CHART: French far right fails to win but shows massive growth

The far-right Rassemblement National (RN) did not achieve the sweeping victory it had dreamt of in the parliamentary elections on July 7, however it still has more support around France than ever before.

The RN won 33.14% of the vote in the second round - around 10.6 million votes (as in the first round) - coming third behind the left-wing alliance of the Nouveau Front Populaire and the centrist alliance of Ensemble !. This means it is unlikely that President Macron will name any RN MPs as ministers - let alone prime minister, as RN president Jordan Bardella had hoped after the first round of voting.

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The RN took the lead in the first round on June 30, with 37 of its candidates securing automatic election - including the party’s co-leader Marine Le Pen - forgoing a second round of voting.

Never before has the far-right won the first round of a French parliamentary election.

The defeat came as a surprise.

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Nonetheless, Mr Bardella said it represented a continuation of the party’s rapid growth.

“The momentum behind the RN, which put it well ahead in the first round and enabled it to double its number of MPs, are the building blocks of tomorrow's victory," he said on Sunday (July 7) at 20:00.

Indeed, the party won more than double the number of votes than in the 2002 presidential election when (under its old name Front National) Jean-Marie Le Pen was defeated by Jacques Chirac by a crushing 25,537,956 votes against 5,525,032.

Indeed, the successor of Mr Chirac’s party, Les Républicains is at present the smaller of the main right-wing parties in parliament.