Ensemble with 21.27%, and The Republicans and miscellaneous right candidates with 10.22%, with an overall turnout of 66.71%, the highest since 1997. On the basis of these results (not accounting for candidate withdrawals after the first round), 306 constituencies were headed to three-way runoffs and 5 to four-way runoffs, with only 94 three-way runoffs and 1 four-way runoff remaining after the publicly announced withdrawals of 132 NFP and allies, 83 Ensemble and allies, and 6 other candidates ahead of the registration deadline for the second round. A total of 76 candidates were directly elected in the first round, and RN-supported candidates qualified for the second round in 444 other constituencies, compared to 415 for the NFP, 321 for Ensemble, and 88 for LR or other candidates on the right (according to ''Le Mondes classifications of candidates by political affiliation).

Background

Following the 2022 legislative election, Ensemble lost its absolute majority in the National Assembly. Among the member parties of the coalition was President Emmanuel Macron's party, Renaissance (formerly La République En Marche!). Meanwhile, the two main opposition blocs, the left-wing New Ecological and Social People's Union (NUPES) and far-right National Rally (RN) made significant gains in terms of seats. Despite that, no group won the absolute majority, resulting in a hung parliament for the first time since the 1988 election. The lack of an absolute majority led to the repeated invocation of article 49.3 of the constitution in order to adopt legislation, with Élisabeth Borne doing so 23 times by December 2023.

On 9 June 2024, shortly after 21:00 CEST, Macron dissolved the National Assembly and called snap elections in a national address following projections which indicated that the L'Europe Ensemble electoral list would be significantly eclipsed by the RN in the European Parliament elections in France. In his address, he called the rise of nationalism by agitators a threat to France, Europe, and France's place in the world. He also warned that the far-right would bring about the "impoverishment of the French people and the downfall of our country." The dates of the first and second rounds of elections were set for 30 June and 7 July, respectively.

Reactions to the announcement

Politicians

RN leader Jordan Bardella called the large gap between the RN and L'Europe Ensemble electoral lists in the European Parliament elections a "stinging disavowal" of President Macron, saying that the results marked "day 1 of the post-Macron era." Marine Le Pen, president of the RN group in the National Assembly, and Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of La France Insoumise, celebrated the election results and welcomed the announcement of snap elections.

Former President Nicolas Sarkozy condemned Macron, seeing his decision to dissolve parliament as a "serious risk for the country." Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo reacted extremely negatively to Macron's decision, saying that the elections posed a serious threat to the upcoming 2024 Summer Olympics because they would not only "spoil the mood of the whole country" but also carry the risk of street riots and demonstrations.

Media

The decision to hold an election came as a surprise to outside observers and was widely seen as being risky for the presidential majority of Emmanuel Macron, with some suggesting that Macron wished to force a decision between the RN and their opposition and others assessing that Macron intended to win a majority, with Renaissance leader Stéphane Séjourné attempting to tempt moderate incumbents on both the left and right to join his alliance in comments made just after the dissolution was announced.

Most international media expressed deep surprise at Macron's decision, calling the snap elections a "desperate gamble." In general, Macron's decision was perceived negatively, and the prospects for his alliance's victory in the elections were assessed as low. ''La Libre Belgique'' called Macron a "wounded political animal." According to the BBC, by calling snap elections, Macron jeopardised the democracy of the Fifth Republic and risked provoking violence in the streets and institutional collapse. ''The Guardian'' considered Macron's measures an attempt to avenge his defeat in the preceding European Parliament elections, which could result in radicals coming to power and splitting the country. ''Die Zeit'' believed that Macron "lost his cool" to such an extent that he actually "gave the country to Marine Le Pen." The Greek daily newspaper ''Kathimerini'' called Macron's decision an unwise gamble that would lead to nothing good. French media raised the issue of holding the 2024 Summer Olympics in conditions of political instability.

Electoral system

The 577 members of the National Assembly, known as deputies, are elected for five years by a two-round system in single-member constituencies. A candidate who receives an absolute majority of valid votes and a vote total greater than 25% of the registered electorate is elected in the first round. If no candidate reaches this threshold, a runoff election is held between the top two candidates plus any other candidate who received a vote total greater than 12.5% of registered voters. The candidate who receives the most votes in the second round is elected.

A consequence of the 12.5% threshold was the potential for three-way runoffs, also referred to as ', in a greater number of constituencies in the second round in the event of higher turnout and diminished number of candidates, as was anticipated to be the case in 2024 relative to previous legislative elections. Such a dynamic reinforced the likelihood that higher turnout became an advantage for the National Rally, which received a clear plurality of the vote in pre-first round polls and as a result would be expected to win a greater share of seats due to the increased number of three-way races in the second round, not accounting for the possibility of candidate withdrawals.

With pre-election polls suggesting that the 2024 legislative elections would feature the highest level of turnout in decades with an exceptionally tripolarised electorate, pre-election estimates of the potential number of three-way races were also at unprecedented levels, and ultimately 306 constituencies headed to three-way runoffs and 5 to four-way runoffs, with 94 three-way runoffs and 1 four-way runoff remaining after candidate withdrawals announced ahead of the registration deadline for the second round.

Campaign

Timeline

The two rounds of the election are scheduled for 30 June and 7 July in metropolitan France (France, adjacent islands, Corsica), while each round will take place a day earlier in France's overseas departments ( Saint Pierre and Miquelon, Saint Barthélemy, Saint Martin, Guadeloupe, Martinique, French Guiana, French Polynesia) as well as in embassies and consular posts in the Americas. Polling stations are open from 8:00 to 18:00 local time, with some open until 20:00. All media coverage in terms of candidate interviews and programmes, campaigning, and publication of public opinion polls are banned from midnight on the day before the election in (29 June and 6 July) to the closing of the last polling stations on election day.

The timeline for candidates to register for the first round of elections was from 12 June until 16 June, while the candidate registration deadline for the second round is 2 July. The official campaign, during which audio-visual and electoral regulations must be respected, began on 17 June.

For those registered on consular electoral lists, online voting for constituencies for French residents overseas runs from 25 June at 12:00 CEST to 27 June at 12:00 CEST for the first round, and from 3 July at 12:00 CEST to 4 July at 18:00 CEST for the second round. Many of those attempting to vote on 25 June reported that the voting website was unreachable due to high traffic. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs announced on 27 June that 410,000 online ballots were cast during the voting period, a new record compared to 250,000 in 2022.

The extremely short amount of time to prepare for the election posed significant logistical challenges, especially in overseas France, due to municipalities being required to cover the costs of organising the ballot by themselves in addition to the necessity of recruiting and training volunteers to run polling stations in relatively little time. In a press release, the stated that many mayors remained worried "about the ability of their communes to organise these two elections under satisfactory conditions." While monetary compensation for assessors is usually prohibited, some communes opted to ignore the electoral code given that exceptions were granted to communes under similarly "exceptional circumstances" in the past. Furthermore, the timing of the election made it impossible for candidates and parties to present enough representatives presents at polling stations, with only a tenth of those required having been nominated in Nice. While such issues might normally be sufficient reason for the Constitutional Council to annul election results in specific constituencies, legal scholars considered this possibility unlikely given the lack of time for officials to prepare for the elections.

Protests

On 9 June 2024, protests started immediately following the European election results, where several hundred people demonstrated against the RN's victory at Place de la République in Paris and called for a “union of the left” in the next legislative elections and several dozen people chanting anti-Jordan Bardella slogans in Lille. Many labour unions, student groups, human rights groups, and political parties called for rallies in order to oppose the anti-immigration and Eurosceptic policies of National Rally, and to promote "progressive alternatives for the world of work". Political parties that called for rallies included the Socialist Party, Communist Party, The Ecologists and La France Insoumise, while union groups calling for rallies included the French Democratic Confederation of Labour (CFDT), the General Confederation of Labour (CGT), the Union of Autonomous Trade Unions, the Fédération Syndicale Unitaire, and the Solidaires, promoting the "largest possible" demonstrations.

On 18 June, the CGT called for voters to support the left-of-centre New Popular Front alliance, marking the first time it ever issued specific voting instructions for a specific candidate or party.

Parties and coalitions

Summary

Below are the major parties and alliances (including any primary components with candidates in at least 3 constituencies) contesting the elections in a majority (289 or more as tallied by ''Le Monde'') of constituencies, listed by their combined results in the previous elections. Footnotes using this reference may also make use of JSON dat
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within this page, which includes codes assigned by the Ministry of the Interior as well as political parties and alliances (New Popular Front and Ensemble) as analysed by ''Le Monde'' for all 4,010 candidates.

Due to the suddenness of the dissolution of the National Assembly, significantly fewer candidates will compete in the legislative elections in 2024 compared to previous years, with only 4,010 candidates in 577 constituencies (the lowest figure since the 1988 election). The decline is also explained by both national and local alliances as well as the absence of candidates in some constituencies in order to support other ideologically-aligned candidates. Smaller parties – such as the Animalist Party, which presented 421 candidates and received 1.1% of the vote in 2022 but announced it would not present candidates in 2024 – were the most significantly affected due to their inability to negotiate alliances with larger parties and present candidates in the majority of constituencies with such short notice.

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New Popular Front

Leftist politician François Ruffin called on all left-wing parties, including The Ecologists (LE), to form a " popular front" in order to avoid the "worst" outcome. Calls for unity were also shared by Socialist Party (PS) leader Olivier Faure, LE leader Marine Tondelier and French Communist Party (PCF) leader Fabien Roussel. A letter of 350 intellectuals (including Esther Duflo and Annie Ernaux) calling for a union of left-wing forces was published in ''Le Monde'' on 10 June. The New Popular Front was established on the same day, bringing together La France Insoumise (LFI), the PS, LE, the PCF, Place Publique, and various other political forces.

On 13 June, LFI, the PS, LE, and the PCF reached an agreement on how to allocate 546 constituencies (including metropolitan France and French voters living abroad) between candidates of their choice, obtaining 229, 175, 92, and 50 constituencies, respectively, with these seats divided among themselves and allied forces. After outcry from other members of the alliance, Adrien Quatennens, previously convicted of domestic violence, withdrew his candidacy in Nord's 1st constituency on 16 June. Several incumbent LFI deputies critical of leader Mélenchon – Alexis Corbière, Raquel Garrido, Hendrik Davi, and Danielle Simonnet – were not renominated in their constituencies under the banner of the New Popular Front, a decision critiqued both by their supporters and other party leaders within the alliance. Nevertheless, the four candidates maintained their candidacies against LFI opponents in their constituencies. Frédéric Mathieu, another Mélenchon critic within LFI, was also not renominated and opted not to run for re-election.

The coalition unveiled its campaign platform on 14 June, which included overturning Macron's pension, unemployment, education, immigration, police, guaranteed minimum income, and universal national service reforms, as well as his cuts to funding for low-income housing and his merger of French nuclear safety organisations; lowering the retirement age to 60 in the longer-term; implementing price freezes on essential food, energy, and gas; raising the minimum wage to €1,600 per month (representing a 14% increase) and personalised housing assistance by 10%; moving towards a 32-hour work week for arduous or night shift jobs; conditioning government support for businesses on adherence to environmental, social, and anti-discriminatory regulations; reserving workers one-third of seats on boards of directors; increasing financial transaction taxes; banning bank financing for fossil fuels; nationalising control over water; reforming the generalised social contribution and inheritance taxes (capping the latter), as well as nearly tripling the number of income tax brackets from 5 to 14, to make them more progressive; re-instituting a solidarity tax on wealth "with a climate component"; enacting an exit tax on funds withdrawn from the country; charging a vehicle miles traveled tax on imports; guaranteeing a price floor for agricultural products; cancelling the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement and any future free trade treaties; and forbidding the imports of agricultural products which do not meet domestic social and environmental standards.

Other key NFP proposals included raising the image and salaries of public healthcare, education, justice, and government jobs; strengthening the industrial sector in key strategic areas; establishing the right to menstrual leave; prohibiting new major highway projects; outlawing intensive animal farming and the usage of all PFASs, neonicotinoids, and glyphosate; re-examining the Common Agricultural Policy; providing partial or full government financing for home insulation; creating free public water fountains, showers, and toilets; constructing 200,000 new public housing units per year; requiring mandatory rent control in high-rent areas; introducing proportional representation; removing article 49.3 from the constitution; outlawing the usage of blast balls by riot police; continuing to supply weapons to defend Ukraine; recognising the state of Palestine along with Israel; and demanding compliance with the International Court of Justice (ICJ) order against Israel and ceasing support for Benjamin Netanyahu's government.

Opponents of the New Popular Front exploited uncertainty around who would be appointed prime minister in the event of the victory of the left, warning of the threat of Jean-Luc Mélenchon's appointment given his refusal to recuse himself from the post; although on 22 June he said that he would be willing to be appointed prime minister, he claimed that he would "not impose" himself, even as numerous other potential appointees' names have circulated. Other figures on the left, while reluctant to address the question of who they believed should be prime minister, were taken aback by his comments: former president François Hollande, running in Corrèze's 1st constituency, opined that Mélenchon should "keep his mouth shut," former prime minister Lionel Jospin said that he was hearing "just about everywhere, and particularly from voters of the left" that "Jean-Luc Mélenchon is not the solution," Fabien Roussel released a statement saying that "Mélenchon's nomination for the post of prime minister, peculation about whichhe himself is feeding into, has never been subject of an agreement between the forces of the Popular Front," Marine Tondelier, interviewed on LCI about Mélenchon's remarks, painted a generic portrait of the attributes of the ideal prime minister, ending with "and lastly, someone who unites." In a pre-election Elabe poll, only 16% of respondents – including just 49% of Mélenchon's 2022 voters, 24% of supporters of green parties and 17% of Socialist Party supporters – indicated they would be supportive of his appointment as prime minister, compared to 83% against the idea.

Infighting broke out into the open on 24 June, starting with PCF leader Fabien Roussel's comments in the morning, "I say this to Jean-Luc Mélenchon: no one can proclaim himself Prime Minister," to which he added that the New Popular Front needed "the most unifying personality" to lead them in the incoming National Assembly which, according to him, would clearly not be Mélenchon, comments also echoed by Faure. Those remarks were followed by Tondelier declaring that Mélenchon would not be prime minister, and that any prime minister would have to be chosen by consensus between the forces of the New Popular Front, but she was almost immediately rebuked by LFI national coordinator Manuel Bompard, who argued that "nobody can decide to exclude" Mélenchon. In back-to-back evening interviews on France 2, Place Publique co-founder and MEP Raphaël Glucksmann, echoed Tondelier's comments in declaring definitively that "Mélenchon will not be prime minister," even as Mélenchon told Hollande to "shut up" in response to his comments the previous day, complained that the speculation was due to "jealousy" of others on the left, and lamented the fact that he had to cede 100 additional constituencies to PS candidates compared to the New Ecological and Social People's Union (NUPES) in 2022 because Glucksmann's list outpolled the LFI list in the preceding European elections. Interviewed on 26 June, Faure said Mélenchon would not be prime minister, and the latter chided his alliance partners' "petty" bickering and reaffirmed that any decisions about who would become prime minister would only be made after the elections, but did not close the door to the possibility of him seeking the post, saying "there are those who don't like me and others who do like me." On 1 July, LFI deputy Sophia Chikirou declared that "it will be either Mélenchon at Matignon, or another" LFI member if they constitute a majority of left-of-centre elected officials, owing to her feeling that other members of the alliance were indebted to them.

Ensemble

The Ensemble coalition of Renaissance, the Democratic Movement (MoDem), Horizons, the Union of Democrats and Independents (UDI), and the Radical Party was renewed after swift negotiations soon after the dissolution announcement.

Just after the early election was called, Secretary General of Renaissance Stéphane Séjourné announced that the presidential majority would field candidates against "other republican candidates" in the hopes of splitting his opposition, with Clément Beaune naturally excluding La France Insoumise (LFI) and the National Rally (RN) from that definition. The alliance ultimately chose not to field candidates in 67 constituencies, many of which were represented by incumbents of The Republicans (LR), and several others from the Socialist Party (PS) as well as members of the Liberties, Independents, Overseas and Territories (LIOT) group in the National Assembly. On 12 June, Emmanuel Macron said that he had called the election to prevent a far-right victory in the 2027 presidential election. He criticised The Republicans for its potential alliance with the RN, as well as the New Popular Front (NFP), and urged all parties "able to say no to extremes" to unite.

In an open letter published on 23 June, Macron wrote that he hoped that "the future government ould gatherrepublicans of diverse sensibilities who will be known for their courage to oppose the extremes," in acknowledgement of the possibility of a post-election coalition. Additionally, in response to speculation that he might resign, he affirmed that he would remain president until May 2027. Most – but not all constitutional experts – rejected the possibility of Macron resigning in order to avoid potential legislative deadlock in the event of an unclear election outcome (with legislative elections prohibited within a year of the preceding one), considering that article 6 of the constitution explicitly prohibits presidents from serving more than two consecutive terms, and such a scenario would entail him seeking a third given that his current term would consider to have ended after such a resignation.

On 20 June, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal pledged to lower electricity bills and inheritance taxes, link pensions to inflation, and provide aid to first-time property buyers. Other proposals he presented included raising the value-sharing bonus by up to €10,000 per year, constructing 14 new nuclear reactors, banning access to social networks to those aged 15 and under, halving the usage of pesticides by 2030, and doubling the army budget by 2030. Echoing the RN's proposals in response to a spate of youth violence, Attal also announced that he would seek to abolish age as a mitigating circumstance for statutory penalties by default, meaning that judges would charge lawbreaking children as adults unless they provided explanations as to why an exception should be granted. At the same time, he attacked the RN's programme of "division, hate, and stigmatisation," and said the RN's backtracking on various economic policies showed that they were "not ready to govern." Macron likewise castigated the "uninhibited racism or anti-Semitism" of the campaign in response to RN deputy Roger Chudeau saying that his fellow former cabinet member Najat Vallaud-Belkacem should not have been able to serve because of her dual nationality.

Trailing in third place nationally behind the NFP and RN in pre-election polls, Macron and his allies decided to focus their attacks on the programme of the New Popular Front prior to the first round and mostly avoid direct confrontation against the RN until the second round. Attal claimed that the NFP's proposal to raise the minimum wage by 14.3% to net €1,600 per month would lead to the loss of 500,000 jobs, and Minister of Finance Bruno Le Maire claimed that it would be "a catastrophe" resulting in "mass unemployment" if implemented, with the European Commission having just announced it would meet to launch the excessive deficit procedure against France. Macron publicly denounced the NFP's "totally immigrationist" stance and decried proposals which would make it easier for transgender people to change their civil status by allowing them to do so at their local town hall as "completely grotesque," and his former prime minister Élisabeth Borne decried the alliance as being one of "separatist wokists who support Islamism and communitarianism" with a nonsensical programme and disastrous economic policies.

A recurring theme of the Ensemble campaign was the willingness of its figureheads to draw equivalencies between the New Popular Front and National Rally. On 21 June, Macron argued that, "contrary to what some say," the left and RN are not "rampart of achother ... there are extremes we must not allow to pass." Finance minister Bruno Le Maire warned that a victory by either the far-right or the left could cause a financial crisis, lambasting both of their economic platforms as "leftist projects inspired by Marxism." In an interview on 24 June, Gender Equality Minister Aurore Bergé remarked that "the best rampart, particularly against the Popular Front, is not the RN, it's us," and like Macron, refused to give second-round voting instructions in support of either of "the extremes" represented by the New Popular Front and RN prior to the first round. In a podcast episode released the same day, Macron warned that the "two extremes" would lead France "to civil war," whether because of the xenophobia of the RN or the communitarianism of the left.

Many of Macron's closest advisors publicly expressed dismay at his decision to dissolve the National Assembly in the days after his surprise announcement. Yaël Braun-Pivet, president of the National Assembly before the dissolution, privately disagreed with the decision and attempted to dissuade him, and said she believed that a coalition was possible. Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire trashed Macron's coterie at the Élysée as "woodlice," and his former prime minister Édouard Philippe, head of the Horizons party within the Ensemble alliance, said that Macron had "killed the presidential majority" through his reckless decision. Outgoing Ensemble deputies expressed exasperation with Macron, with one remarking that "I wish he'd shut up and let us get out of the mess he's gotten us into;" François Bayrou, leader of alliance member MoDem, deemed it necessary to "de-Macronise the campaign;" and candidates became "fed up" with Macron's refusal to abide by his promise to stay out of the campaign.

As Macron's popularity ratings plunged to their lowest level ever in post-dissolution surveys, with noting that most respondents in an Ifop- JDD survey characterised the decision as "incomprehensible," "thoughtless," or "irresponsible" and 70% in a BVA Xsight- RTL survey declaring that they did not want Macron involved in the campaign, Ensemble candidates kept a local focus, with images of Macron were almost entirely absent from campaign posters: only one out of 22 government ministers' posters featured his image. Along with Philippe, Le Maire, and Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin (who announced that he would leave the government if re-elected to the National Assembly), many of Macron's early supporters distanced themselves from him, and he faced increasing rejection among former allies frustrated with his antics and public statements.

The Republicans

The president of The Republicans (LR), Éric Ciotti, spoke in favour of an alliance with the National Rally RN during an 11 June interview with the French channel TF1. Olivier Marleix, the head of the party in the National Assembly, called for Ciotti's resignation in response. On 12 June, The Republicans' political committee voted unanimously to remove Ciotti as its president and expel him from the party. However, the latter rejected the decision, calling it "a flagrant violation of our statutes" that was illegal and void. A Paris court reviewed the decision on 14 June, in which Ciotti was reinstated as party leader in the interim, as well as a member of the party, which was followed by two additional abortive attempts to remove him, while the local branch of The Republicans in Hauts-de-Seine announced a local alliance with Renaissance. On 17 June, Ciotti secured an agreement with RN to present 62 candidates (later 63), none of which are outgoing LR deputies except for himself and his close ally Christelle d'Intorni, while the national investiture committee of LR unveiled candidates in a majority of other constituencies, including all other incumbent deputies seeking re-election, as well as fielding candidates against both Ciotti and d'Intorni. Because Ciotti requested that the party's bank require his authorisation for any transactions, LR candidates are not receiving any financial support from the party.

With no detailed national election programme to run on, most LR candidates opted to campaign primarily on issues concerning their constituencies, rely on their strong local roots and name recognition in order to fight for their survival, and keep their distance from the drama surrounding the other three main political forces and Ciotti's alliance with the RN. Numerous incumbent LR deputies declined to feature the party's logo on their election paraphernalia, stayed out of national media, and tried to portray themselves as independent of any party, with Aurélien Pradié choosing to describe himself on leaflets as "a strong voice, a free voice," before announcing that he would run only under the label of his micro-party ''Du courage'' on 26 June, declaring in an interview with '' La Dépêche'' that "Gaullism isn't dead, it's more alive than ever, but LR is dead." This reduced visibility was also the product of the highly varied circumstances of LR candidates, with 63 invested as part of the LR-RN alliance, roughly 400 invested by the party's national investiture committee, and 39 other candidates (including 26 incumbents) completely unopposed by the Ensemble coalition owing to their "constructive" alignment with Macron's policies. Even figures with a significant national profile like former party president Laurent Wauquiez, threatened by the possibility of an RN wave, sought to stay out of the national spotlight and focused on avoiding being subsumed by the tripolarisation of the electorate.

National Rally

Eight of the 30 National Rally (RN) MEPs newly elected to the European Parliament in June 2024 decided to run in the national election. As occupying both posts is impossible, in case of their victory in the legislative elections they will be replaced with other party members further down the list.

Marine Le Pen promised that the RN would form a "national unity government" should it win the election, and in an interview with '' La Voix du Nord'', she indicated she was open to the possibility of appointments for figures from the left in an RN-led government. At the same time, party leader Jordan Bardella said that he was "the only one capable of blocking Jean-Luc Mélenchon and blocking the far left" and urged "all the patriotic forces of the republic" to unite and prevent the left from winning the election. He also pledged to pass an immigration law allowing the deportation of "delinquents and Islamists" and cut energy costs as prime minister. In an interview with ''Le Monde'', Le Pen confirmed that Bardella would not seek the post of prime minister in the absence of an absolute majority.

On 18 June, Bardella urged voters to give his party an "absolute majority" for it to be able to govern effectively, while pledging to cut energy taxes to 5.5% from 20%. Bardella pledged to uphold French military commitments to NATO and support Ukraine against the Russian invasion, but ruled out sending long-range missiles and other weapons that could be used to strike Russian territory. Alluding to the possibility of Emmanuel Macron sending ground forces to Ukraine, Le Pen deemed Macron's title of "commander-in-chief of the armed forces" as "honorary" given the need for both the heads and state and government to make most defence decisions, though constitutional law experts noted that the president's approval was still required for the usage of nuclear weapons.

Due to worries about public backlash and concerns from investors, the RN softened and postponed some elements of its initial economic proposals, including the planned tax exemptions on those under 30 and abolition of the value-added tax (VAT) on 100 essential products, and proposals to increase teachers' salaries were also deferred. Despite initial claims otherwise, Bardella reaffirmed on 17 June that the RN intended to repeal the 2023 pension reform and reduce the legal retirement age to 60, but only for those who started working before the age of 20. In an interview with '' Le Journal du Dimanche'' published on 22 June, Bardella announced that, as prime minister, he would initiate a national budgetary audit and call a constitutional referendum to guarantee reductions in migratory flows in 2027. He also stated that he did not support Frexit and assured that, after their alliance, members of The Republicans (LR) supported jointly by Éric Ciotti and the RN would be included in his government.

Bardella officially unveiled the RN's programme on 24 June, including measures to introduce mandatory sentencing, end child benefits for parents of underage repeat offenders, and sentence youth criminals to short prison sentences at closed educational centres for children. He confirmed that the RN continued to intend to abolish ''jus soli'' because "the automatic acquisition of French nationality is no longer justified in a world of 8 billion people, ithour daily struggles of our inability to integrate and assimilate them multiplying on our soil," and expressed his desire to both "re-establish the offence of illegal stays" and to concretise these proposals in the constitution "to also make them untouchable by European or international jurisprudence" through a national referendum. In addition, he declared that he would scrutinise "spending that encourages immigration" and "certain expensive and abusive tax loopholes," and that the reversal of Macron's pension reform would be implemented gradually, shifting the legal retirement age to 62 for those who have worked for at least 40 years. The party is against measures to tackle climate change and protecting the environment.

Other RN proposals included seeking to provide incentives for medical professionals to work in underserved areas and for retirees to return to work, reducing taxes on agriculture, privatising French national media, boosting fertility rates by allowing parents to claim their first two children as a full share rather than the current half-share for the purposes of personal income tax calculations, eliminating inheritance taxes for lower-income families, continuing to not recognise Palestine as a state as doing so would, in his view, be "to recognise terrorism," imposing moratoriums on new wind farms and the closure of healthcare facilities, banning agricultural products which fall below standards for domestic products, and ensuring that only French nationals be eligible for some security and defence jobs, after an earlier announcement that Dual nationals would be banned from such "sensitive" jobs as those. After outcry following RN deputy Roger Chudeau's comments that dual nationals (specifically Najat Vallaud-Belkacem) should not hold ministerial posts, Le Pen disavowed the idea that of restricting ministerial posts on basis of dual nationality and added that Chudeau's comments were contrary to the RN's programme.

Other political parties

Marion Maréchal, a far-right candidate for Reconquête in the preceding European Parliament election, met with her aunt Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella, leaders of the National Rally (RN), on 10 June in order to discuss a potential far-right alliance during the legislative election. After the meeting, Maréchal indicated that Bardella was opposed to an alliance with Reconquête as his party did not want to be affiliated with Reconquête party leader Éric Zemmour; regardless, she announced her endorsement of the RN. On 12 June, Zemmour announced that he was expelling Maréchal from the party. The party ultimately presented candidates in 330 constituencies, deciding not to run candidates in constituencies where ideologically similar candidates had the strongest chance of winning.

Debout la France only contested 107 constituencies, backing candidates supported by the RN elsewhere, and party leader Nicolas Dupont-Aignan expressed his support for the alliance between Éric Ciotti and the RN.

Trotskyist party Lutte Ouvrière presented candidates in 550 constituencies. Other parties presenting a double-digit number of candidates, according to a ''Le Monde'' analysis, include the New Anticapitalist Party with 30 candidates, Ecology at the Centre with 23 candidates, Unser Land with 14 candidates, and Résistons! with 12 candidates. The Animalist Party, which was able to field candidates in 421 constituencies in 2022, announced that it would not attempt to field candidates with such short notice before the first round of the 2024 legislative election.

Debates

France 3 and France Bleu announced they would organise more than 200 debates between local candidates which would be broadcast on local television and radio with the first set held on 19 June, followed by additional debates on 26 June and 3 July. Between the two rounds, 23 RN candidates refused to participate or cancelled their appearances in these debates.

TF1 also announced plans to hold a debate on 25 June between Gabriel Attal, Jordan Bardella, and Manuel Bompard. On 22 June, Attal, taking note of three-time presidential candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon's comments refusing to rule out the possibility that he might seek to become prime minister, challenged him to participate in the debate instead of Bompard, the national operations team coordinator of La France Insoumise, a demand also echoed by Bardella, though Mélenchon declined. The Republicans appealed their exclusion from the TF1 debate to the '' Conseil d'État'', with the Regulatory Authority for Audiovisual and Digital Communication already having declined to take action, though this appeal was rejected the next day, a few hours before the debate.

France 2 also held a debate on 27 June between Attal, Bardella, and Olivier Faure, during which Attal directed viewers to a calculator for retirement pensions under the New Popular Front's plans, leading the alliance to initiate emergency proceedings against Renaissance for "false and misleading allegations likely to alter the vote" under article L163-2 of the electoral code, with hearings set for 1 July.

Several debates were also scheduled for between the two rounds, including one hosted by France 2 on 4 July. For the other two debates between the two rounds, the New Popular Front chose to send Marine Tondelier on BFM TV and Ian Brossat on CNews, respecting the boycott of the channel by The Ecologists and the Socialist Party. On 1 July, Bardella challenged Mélenchon to a one-on-one debate, which the latter declined, and Tondelier confirmed her participation in the third debate. BFM TV announced on 2 July that no debate would be held, and the three invitees would instead each be allocated a one-hour segment in a different viewing format.

Candidate incidents and controversies

Racism, anti-Semitism, and hate symbols

The campaign was marred by numerous incidents of racial and anti-Semitic abuse. On 17 June, Hanane Mansouri, The Republicans (LR) member supported by the National Rally (RN) for Isère's 8th constituency, revealed that she was inundated by anti-Arab racist abuse after her candidacy was confirmed. La France Insoumise (LFI) candidate Yasmina Samri, running in Charente-Maritime's 1st constituency, decided to end her candidacy after receiving numerous racist insults and threats. While campaigning in Marseille for the New Popular Front on 20 June, Raphaël Glucksmann, accompanied by journalist Léa Salamé, was recorded being told "shame on you as a Jew" by a voter after trying to give them a leaflet. He subsequently revealed that his cell phone number had been leaked on Telegram groups and he was now simultaneously being bombarded with hateful messages from members of the Jewish far-right – outraged at his involvement in the alliance – and those on the left who alleged he was a pro- Netanyahu Zionist on the basis of his Ashkenazic surname.

On 24 June, Shannon Seban, Renaissance candidate for Val-de-Marne's 10th constituency, announced that she filed a police complaint in response to a group of pro-Palestine festivalgoers screaming "get out, dirty Zionist" at her. In Calvados, the campaign posters of LFI MEP-elect Emma Fourreau and 6th constituency candidate Noé Gauchard were defaced with swastikas and neo-Nazi symbols, as were those for The Ecologists (LE) candidate Guillaume Hédouin in Manche's 1st constituency along with the word "Islam," while those for Pascaline Lécorché of Place Publique in Bouches-du-Rhône's 1st constituency were covered with "Hamas candidates" stickers. On the day of the first round, Roxane Lundy, Génération.s, candidate for Oise's 1st constituency, discovered that her campaign posters in Beauvais and Maignelay-Montigny had been defaced with swastikas.

On 17 June, ''Libération'' reported that Marie-Christine Sorin, RN candidate for Hautes-Pyrénées's 1st constituency, made a tweet in January saying "No, not all civilizations are equal ... omehave just stayed below bestiality in the evolutionary chain." The RN initially suspended their support for Joseph Martin, candidate for Morbihan's 1st constituency, after the discovery of a 2018 tweet reading "Gas brought justice to the victims of the Holocaust," but reinstated him after he explained that he meant it as an allusion to the death of Holocaust denier Robert Faurisson the day prior. On 19 June, the pro-Éric Ciotti faction of LR withdrew their support for Louis-Joseph Pecher, jointly supported by the RN in Meurthe-et-Moselle's 5th constituency, due to his history of "anti-Semitic, homophobic and odious remarks." Another pro-Ciotti LR candidate supported by the RN, Gilles Bourdouleix, was previously convicted for condoning crimes against humanity in 2014 for saying that "Hitler didn't kill enough" Romani people, though his sentence was suspended on the basis that he never intended for his remarks to be made public. On 25 June, Pascal Schneider, mayor of Neuves-Maisons, filed a complaint with the public prosecutor against Pierre-Nicolas Nups, candidate of the Party of France in Meurthe-et-Moselle's 5th constituency, for electoral posters featuring a young white boy with blue eyes and blonde hair reading " Let's give white children a future."

On 26 June, Thierry Dussud of the RN, substitute for the Ciotti-aligned LR candidate supported by the RN in Ardèche's 2nd constituency, Vincent Trébuchet, announced that he would quit after racist and anti-Semitic posts he made resurfaced, including one in which he declared "let's give the Africans back to Africa." In addition to the 20 RN candidates identified by ''Libération'' as having made racist, anti-Semitic, and discriminatory comments on social media, '' Mediapart'' also uncovered similar posts by another 24 RN candidates using their real names. On 27 June, LFI withdrew its support for Reda Belkadi, candidate for Loir-et-Cher's 1st constituency, after the discovery of his past anti-Semitic and homophobic tweets including anti-Jewish and anti-gay slurs. On 1 July, Paule Veyre de Soras, RN candidate for Mayenne's 1st constituency, apologised for her comments that "my ophthalmologist is a Jew, and my dentist is a Muslim" in response to a journalist's question about racism within her party. On 2 July, Ludivine Daoudi, RN candidate for Calvados's 1st constituency, withdrew after her NFP opponent circulated images of her wearing a Luftwaffe visor cap with a swastika on it. That same day, Daniel Grenon, incumbent RN deputy for Yonne's 1st constituency, was referred to the public prosecutor for saying during a debate that "North Africans came to power in 2016 ... heyhave no place in high places."

On 26 June, Reconquête leader Éric Zemmour shared a video of him tapping along to the rhythm of the TikTok-viral song "Je partira pas" ("I won't leave"), which features various overtly xenophobic lyrics, with audio of the song – remixing the screams of a man being apprehended by the police while being carried off a plane in a viral video – in the background. While the song, supposedly created with AI by an artist under the name "Crazy-Girl," was removed for violating TikTok's content guidelines, it spread widely over social media, and was denounced by French Communist Party leader Fabien Roussel. SOS Racisme announced that it filed a complaint with the authorities regarding the song for incitement of hatred.

Attacks and death threats

Several candidates also reported attacks against them and activists supporting them over the course of the campaign. , LFI candidate and incumbent deputy for Territoire de Belfort's 2nd constituency, decried physical attacks and the usage of racist slurs against his supporters on 17 June. On 20 June, Hervé Breuil, RN candidate for Loire's 2nd constituency, alleged that a group of masked individuals struck him from behind and pelted him with rotten fruit while hurling verbal abuse at him. On 23 June, numerous left-wing activists (for LE candidate Céline Papin in Gironde's 1st constituency, LE candidate and outgoing deputy Sabrina Sebaihi in Hauts-de-Seine's 4th constituency, and Socialist Party (PS) candidate Joao Martins Pereira in Val-de-Marne's 8th constituency) reported being assaulted and threatened by supporters of the far-right. Séverine Vézies, LFI candidate for Doubs's 1st constituency, claimed that a self-proclaimed RN supporter attempted to strike a man in his 80s with a broomstick while putting up a campaign poster for her on 25 June.

Many candidates also reported receiving death threats both online and in real life. On 15 June, Jean-Jacques Gaultier, LR candidate for Vosges's 4th constituency, reported receiving a death threat via post. On 19 June, Elsa Richard, LE candidate for Maine-et-Loire's 1st constituency, reported messages from people threatening to behead her in front of her house to the police. On 21 June, Pierre Morel-À-L'Huissier, miscellaneous centre candidate and outgoing deputy for Lozère's constituency, filed a police complaint after discovering a large tag with a death threat against him in Gorges du Tarn Causses

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