France President Emmanuel Macron announced on Sunday, that he was dissolving the National Assembly, the lower house of the French Parliament. The new parliamentary elections will be held on 30 June and 7 July 2024.
France Snap Election 2024
French President Emmanuel Macron announced on 9 June that he was dissolving the National Assembly and calling for the new parliamentary elections following the far right’s landslide victory in the European elections. The election for France’s lower house of parliament, conducted over the two rounds, will be on 30 June and 7 July 2024.
Candidates will run for 577 seats in France’s parliament or The National Assembly. Preliminary results showed that Marine Le Pen;s far- right National Rally secured more than 30% of the vote compared with 14.5% for the French president Renaissance party.
Any number of the candidates can participate in the first round in each district but there are specific thresholds to advance to the second round, typically the run- off includes the top candidates. If a candidate receives majority votes then 25% in the first round they are elected without a second round.
France Snap Election 2024 Reason
French president Emmanuel Macron has called a snap election after his party suffered a crushing defeat in parliamentary elections. Macron dissolved the France parliament on Sunday and called for legislative elections to be held on 30 June and 7 July 2024. Voters must be called to the polls in the 20 to 40 days of the assembly’s dissolution.
For several months, a small group of confidants worked discreetly at the Elysee Palace on a high risk scenario, the dissolving of the National Assembly. According to the senior fellow at the global policy institute, Macron’s decision to seek a snap election is a call from him to French citizens to make a choice.
It comes after Marine Le Pen’s far right National Rally party was projected to win 31.5% of the European Union parliamentary vote, compared with 14.5% for the Macron centrist alliance. Macron might be gambling on Le Pen’s party a chance at partly governing the nation before the 2027 presidential election.
France Snap Election 2024 Format
The 577 members of the National Assembly known as deputies are elected for 5 years by a two round system in single member constituencies. A candidate who receives an absolute majority of valid votes and votes greater than 25% of the registered electorate is elected in the first round.
If no candidate reaches this threshold a runoff election is held between the top two candidates or any other candidate who receives a vote total greater than 12.5% of registered voters and the candidate who receives the most votes in the second round is elected. Voters must be called to the polls in the 20 to 40 days of the assembly’s dissolution.
What happens next in France Snap Election 2024?
Despite its triumph in the election it is unclear whether the National Wally can capture a significantly large number of the seats in the lower house of the French Parliament. It’s not sure that the National Rally will be the same success.
If Macron is unable to muster a strong parliamentary majority then he could find himself in a rare cohabitation scenario, where the presidency and the National Assembly are on the opposing political sides. In that scenario Macron would be compelled to choose a prime minister of a different political party, which could potentially block much of his domestic agenda.
By calling for parliamentary elections in 2024, three years ahead of the next presidential election, Macron is putting the legislative term out of the sync with the presidential term. Parliamentary elections have consistently taken place right after the presidential elections.
Each parliamentary election has produced the majority from the same political side as the recently elected president. There have been no cohabitations since the alignment of the electoral calendars.
The two elections could be realigned again if the next president in 2027, decides to dissolve the National Assembly after at the Elysee Palace. Paris is also scheduled to host the upcoming Olympic Games starting in July. The secret was well kept until Macron’s address at 8:58 p.m., when he announced on television and called snap elections.