Enlarge image
Emmanuel Macron won that evening - and yet lost a lot of power
Photo: Aurelien Morissard / imago / IP3press
This general election is like a defeat for Emmanuel Macron.
Formally it's a win, yes.
But according to all forecasts by pollsters on Sunday evening, the party alliance of the French President will fall far short of an absolute majority in the Paris National Assembly.
According to the Ipsos Institute, the president's electoral alliance can only count on around 230 deputies, 289 would be needed for a majority of their own.
On the other hand, the right-wing extremist Marine Le Pen can feel like the winner of the parliamentary elections: the woman who challenged Macron to be a finalist in the presidential election in April is likely to place 85 MPs in parliament.
That's a lot more than expected, given that the electoral system favors centrist parties.
The alliance of the left-wing radical Jean-Luc Mélenchon will be the strongest opposition force, but with an estimated 149 it will not do as well as predicted in the past few weeks.
Voter turnout is so low that there is a lot of frustration about politics as a whole: it is only 46 percent of those entitled to vote.
The result of the general election is a massive setback for Macron's Ensemble party alliance - it will have far-reaching consequences for the president, because it shifts the balance in favor of parliament.
Macron, who previously ruled the country lonely, sometimes autocratically, is starting his second term in office severely weakened.
And this at a time when an economic crisis is looming.
The evening of the election in Macron's party headquarters in Paris is correspondingly dreary: there is no election party.
Because the party at the head of state is also over.
A few weeks ago, in the campaign headquarters, Macron euphorically thanked his overjoyed helpers for their work in the presidential election.
Even the neighbors from the adjacent residential buildings applauded.
Less than two months later, this evening appears ages ago.
“We are in political shock”
This time there are no party supporters to be seen far and wide: So there are not even long faces to look into.
The party celebrities also avoid showing themselves.
The ruling party has sent only the absolute minimum to answer journalists' questions: Sylvain Maillard, entrepreneur and MP for Paris, is to speak at some point in the evening.
On television, Macron's government spokeswoman tight-lipped concedes the massive setback: "We have first place, even if it is a disappointing first place." Macron's Finance and Economics Minister Bruno Le Maire is clearer: "We are suffering a political shock."
Shortly before the second round of the parliamentary elections, the government camp even described the impending failure of the absolute majority as the trigger for a “political and institutional crisis”.
"An only relative majority will force us into endless negotiations, which will take a lot of time," said one minister.
In fact, Macron's Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne can only govern together with the bourgeois Republicans in the future.
This gives the Conservatives, who can limit their political damage to around 80 seats, considerable power over French politics in the coming years.
Enlarge image
Marine Le Pen after the announcement of the election results
Photo: DENIS CHARLET / AFP
The opposition from right and left is already setting the tone with which they now want to make life difficult for Macron and Borne.
"We will present a tough, unyielding opposition," calls out Marine Le Pen to loud cheers from her supporters in Hénin-Beaumont in northern France.
That's where she has her constituency, that's where she was elected.
The French lower house, the National Assembly, is finally becoming "really a bit more national" thanks to the strong result of her party.
»Not for a moment do we give up our ambition to rule this country«
The left-wing tribune Mélenchon is also satisfied – even if his electoral alliance with the Greens, Communists and Socialists is not as strong as expected.
Because he hit Macron hard in this election.
"We have achieved our goal, we have managed, within a month, to overthrow the man who treated us with so much arrogance." Macron is meant.
"We will not give up our ambition to rule this country for a moment," exults Mélenchon.
"Fall" is a big word, the President is in office.
But one thing is clear on this evening: Governing will be very difficult for Macron in the next few years.
For many of his ministers, however, their job in government is already over: the president had demanded a victory from those ministers who stood for election in a constituency.
Those who do not win a seat in parliament are kicked out of the cabinet.
Important Macron ministers lose MPs
So it happens that Health Minister Brigitte Bourguignon will lose her job - even though the corona crisis is not over.
Things also looked bad on Sunday evening for several of Macron's close confidants, including Europe Minister Clément Beaune and Stanislas Guérini, who was supposed to reform the civil service.
Richard Ferrand, previously Speaker of Parliament, loses his seat in the National Assembly.
Prime Minister Borne, on the other hand, wins her constituency in Normandy and is allowed to stay.
But she wins it with no glamor - and that suits the evening as a whole.
In Macron's orphaned campaign headquarters, instead of an election party, there is only water from paper cups.
On the wall, the president smiles lonely in the dark blue woolen coat from the election poster that says "Nous tous," "All of us."
One of the few party members who ended up here aptly summarizes the system change that the voters decreed in France on this memorable election Sunday: "It's great," says the man, "now we have proportional representation without really having this right to vote Finance Minister Le Maire put it more positively on television: "We will have to develop a culture of compromise." France's parties like nothing less than making compromises.
And that's especially true for the President.
