The Daily - France’s Big Decision

Episode Date: April 22, 2022

When they go to the polls on Sunday, voters in France will be faced with the same two presidential candidates as 2017: Emmanuel Macron, the president and a polished centrist, and Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Rally party.Yet the context is different. There is a war in Europe, and the contest is tight.What are the stakes in the runoff election, and how has the race become so close?Guest: Roger Cohen, Paris bureau chief for The New York Times.Want more from The Daily? For one big idea on the news each week from our team, subscribe to our newsletter. Background reading: President Emmanuel Macron will face Marine Le Pen, the far-right leader, in the runoff on Sunday. The outcome will be crucial for France and reverberate globally.No French president has been the object of such intense dislike among significant segments of the population as Mr. Macron. How deep that loathing runs will be a critical factor in the election.For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. On Sunday, French voters will choose between two candidates for president with profoundly different visions for the direction of France, its relationship with a newly aggressive Russia, and its role in defending Europe. I spoke with my colleague, Paris Bureau Chief Roger Cohen, about why the race has become so close and its stakes so high. It's Friday, April 22nd.

Roger, the last time we covered a presidential election in France was 2017. And while our guest on the show was different, not better, just different, the candidates were exactly the same as they are this year, Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen. So tell us what we need to know this time around. Well, in 2017, Michael, at the last election, Emmanuel Macron was a young, come-from-nowhere candidate, the head of a new party that he created. It's the sound of a page of political life that is turning.

Who promised to change France, to install a start-up culture, to revitalize the economy. The best of the left, and the best of the right, and even the best of the economy. And to break the old divisions of left and right. And so he just burst on the scene from nowhere and rode a tide of enthusiasm to victory. And just like in this election, Macron came up against Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Rally, formerly National Front Party,

which had been founded by her dad back in 1972. It's up to the French to décider qui peuple la France. And it's a party with a very strong nationalistic and anti-immigrant line. Je rendrai aux Français leur pays. And increasingly, it has become the party of much of the working class in France. So this is very much a classic rematch.

But my sense is that the context of this race is very different for the two candidates that you just sketched out. It is very different. It's very different for one overwhelming reason, which is that there is a war in Europe and people here in France are concerned about that. You hear people muttering about nuclear war in the boulangerie or bakeries. But above all, it raises the stakes of the election because up to now, President Biden has managed

to engineer a united front among allies in Europe to save Ukraine and to stop Russia, stop President Putin. But Marine Le Pen, for a long time, has been very close to Russia. So if she were elected, then that could fracture the unity that President Biden has managed to engineer. The second reason it's different is quite simple. It's close. How close? Pretty close.

Last time, Macron crushed Le Pen, getting 66% of the vote to her 34%. This time, polls show Marine Le Pen nipping at the heels of Macron with about 47% of the vote to his 53%. Well, Roger, explain that. How did we get to this point where this rematch is now that close? What happened over the past five years in France that accounts for that? Well, Michael, a whole series of things happened. On the economic front, Macron had promised to address the issue of inequality. In fact, he didn't.

And in the first couple of years of his presidency, he instituted policies that were beneficial for corporations and for the rich, but weren't perceived to do a whole lot for the average person in France. He actually seemed so removed from the lives of ordinary people that some started to call him Jupiter after the king of the gods. And this came to a head in late 2018 when he tried to increase the tax on diesel fuel for environmental reasons. And that was just fine if you're living in Paris, taking the metro, no problem.

But if you were in some remote rural area and you're using your car to get to work and it's already tough to get to the end of the month, then this kind of measure was much more difficult to swallow. And what happened is that this ignited a series of protests over several months. The protesters who call themselves Gilets Jaunes or Yellow Vests are part of a grassroots citizens movement. That became known as the Yellow Vest Movement because of the neon vests that the protesters chose to wear. Police shut down roads to the presidential palace and used tear gas to break up the crowds. 135 people were injured and

1,000 protesters were in custody by nightfall. And the protests were very widespread to the point that they brought much of France to a standstill. The wealth gap is getting wider and we've reached a point where there are the very rich and the very poor. And more and more people are slipping into poverty. And this is the moment where Macron recognizes that he's been too aloof, and he gets it. He goes on this listening tour. He hears the complaints of people for whom this gas price

increase was simply intolerable, and he sees that he has to do something different, and he increases the minimum wage for people. The tax that was going to be imposed gets canceled. He creates what he calls a purchasing power bonus for workers and in companies. And all these measures suggest that he's hearing the complaints that are out there in the country. So, Roger, how are those economic issues that you just laid out that felt like they sparked the Yellow Vest movement? How are they playing out right now? Well, it's a curious thing, Michael. France, in many ways, has come out of COVID, which of course hit the economy hard very well. It's growing at 7% right now. Unemployment is at a record low. At the same time, however,

the effect of the war has been that prices are shooting up. Fuel prices have gone up around 40% in the last year. And the people who are, if you like, Marine Le Pen's potential electorate, People who are, if you like, Marine Le Pen's potential electorate, that's to say the poorer, working class sections of the population, they are struggling. So right now, those same issues that prompted the LBS movement, it's not like they're resolved. They're still lurking there and they're playing into this election. And what does Le Pen have to say about those issues in this campaign? Well, she's leaning right into those issues. She's vowing to slash sales taxes to 5.5% from 20% on fuel, oil, gas, and electricity, and cutting tax altogether on 100, quote, essential goods.

How she pays for all that is less clear, but it's certainly having an impact. So, Roger, that's the economy. What else explains Le Pen's success this time around? Well, Michael, the immigration issue is big. And it's not really all immigration. It's the arrival in France of large numbers of Muslim migrants from North Africa and refugees from many different places, including Afghanistan. There are more than 6 million Muslims in France. It's the European country with the largest Muslim population. And in the minds of many French people, something happened, which is that that immigration became associated with violence, with a series of terrorist attacks in France. There was the attack on the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine by a couple of Islamist

terrorists, which wiped out most of that publication's staff. Then a whole series of terrorist attacks in Paris, including on the Bataclan concert hall, and that left more than 100 people dead. And as a result of that, in French people's minds, Islam and Islamism, a violent anti-Western expression of Islam, became conflated. And then, Michael, during the Macron presidency itself, there was another terrorist attack that proved particularly traumatic for French people. Thousands of people have taken part in rallies across France to express outrage at the beheading of a teacher in a suspected Islamist attack.

And that was the beheading of a schoolteacher. The schoolteacher's name was Samuel Paty. He was trying to teach freedom of expression. Samuel Paty was killed by a man who knew him only through social media, the result of an online campaign launched by an outraged parent that spread... So the idea that a schoolteacher would be attacked for trying to impart some of the basic values of the French Republic was particularly traumatic. Many in France support taking a tough line against extremists.

It's the very values of the republic that are being attacked here. And the president, Emmanuel Macron, felt he had to react. And how did he react? Well, like, he moved to the right on these issues of Islam and immigration. And he got his government to pass new legislation, which has enabled the government, often with fairly flimsy reasons, to shut down mosques or Islamic associations where it argues that violent forms of Islam are being taught. So he did that. The left did not like it, and the left remembers it. But Marine Le Pen was in a different situation

because, of course, she's been the head of an anti-immigrant party for a long time. So she could say after the party beheading, you see, you see, you see, I was right. There is too much immigration in France. There's particularly too much Muslim immigration. It presents a danger. And on a practical level, she wants to give preference to French people for jobs. She wants to cut off Social Security payments to foreigners unless they've held jobs for five years. She wants to ban the wearing of headscarves in public and make wearing them punishable by fines. Wow. And I would say that Marine Le Pen has been pretty successful

in reminding people of her message, in playing on the anxieties of French people, on playing on these images that are in the French psyche that link Islam and violence. So a clear way to understand Le Pen's rise since the last election, her appeal, is that she's successfully capitalizing

on two classic issues for really any populist. Grievances over an economy that has left many working class people behind and grievances over immigration that have made many of those voters feel less secure about their place in society and in this case, more vulnerable to terrorism. Well, Mike, I think another important element has been a cultural change.

And that came with the rise during the Macron presidency of the Fox News of France, which is called CNews. which is called CNews. I'm delighted to see you again this morning on CNews. And it's become one of the top news channels in France. And it serves up a daily diet of Le Pen's ideas. Essentially, ideas of the far right about... Immigration. C'est ça, 41% des Français sont pour une immigration zéro. Immigration. Ce qui en fait résulte d'une idéologie.

Une idéologie, le fameux wokisme qui est loin... Est-ce qu'on peut parler du féminisme en étant un homme? Bonjour à tous et bienvenue à vous. And one of the prime examples of the kinds of personalities who have been spotlighted on CNews Bonjour à tous et bienvenue à vous, bonjour à vous Eric Zemmour is a TV pundit named Eric Zemmour. Bonjour et je suis content de vous retrouver. And if you think Marine Le Pen is on the right of the political spectrum, well... La République, c'est l'assimilation.

Ce n'est pas le multiculturalisme. On ne vient pas comme on est, ce n'est pas McDonald's. Eric Zemmour was further right. Quand je dis que l'islam n'est pas compatible avec la France, c'est très simple. He's declared in various forums, for example, that Islam and France are simply incompatible. He said, quote,

France is liberty, equality and fraternity. Islam is submission, inequality and fraternity in the Ummah, that is, between Muslims. Islam is submission, inequality and fraternity within the Ummah, meaning between Muslims. On another occasion, he described unaccompanied migrant children as quote, thieves,

murderers, rapists. His comments were so inflammatory, in fact, that they actually got his show, in the end, kicked off CNews, and he was charged in court with hate speech. Nevertheless, he ran for president himself in this election. He'd been very popular on TV, himself in this election. He'd been very popular on TV. And he didn't make it through to the end, to the runoff. But still, in the first round, he managed to get over 2 million votes.

And the reason he's still an important figure to mention is because he's told his voters to vote for Marine Le Pen now. And he also served Marine Le Pen's purposes. How so? Because he helped her in the central endeavor she's been on since the last election, which is to soften her image. Fascinating. He made her seem more moderate, more reasonable, more electable by comparison. more electable by comparison. So just to recap, CNews and the prominence of a character like Zemmour on it is creating a much wider path for a candidate like Marine Le Pen,

in the same way, as you've kind of hinted at, that Fox News has created a path for America's most conservative political figures. Yeah, Mike, I think that's true. I think in the end, the net effect of CNews and the other issues we've been talking about has been to make the idea that a politician with the kinds of views that Marine Le Pen has, has made that idea acceptable. It's a notion that is there and that many French people now accept that somebody with her far-right politics could lead the country. We'll be right back. Roger, we have been talking almost exclusively about the domestic issues that have dominated this campaign for French president.

But I want to return to where we started this conversation, which is with the war in Ukraine, which is the prism through which many people outside of France, as you said, are viewing this election. So how exactly has the war played out within the campaign? Well, President Macron saw himself as the European peacemaker. He thought through the contacts he already had with President Putin that he could reach out to the Russian president. And I flew on the presidential plane to Moscow just before the war broke out. They talked for hours and hours and hours. And on the presidential plane to Moscow just before the war broke out. They talked for hours and hours and hours. And on the way back in the plane, President Macron told everyone that he thought he'd secured certain things from President Putin about the war. And nobody can blame him for reaching out. But the result of all that was at a certain point, although his polling was going up initially, you know, the statesman, the grand diplomat, he began to seem distracted.

And I guess all that was summed up by a cartoon in the Daily Le Monde, which showed President Macron at a rally. And you could see hundreds of faces in the backdrop. President Macron at a rally, and you could see hundreds of faces in the backdrop. And Macron is on his cell phone, and he's saying, Vladimir, I'm finishing up a chore here, and I'll call you back. The chore being running for president of France. Yes, this chore was campaigning, was actually trying to persuade French people to re-elect him and do so on more than the basis that he was a very active European statesman. So he began to give French people the impression that the presidential election was a tiresome detail that he had to deal with in the brief interludes between telephone calls to Moscow.

between telephone calls to Moscow. Mm-hmm. Well, let's now turn to Le Pen, because I have to imagine that her approach to this war has proven equally complicated for her candidacy. Very complicated, in that Marine Le Pen has been a strong supporter of Vladimir Putin from the moment that she became the leader of her party in 2011. And

that year even declared what a big admirer of Putin she was. She was just fine with Vladimir Putin's annexation of Crimea. And she was just fine with Russia's stirring up a little war in the Donbass. And moreover, in 2014, when her party was in a tight spot financially, she managed to get a $12 million loan from a Russian bank, which is still outstanding. And all this set up her 2017 campaign move, where she appeared in the Kremlin three and a half weeks before the first round of voting, shaking hands with Vladimir Putin and talking about their shared values. Roger, that is an extraordinary level of admiration and entanglement with Russia by a candidate for president of a major European country. So I'm curious how much

she has had to recalibrate that in this campaign since Russia invaded Ukraine. Well, she has recalibrated to some degree. She has backpedaled. She has said that Vladimir Putin's decision to invade Ukraine crossed a, quote, red line. And she has expressed some horror with the apparent war crimes in places like Budja. But on the essentials, as she She said at this news conference that once peace is made in Ukraine, once the war is over, she would propose a, quote, Wow.

She also announced that she would withdraw France from the integrated military command of NATO. I mean, she said that she would respect Article 5 of the NATO Treaty, that is, an attack on one country will be regarded as an attack on all. on one country will be regarded as an attack on all. Je ne placerai simplement jamais nos forces armées sous un commandement qui ne relève pas de la souveraineté nationale française. But she said she would not place French troops under NATO command. So she was making a clear statement that she wanted to keep French troops under French control. And that was a slap in the face to NATO at this particular moment, Michael,

and I think a very worrying sign of the direction in which a Le Pen presidency would go. So how has all this played out with the French electorate? her still expressing some sympathy to Russia and some animosity towards NATO in the middle of this war. I would have to imagine that that would be a very risky electoral strategy. So what's been the reaction from French voters? You know, Michael, I don't think it's hurt her that much electorally. Why? I think it's because much of her electorate is focused on the economic effects of the war. And she said that she would rule out ever cutting out Russian gas and energy imports because it would kill French consumers because prices would go up so much.

So the fact that she has this alignment with President Putin, I think there are a lot of people in the Macron electorate that are very worried by that. But has it really hurt her domestically? I don't think so. So let's imagine for just a moment, a scenario where Le Pen a scenario where Le Pen does upset Macron, does win this election over the weekend, because voters end up caring much more about these kind of kitchen table issues that Le Pen is campaigning on. What will that mean for Europe and really for the world? Michael, it's a huge deal, comparable with Britain's exit from the European Union or Donald Trump's election. So you would put this in that historical category of Trump's victory and Brexit.

Oh, yeah, it would be huge. It would be huge. France is a nuclear power. France is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. It's one of the two most powerful countries in Europe alongside Germany. And to have France lurch into a far-right, anti-immigrant, illiberal, nationalist form of government with a Putin sympathizer in the Elysee Palace would be a huge change. And I think to have a president who is not only hostile to NATO, but hostile to European unity, that would deeply affect the future of Europe. And it would make the job of confronting Russia over its invasion extremely difficult. Mm-hmm. And kind of brass tacks, Roger, how likely do the people you talk to in the French political world think a Le Pen victory actually is? think a Le Pen victory actually is? Well, brass tacks, Michael. She's behind.

She's trailing President Macron in opinion polls by five, six, seven percentage points. Among the people I speak to, most of them say Macron's going to pull through. But they also say quite often, you know, I have these moments in the day where I just stop in my tracks and I think, oh, my God, could it happen? Could there be a President Le Pen in France? So a surprise is possible. Not likely, but possible. Right. And even if Macron wins by the skin of his knees, that may not feel like much of a victory or much of a mandate. Yeah, Michael. Well, he's a term-limited president. If he wins, he has another five years. And there's no escaping the fact that there's been a sea change in France. What do you mean? Ever since the end of World War

II, there's been an idea that France would never go back to a far-right government. France, of course, was under the fascist Vichy puppet Nazi government during World War II. And the French had this idea of La Digue, the dam against the far right. Well, the dam is now punctured, and I think it's punctured pretty permanently. The far right has made itself part of the mainstream. And I don't see that changing. So let's imagine, as you said, that Macron does win, but wins fairly narrowly. The center parties in France have really collapsed, the socialists on the left, the Republicans on the right. Macron has a party that really is a hollow vessel for him. So once he's gone, there's just this great big void in the center,

and Marine Le Pen will still be there. So it's a whole new world in French politics. Well, Roger, thank you very much. We appreciate it. Thank you, Michael. On Thursday night, new polling found that Macron's lead over Le Pen has widened, but still injected fresh uncertainty into the election by suggesting that over a quarter of French voters may not cast a ballot. That would mark the country's lowest turnout in over 50 years. The results of the election are expected on Sunday night,

shortly after polls close at 8 p.m. local time. We'll be right back. Here's what else you need to know today. You know, the sustained and coordinated support of the international community, led and facilitated by the United States, is a significant reason why Ukraine is able to stop Russia from taking over their country thus far. On Thursday, President Biden announced $800 million in additional military aid to Ukraine, including a newly designed drone

that can be used to strike high-value targets. Every American taxpayer, every member of our armed forces can be proud of the fact that our country's generosity and the skill and service of our military helped arm and repel Russia's aggression in Ukraine. The support will effectively allow Ukraine to create five new artillery battalions as it tries to fend off Russia's offensive in the country's east. And it brings America's total contributions to Ukraine to over $2 billion since the war

began. And in a surprise move, the new parent company of CNN has decided to shut down the network's streaming news service, CNN+, just weeks after a launch that reportedly cost $100 million. CNN+, which recruited high-profile anchors and hundreds of staff, was designed to ensure CNN's future in an era of streaming TV. But CNN's new owner, Warner Bros. Discovery, decided it was inconsistent with its strategy of eventually creating a broader streaming platform that will likely include CNN. Today's episode was produced by Rochelle Banja, Caitlin Roberts, and Sydney

Harper. It was edited by Anita Badajoe, contains original music by Dan Powell and Alisha Ba'itu, Badajoe, contains original music by Dan Powell and Alisha Ba'itu, and was engineered by Chris Wood. Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Lanferk of Wonderly. Special thanks to Constant Mea. That's it for The Daily. I'm Michael Barbaro. See you on Monday.