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Skip to Main Content × MAIN MENU U.S. Edition NEWS U.S. NewsWorld NewsBusinessEnvironmentHealthCoronavirusSocial Justice POLITICS Joe BidenCongressExtremism OPINION ENTERTAINMENT Culture & ArtsMediaCelebrityTV & Film LIFE Style & BeautyFood & DrinkParentingTravelWellnessRelationshipsMoneyHome & LivingWork/LifeShopping COMMUNITIES Queer VoicesWomenBlack VoicesLatino VoicesAsian Voices SPECIAL PROJECTS Highline HUFFPOST PERSONAL VIDEO HOROSCOPES FROM OUR PARTNERS Clean Energy Revolution NEWSLETTERS INTERNATIONAL AustraliaBrazilCanadaEspañaFranceΕλλάδα (Greece)IndiaItalia日本 (Japan)한국 (Korea)QuébecU.K.U.S. FOLLOW US Terms | Privacy Policy Part of HuffPost World News. ©2022 BuzzFeed, Inc. All rights reserved. Log InJoin HuffPost NEWSPOLITICSENTERTAINMENTLIFEPERSONALSHOPPINGVIDEO U.S. EditionOpen editions submenu × World News FranceEmmanuel Macronmarine le pen EMMANUEL MACRON'S LEAD OVER FAR-RIGHT MARINE LE PEN DEPENDS ON 1 MAJOR UNCERTAINTY Macron is in pole position to win reelection Sunday in France's presidential runoff -- but the reported margin over his nationalist rival has a large room for error. SYLVIE CORBET Apr. 23, 2022, 05:45 AM EDT NEXT 00:02 01:12 360p 720p HD 1080p HD Auto About Connatix V159756 About Connatix V159756 1/1 Skip Ad Continue watching after the ad Visit Advertiser websiteGO TO PAGE PARIS (AP) — President Emmanuel Macron is in the pole position to win reelection Sunday in France’s presidential runoff, yet his lead over far-right rival Marine Le Pen depends on one major uncertainty: voters who decide to stay home. A victory in Sunday’s runoff vote would make Macron the first French president in 20 years to win a second term. Advertisement All opinion polls in recent days converge toward a victory for the 44-year-old pro-European centrist — yet the margin over his nationalist rival appears uncertain, varying from 6 to 15 percentage points, depending on the poll. Polls also forecast a possibly record-high number of people who either vote blank or stay at home and don’t vote at all in this second and final round. The April 10 first-round vote eliminated 10 other presidential candidates. Who becomes France’s next leader will largely depend on what people who backed those losing candidates do on Sunday. The question is a hard one, especially for leftist voters who dislike Macron but don’t want to see Le Pen in power either. A second term for Macron relies in part on their mobilization, prompting the French leader to issue multiple appeals to leftist voters in recent days. Advertisement In his victory speech in 2017, Macron had promised to “do everything” during his five-year term so that the French “have no longer any reason to vote for the extremes.” via Associated Press “Think about what British citizens were saying a few hours before Brexit or (people) in the United States before Trump’s election happened: ‘I’m not going, what’s the point?’ I can tell you that they regretted it the next day,” Macron warned this week on France 5 television. “So if you want to avoid the unthinkable ... choose for yourself,” he urged hesitant French voters. The two rivals both appeared combative in the final days before Sunday’s election, including clashing Wednesday in a one-on-one televised debate. Macron argued that the loan Le Pen’s party received in 2014 from a Czech-Russian bank made her unsuitable to deal with Moscow amid its invasion of Ukraine. He also said her plans to ban Muslim women in France from wearing headscarves in public would trigger “civil war” in the country that has the largest Muslim population in Western Europe. Advertisement “When someone explains to you that Islam equals Islamism equals terrorism equals a problem, that is clearly called the far-right,” Macron declared Friday on France Inter radio. In his victory speech in 2017, Macron had promised to “do everything” during his five-year term so that the French “have no longer any reason to vote for the extremes.” Five years later, that challenge has not been met. Le Pen has consolidated her place on France’s political scene, the result of a years-long effort to rebrand herself as less extreme. Le Pen’s campaign this time has sought to appeal to voters struggling with surging food and energy prices amid the fallout of Russia’s war in Ukraine. The 53-year-old candidate said bringing down the cost of living would be a top priority if she was elected as France’s first woman president. She criticized Macron’s “calamitous” presidency in her last rally in the northern town of Arras. “I’m not even mentioning immigration or security for which, I believe, every French person can only note the failure of the Macron’s policies ... his economic record is also catastrophic,” she declared. Political analyst Marc Lazar, head of the History Center at Sciences Po, told the AP he thinks that Macron is going to win again. Le Pen “has this lack of credibility,” he said. But if Macron is re-elected, “there is a big problem,” he added. “A great number of the people who are going to vote for Macron, they are not voting for this program, but because they reject Marine Le Pen.” He said that means Macron will face a “big level of mistrust” in the country. Macron has vowed to change the French economy to make it more independent while protecting social benefits at the same time. He said he will also keep pushing for a more powerful Europe. Advertisement His first term was rocked by the yellow vest protests against social injustice, the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine. It notably forced Macron to delay a key pension reform, which he said he would relaunch soon after reelection, to gradually raise France’s minimum retirement age from 62 to 65. He says that’s the only way to keep benefits flowing to retirees. The French presidential election is also being closely watched abroad. In an opinion piece Thursday in several European newspapers, the center-left leaders of Germany, Spain and Portugal urged French voters to choose him over his nationalist rival. They raised a warning about “populists and the extreme right” who hold Putin “as an ideological and political model, replicating his chauvinist ideas.” A Le Pen victory would be a “traumatic moment, not only for France, but for European Union and for international relationships, especially with the USA,” Lazar said, noting that Le Pen “wants a distant relationship between France and the USA.” In any case, Sunday’s winner will soon face another obstacle to be able to govern France: A legislative election in June will decide who controls a majority of seats in France’s National Assembly. Already, the battles promise to be hard-fought. AP Journalists Catherine Gaschka and Jeffrey Schaeffer contributed to that story. More: FranceEmmanuel Macronmarine le pen Suggest a correction More: FranceEmmanuel Macronmarine le pen POPULAR IN THE COMMUNITY Skip Ads by * * * * * * * * TRENDING MICHAEL COHEN EXPLODES AFTER TRUMP'S LATEST BOAST ABOUT HIS INTELLIGENCE GOV. 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ABSENTEE BALLOT FRAUD PROBE, DIES HOW OREGON'S PRISON SYSTEM RETALIATED AGAINST ITS MOST EFFECTIVE JAILHOUSE LAWYER DONALD TRUMP SAYS PRINCE HARRY IS 'WHIPPED' IN MARRIAGE TO MEGHAN MARKLE MORE IN WORLD NEWS LOSS IS VICTORY FOR FAR-RIGHT MARINE LE PEN IN FRANCE'S ELECTION BLINKEN SAYS RUSSIA IS FAILING IN WAR AIMS, UKRAINE 'SUCCEEDING' U.S. PROMISES NEW AID TO UKRAINE IN FIGHT AGAINST RUSSIA UKRAINE OFFICIAL: ZELENSKYY MEETS TOP-LEVEL U.S. DELEGATION 10 FOUND DEAD AFTER JAPAN TOUR BOAT CARRYING 26 PEOPLE SINKS TO EUROPE'S RELIEF, FRANCE'S MACRON WINS BUT FAR-RIGHT GAINS ZELENSKYY WARNS UKRAINE IS JUST THE BEGINNING FOR RUSSIA 10 MISSING AFTER UNDERGROUND TREMOR AT COAL MINE IN POLAND ZELENSKYY SAYS HE'S MEETING WITH US OFFICIALS BLINKEN, AUSTIN SANCTIONS HIT RUSSIAN ECONOMY, ALTHOUGH PUTIN SAYS OTHERWISE UKRAINE SAYS RUSSIANS TRYING TO STORM MARIUPOL STEEL PLANT, STRIKE ODESA SECOND MASS GRAVE FOUND OUTSIDE MARIUPOL, SAY UKRAINE OFFICIALS BANNED: RUSSIAN OLYMPIC SWIM CHAMP WHO ATTENDED PUTIN RALLY PORTUGAL APPOINTS SUSPECT IN MADELEINE MCCANN DISAPPEARANCE INVESTIGATION ISRAELI POLICE STORM JERUSALEM HOLY SITE AFTER ROCK-THROWING SATELLITE IMAGES SHOW WHAT APPEAR TO BE MASS GRAVES NEAR MARIUPOL LEADERS OF RIVAL KOREAS EXCHANGE LETTERS AMID TENSIONS 'WE FOUND NOTHING:' THOUSANDS OF ISLAMIC STATE VICTIMS STILL MISSING PUTIN CLAIMS MARIUPOL WIN BUT WON'T STORM UKRAINIAN HOLDOUT QUEEN ELIZABETH GETS HER OWN BARBIE UK CLAIMS RUSSIA EXPERIENCING 'CONTINUED FAILURE' IN UKRAINE – BUT PUTIN WILL NOT GIVE UP UKRAINE REFUGEE COUNT HITS STAGGERING NEW MILESTONE JUDGE SENDS JULIAN ASSANGE EXTRADITION DECISION TO UK GOVERNMENT RUSSIA'S CHERNOBYL SEIZURE SEEN AS NUCLEAR RISK 'NIGHTMARE' SHANGHAI ALLOWS 4 MILLION OUT OF HOMES AS COVID RULES EASE RUSSIA PRESSURES MARIUPOL AS IT FOCUSES ON UKRAINE'S EAST HOW LIFE IN THIS SOVIET-ERA APARTMENT BLOCK REFLECTS A UKRAINE IN CRISIS BORIS JOHNSON OFFERS 'WHOLEHEARTED APOLOGY' OVER 'PARTYGATE' UKRAINIAN SEES RUSSIAN TROOPS IN HIS NEW HOME VIA WEBCAM, GETS 'BASTARDS' BOMBED WHY 'THE BATTLE FOR THE DONBAS' IS A SIGNIFICANT NEW PHASE OF THE RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR GRANDMASTER GARRY KASPAROV PREDICTS 'PALACE COUP' MAY OUST PUTIN OVER UKRAINE PUTIN'S WAR ON UKRAINE IS A POLITICAL FLASH POINT IN IRAN RUSSIA LAUNCHES KEY BATTLE FOR THE DONBAS, UKRAINE SAYS EX-MSNBC ANALYST JOINS FIGHT AGAINST RUSSIA IN UKRAINE: ‘I’M DONE TALKING’ PRINCE HARRY SHARES DETAILS ON REUNION WITH QUEEN ELIZABETH AIDE REVEALS WHAT QUEEN ELIZABETH DID AFTER PRINCE PHILIP'S FUNERAL ZELENSKYY: RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE IN EASTERN UKRAINE HAS BEGUN RUSSIA BOMBS CELEBRITY CHEF'S COMMUNITY KITCHEN IN KHARKIV UKRAINIAN DEFENDERS IN MARIUPOL DEFY SURRENDER-OR-DIE DEMAND UKRAINIAN PM SAYS MARIUPOL ‘STILL HAS NOT FALLEN’ DESPITE DEFYING DEADLINE TO SURRENDER NEWSPOLITICSENTERTAINMENTLIFECOMMUNITIESHUFFPOST PERSONALVIDEONEWSLETTERS About UsAdvertiseContact UsRSSFAQCareersArchiveUser AgreementComment PolicyDMCA PolicyHuffPost Press RoomAccessibility StatementPrivacy PolicyConsent Preferences Part of HuffPost World News. ©2022 BuzzFeed, Inc. 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