French leftist leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon. Photo by Thomas Bresson, used under Creative Commons License CC BY 4.0
Many French people were very anxious prior to the second round of their July, 2024 legislative elections. Unlike the American two-party system, in the French multiparty system a candidate needs 50 percent or more of the vote to be seated in the first round. If no candidate gets that, there is a second, runoff round in which the candidate with the majority is seated in the National Assembly (the lower but more powerful legislative house than the Senate).
Elections for the European Parliament (EP) were held in June of this year, shortly before the July elections for the French National Assembly. The candidates presented by the French far-right party in that election did exceedingly well, as did far rightists from other European countries. This French party was formerly called the National Front. Many of the founders were fascists who had supported the Vichy government installed by the Nazis during World War II. It was led for many years after the war by a racist and Holocaust-minimizing man named Jean-Marie Le Pen. Realizing that his fascism and racism were putting off the French electorate in the present era, his daughter, Marine Le Pen, expelled her father from the leadership of the party, and then from the party itself. She took it over and tried to give it a more acceptable image. But it is strongly anti-immigrant and has continued to harbor people of her father’s ilk within it. Continue reading
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“The rivers are the place where nature still exists.” – Bruce Hannon, 2017 interview for Prairie Rivers Network’s 50th Anniversary.
