THE NEW YORK TIMES: President Emmanuel Macron’s belated entry into the campaign and his focus on Ukraine have left him vulnerable to a strong challenge from the right.
PARIS — At last, Emmanuel Macron stepped forth. The French president entered a vast arena this weekend, plunged into darkness and lit only by spotlights and glow sticks, before a crowd of 30,000 supporters in a domed stadium in the Paris suburbs.
It was a highly choreographed appearance — his first campaign rally for an election now less than a week away — with something of the air of a rock concert. But Mr. Macron had come to sound an alarm.
Do not think “it’s all decided, that it’s all going to go well,” he told the crowd, a belated acknowledgment that a presidential election that had seemed almost certain to return him to power is suddenly wide open.
The diplomatic attempt to end the war in Ukraine has been time-consuming for Mr. Macron, so much so that he has had little time for the French election, only to awaken to the growing danger that France could lurch to the anti-immigrant right, with its Moscow-friendly politics and its skepticism of NATO.
Marine Le Pen, the hard-right leader making her third attempt to gain power, has surged over the past couple of weeks, as her patient focus on cost-of-living issues has resonated with the millions of French people struggling to make ends meet after an increase of more than 35 percent in gas prices over the past year. » | Roger Cohen | Monday, April 4, 2022
The Observer view on the French election and rightwing populism: Emmanuel Macron is expected to win but voter support for Marine Le Pen shows the threat of the far right must be tackled »
