French by-elections, 2022-2027

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It's finally worth starting this thread as three interesting legislative by-elections will be coming up in early 2023 after the ConCoun invalidated the election of three deputies:

Charente-1 (Angoulême): Thomas Mesnier (Horizons/macronista) won by 24 votes against the NUPES (LFI) in the runoff. There were problems with 27 votes cast, so the election was invalidated. This is a rare example of a constituency that has boundaries that make sense and aren't terrible (unlike the seat below, ugh). Macronismo and the left are fairly evenly matched here and the by-election could provide a good opportunity for the NUPES.

Marne-2 (Reims east and environs): Anne-Sophie Frigout (RN) won with 54.8% against the NUPES (LFI) in the runoff, in an infamous and infuriating (to me) result that showed better than anywhere else how many macronistas voted RN in those left-fash runoffs. There were problems and irregularities on the ballots of Laure Miller, the official macronista candidate who was 249 votes from second place in the first round, and 965 of her votes were invalidated as a result. The ConCoun said they shouldn't have been despite irregularities on them (namely they included Macron's name, when that is not allowed). She is running again. This constituency really has no business having a RN deputy - it should, in a normal world, have a right-wing (i.e. now macronista) deputy, and the only reason it doesn't is because of those irregularities and the dissident candidacy of the deselected incumbent in 2022.

Pas-de-Calais-8 (Saint-Omer, Aire-sur-la-Lys, Auchel): Bertrand Petit (PS) won with 55.8% against the RN in the runoff. Petit ran as a PS dissident, coming over 6 points ahead of the NUPES official candidate, and joined the PS-NUPES group upon his election. His election was invalidated because his suppléant was already the suppléant to a senator. This is an historically leftist seat (under slightly different boundaries, a popular longtime PS incumbent, Michel Lefait, was the only left-winger to win by the first round back in 2007), but which has trended hard to the far-right in presidential elections (Mélenchon, as elsewhere in this part of the world, did worse in 2022 than in 2017) - but which clearly can still vote for popular, locally-rooted left-wing candidates (and given muh #trends and lack of Communist history outside of the mining basin towns of Auchel and Burbure, LFI is not a good fit here).

If I feel like it, I will write profiles of these three constituencies - all quite interesting - a bit later on.

This thread can also be used in cases of local by-elections too, even though nobody cares about them, not even the people who can vote in them.

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Saint-Omer is notable as the historic centre of France's glass industry - Arc International is based in Arques, an industrial suburb of Saint-Omer, and while the industry isn't what it was, the company still employs a few thousand locally - so for British posters think of it as a rough analogue for St Helens.

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Louis Aliot's RN binôme won the second round of the cantonal by-election in Perpignan-5 with 53.5% of the vote against 46.5% for the right-wing binôme led by Jean-Louis Chambon, the mayor of Canohès (who has switched parties more often than a Brazilian politician: a PS general councillor, reelected mayor in 2020 as PS-DVG, sought reelection in the 2021 departmental election as DVD-LR, supported LREM in the legislative elections, is now LR). Turnout was 23.6%, slightly higher than in the first round, with a big turnout differential between Perpignan itself (16.9%) and Canohès (38.4%).

The RN gained 456 votes, the right gained 756 votes (the left-wing incumbents had gotten 893 votes last week). In Perpignan Aliot won with 65.4%, while Chambon won 57.8% in Canohès.

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The three by-elections are actually this weekend (and next weekend, for runoffs), so I'm rushing to write my profiles.

Marne-2 (Reims west and environs)

Population (2022): 113,933
Makeup: Former cantons of Châtillon-sur-Marne (except the communes of Courtagnon, Nanteuil-la-Forêt et Pourcy), Fismes, Reims I, Reims III, Reims V, Reims VIII, Ville-en-Tardenois

This constituency covers part of Reims, largely the northwestern-ish parts and parts (though not all) of downtown, and its surroundings to the west of Reims, including the Vesle valley to Fismes and parts of the montagne de Reims, a wooded hilly region/plateau famous as a prominent champagne producing area. The absolutely wonderful 2010 redistricting split the city of Reims between no less than four abominable constituencies. In 2022, around 45% of registered voters were in Reims (and around a third of all Reims voters reside in this constituency). Besides Reims, the other major communes in the constituency are the neighbouring suburban communes of Tinqueux (pop. 10,290), Bezannes (pop. 2,980) and Saint-Brice-Courcelles (pop. 2,886), as well as Fismes (pop. 5,590), a town on the Vesle river and the border with the Aisne.

This is a conservative, right-wing constituency - in the first round in 2022, Macron won 31.7% against 25.1% for Panzergirl, 17.8% for Mélenchon and 7.4% for Zemmour. In the runoff, he won 59.5%, making it his best constituency in the Marne (and, writ large, the former region of Champagne-Ardenne). In 2017, Macron won 23.9% in the first round, followed by Fillon (23.5%), Panzergirl (22.7%) and Mélenchon (16%), and he won with 64.6% in the runoff. This constituency's electoral geography follows a pretty familiar pattern in the new #alignment, if you want to call it that: a large urban centre (Reims) where the far-right is quite weak (Panzergirl did get 22.3%, which is non-negligible still) and where the left's strength is increasingly concentrated (Mélenchon's very urban vote in 2022 got him 24.5% in Reims) -- even though Reims was historically a pretty conservative, right-leaning city; Macron is strongest in the wealthy suburbs and Panzergirl's support increasing with distance from the large urban centre.

In Reims itself, the old bourgeois city-centre, including the famous cathedral, is the wealthiest part of the city and usually the most right-wing part of the city - naturally, Macron performed very well in downtown Reims in 2022, winning over 35% of the vote in most precincts. The peripheral areas of the city, including post-war low-income housing projects (in this constituency, Croix Rouge and Croix du Sud) as well as older (interwar) working-class neighbourhoods, tend to be poorer and more blue-collar. Croix Rouge and Croix du Sud, large post-war HLM estates with large immigrant populations (and some of the poorest parts of Reims, with poverty rates around 60%), are left-wing strongholds, with Mélenchon receiving over 50% in one precinct and over 40% in two others, although turnout tends to be very low in these low-income immigrant neighbourhoods. Panzergirl finds significant support in whiter low-income neighbourhoods, like Trois Fontaines and La Neuvillette.

The montagne de Reims is an affluent winemaking region located to the south of Reims, with high housing prices and a generally affluent population - traditionally very right-wing (voting for Fillon in 2017, for example), Macron inherited the mainstream conservative vote and got excellent results in many communes part of the montagne de Reims, for example 48.5% in Jouy-lès-Reims and 45.7% in Pargny-lès-Reims. In contrast, Macron wasn't quite as successful at inheriting the mainstream right's old support in the Marne valley, a less prosperous winemaking region (which also lacks the suburban draw of the montagne de Reims). In general, Reims' western inner suburbs are quite affluent and Macron performed very well (again, inheriting much of the old conservative vote), with 42.5% in Gueux, 36.8% in Hermonville, 36.4% in Bezannes (a rapidly growing affluent suburb southwest of Reims, home to a TGV station since 2007), 36.9% in Merfy, 43% in Chenay and 34% in Champigny. There are exceptions: Panzergirl won 30.6% in Saint-Brice-Courcelles (47.2% in the runoff), an old working-class industrial suburb of Reims (historically with textile and glass factories) - historically left-wing (Flanby won it solidly in 2012, but Mélenchon won just 18.2%), and also did well in neighbouring Tinqueux (26.7%).

The old industrial town of Fismes - the local economy used to be dominated by a sugar factory which closed in 1978, as well as foundries and small-scale metalworking - will excite the fans of #globaltrends, as it was a left-wing island in an otherwise deeply conservative rural region (Flanby won it as recently in 2012, and Jospin won nearly 60% there back in 1995) which has now become solidly far-right (Panzergirl won 44.2% and 62.2% in the first and second rounds last year, respectively). Tellingly, Panzergirl campaigned in Fismes a few days ago...

This constituency is right-wing, and as I wrote earlier, it also really has no business having a RN deputy - it should, in a normal world, have a right-wing (i.e. now macronista) deputy. The seat was held by Catherine Vautrin (RPR/UMP) from 2002 to 2017, and she won reelection in the seat's current boundaries in 2012 with 53% in a runoff against the PS. She was defeated by macronista newcomer Aina Kuric in 2017, who took 51.2% of the vote in the runoff against Vautrin (as it turns out, Vautrin, now president of the Grand Reims urban community, is now also a macronista). Aina Kuric was one of the few macronista deputies of the 2017 batch that dared go against the majority at times - she voted against the government's asylum and immigration law in 2018 and was nearly expelled from the group. Kuric left LREM in 2019 and joined the new Agir ensemble group in 2020 and Edouard Philippe's Horizons party. Kuric was not renominated by the majority in 2022, which instead nominated Laure Miller, a former Sarkozy protégé, ex-LR departmental councillor in Reims and an adjointe to the mayor of Reims, Arnaud Robinet (an ex-UMP/LR who is now macronista since 2021). Miller had just supported Pécresse and sought the LR nomination, and her name was allegedly pushed by Sarkozy himself and backed by Vautrin, who was widely speculated as a potential prime minister for FBM 2.0 around the same time. Kuric ran as a dissident, and in a confusing imbroglio, both candidates claimed to be the candidate of the presidential majority. Miller initially added on her ballot papers the mention that she was the "official candidate of Emmanuel Macron", a seemingly innocuous note (although very Second Empire...) that is in fact the cause of this by-election...

In the 2022 election, the macronista kerfuffle caused the two candidates to cancel themselves out: Miller won 21.2% and Kuric 12.5%, finishing third and fourth respectively, with Miller falling 249 votes short of qualifying for the runoff. This led to an unexpected runoff configuration featuring the NUPES (which placed first with 22.5%) and the RN (which was close behind with 22%). LR fell to 10.9%. Since I hold grudges for a long time, I'll probably remember this constituency's infamous and infuriating runoff result that showed better than anywhere else how many macronistas voted RN in those left-fash runoffs: the RN's candidate, Anne-Sophie Frigout, came out victorious with 54.8% against 45.2% for the NUPES' candidate. Abstention increased (from 54% to 56.3%) and the percentage of blank and invalid votes shot up to 18% of votes cast, so a lot of macronista (and other) voters did refuse to choose, but the RN did net over 7,400 more votes (while the NUPES only gained 4,700 or so votes).

Miller immediately cried foul after the first round and challenged the result, claiming that the result did not reflect voters' preferences. Her argument: her initial ballot papers mentioning Macron's name were irregular, because the electoral code does not allow ballots to include the name of someone other than the candidate, and she therefore needed to reprint new ballots. However, several voters - 965 - cast their votes for her using the irregular ballot papers with Macron's name (voters usually receive candidates' pamphlets and ballots by mail before the election, and can vote with the ballots provided there as well), which were invalidated. However, in invalidating the election, the ConCoun said that they shouldn't have been nulled despite these irregularities on them. And here we are.

This is a high stakes by-election for the RN and macronismo: for the former, needing to keep a seat where they got very lucky in 2022, hoping to do so by turning these by-elections into a referendum on Macron and the unpopular pension reform just announced; for the latter, needing to win back a seat they should not have lost in the first place (and can now theoretically win it back because Kuric is not running again), but facing a difficult context as a government party in a by-election when the government is unpopular. Seemingly this is not quite as big a priority for the NUPES, which probably realizes that it can't win here.

There are nine candidates: the RN incumbent Anne-Sophie Frigout is running again, her main accomplishment thus far being a bill to ban low emission zones (but yes remember, Panzergirl is an environmentalist at heart and loves cats!). Laure Miller now faces no competition as the presidential majority's candidate, with Kuric deciding not to run again after once again being passed over for the nomination. She has received the visit of a few cabinet ministers as a show of support. The NUPES has a new candidate, Victorien Pâté, who was LFI's candidate in 2017. Stéphane Lang is LR's candidate again - Lang, like Miller, is also an adjoint to the mayor of Reims and LR departmental councillor in Reims, reelected in a binôme with Robinet's partner in 2021. The other candidates include a zemmourista, the obligatory LO Trot, two randos and a candidate of the 'Écologie au centre' scam.

I'd feel that the most likely runoff configuration is macronismo vs. RN, although I'd expect turnout to be very low - the only by-election in this legislature thus far, in Yvelines-2, had just 26% turnout in the first round (it was a much less interesting election, although in a constituency which has higher turnout in general than this one).

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Charente-1 (Angoulême)

Population: 121,514
Makeup: Former cantons of Angoulême Est, Angoulême Nord, Angoulême Ouest, Le Gond-Pontouvre, La Couronne, Ruelle-sur-Touvre, Soyaux

What, a French constituency that doesn't weirdly split a city, and makes sense?! This constituency, redrawn in 2010, includes Angoulême and most of its metropolitan area. Angoulême is a provincial city and préfecture of the Charente with a population of 41,600 (2019). The other towns in this constituency are the neighbouring suburban communes of Soyaux (pop. 9,700), La Couronne (pop. 7,760), Saint-Yrieix-sur-Charente (pop. 7,380), Ruelle-sur-Touvre (pop. 7,300), Gond-Pontouvre (pop. 6,100) and L'Isle-d'Espagnac (pop. 5,600).

Angoulême is an old industrial centre, historically one of the most industrialized urban areas between the Loire and the Garonne - the paper industry was established in the 16th century, a naval foundry on the Touvre river in Ruelle was founded in 1753, and more recently electromechnical engineering (Leroy-Somer, an electric motor manufacturer, is based in the city). The city faced industrial decline in the 1960s (its population peaked in 1962) and nowadays it is a commercial and administrative centre (around 42% of jobs in 2019 were in public admin, healthcare, education and social welfare), and also the location of the very successful annual Angoulême International Comics Festival.

Angoulême's suburbs to the southeast along the Charente and Boëme rivers (La Couronne, Saint-Michel, Nersac) are old industrial areas, traditionally based around the paper industry (and, nowadays, a cement plant in La Couronne). To the northeast, along the Touvre river (Gond-Pontouvre, L'Isle-d'Espagnac, Ruelle etc.), is also an old industrial region, especially the old industrial centre of Ruelle-sur-Touvre with its naval foundry. Soyaux, the second-largest municipality in the Angoulême metro, is a lower-income suburb which grew rapidly in the 1950s and 1960s (but has stagnated since) with the construction of a large housing project (Champ-de-Manoeuvre) which concentrates around 40% of the commune's population and is a 'priority neighbourhood' (i.e. deprived, low-income neighbourhood in urban policy terminology). Angoulême's wealthier suburbs are located to the north and south, namely Saint-Yrieix-sur-Charente to the north and Puymoyen to the south.

This was a fairly left-wing constituency in the past. It's not quite as left-wing now (post-2017 'realignment'). In 2022 (first round), Macron won 28.6%, Mélenchon was a strong second with 24.1%, while Panzergirl won 21.2%, her weakest result of the department's three constituencies. Zemmour won 5.6% and Jadot took 5%. In the runoff, Macron won 62.4%, by far his best result in the department. Mélenchon placed first in Angoulême with 32%, an impressive showing, up about 8 points from 2017, against 27.3% for Macron and only 14.8% for Panzergirl. Mélenchon did best in the more rundown and 'bobo' old town as well as the peripheral low-income 'priority neighbourhoods' of Basseau-Grande Garenne, Ma Campagne and Bel Air-La Grand Font (areas with substantial immigrant populations as well). Mélenchon also won in Soyaux, with 29.7%. Macron's best results came from the wealthier suburban communes, with 32% in Fléac and Saint-Yrieix-sur-Charente and 35.5% in Puymoyen.

Historically, however, Angoulême was more of a swing city -- the left's real strength, going back to the Third Republic and early 20th century in some cases, was in the industrial valleys outside the city. For example, in 1995, whereas Jospin only narrowly won Angoulême with 50% in the runoff, he got 60% in La Couronne, 65% in Saint-Michel, 64% in Ruelle-sur-Touvre and 59% in Gond-Pontouvre. In 2022, Panzergirl placed first in La Couronne (with 28.8%) and Nersac (28.4%), as Mélenchon's vote fell between 2017 and 2022 in those and other places (-1.8 in La Couronne, -2.4 in Ruelle), a pattern seen elsewhere in France in that election.

In the 1986 redistricting, Angoulême was split between the first and fourth constituencies, the latter of which was abolished in 2010, both constituencies were won by the PS in every election since 1988, with the exception of the first constituency in the blue wave of 1993. Under the current boundaries, PS incumbent Martine Pinville was reelected in the first round in 2012 with 50.1%. However, in 2017, she was defeated in the first round, winning just 11.6%, in third place behind LFI (13.3%) and LREM's Thomas Mesnier (38%). Mesnier defeated LFI in the runoff with 60%. Mesnier was elected departmental councillor, as the centre-right candidate, in 2021 in the canton of Angoulême-3. Since 2021, he is a member of Horizons, Édouard Philippe's party and is part of the party's national executive.

In 2022, Mesnier won 30.5% in the first round, closely trailed by the LFI-NUPES candidate, René Pilato, who won 27.5%. The RN won 16.1% and Jean-François Dauré, the PS mayor of La Couronne running as an anti-NUPES dissident supported by the president of the departmental council, won 12.5% (finishing first in his commune). In the second round, Mesnier was reelected with a majority of only 24 votes against Pilato. The left won in Angoulême with 54% but also in La Couronne, Soyaux, Saint-Michel, Gond-Pontouvre and Ruelle. There were problems with 27 votes cast, so the election was invalidated given the tiny difference in the second round.

The by-election is a rematch between Mesnier, who is the vice president of the Horizons group in the National Assembly, and Pilato, now left without a cumbersome dissident in his way. There are six other candidates, but besides the RN, none of them are really relevant. Pilato is the NUPES' main hope for a gain in these by-elections, and he's been supported by several prominent LFI deputies including Manuel Bompard, Mathilde Panot and Danielle Simonnet. Mesnier's victory would be of importance to the majority, and most particularly Édouard Philippe, the most popular politician in France (not a high honour these days), who has come to support his candidate.

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Pas-de-Calais-8 (Audomarois/Saint-Omer, Aire-sur-la-Lys, Auchel)

Population: 123,367
Makeup: Former cantons of Aire-sur-la-Lys, Arques, Auchel, Norrent-Fontes, Saint-Omer Nord, Saint-Omer Sud

This constituency could be thought of as including two or three distinct regions: the Audomarois, around the city of Saint-Omer and its agglomeration, and the western end of the mining basin, around Auchel, with the town of Aire-sur-la-Lys, along the Lys (Leie) river, in between. There are only limited socioeconomic links between the two opposite ends of the constituencies, as can be seen in commuting patterns. In the 2010 redistricting, the eighth constituency gained the (former) cantons of Auchel and Norrent-Fontes while losing that of Fauquembergues. The largest towns in the constituency are Saint-Omer (pop. 14,900), Longuenesse (pop. 10,560), Auchel (pop. 10,270), Aire-sur-la-Lys (pop. 9,690) Arques (pop. 9,580) and Isbergues (pop. 8,700). Saint-Omer, Longuenesse, Arques as well as Saint-Martin-lez-Tatinghem (pop. 5,900) and Blendecques (pop. 4,900) are the main communes in the Saint-Omer agglomeration.

The Audomarois (Saint-Omer region) remains an important industrial region, based around the glass industry in Arques, the headquarters of Arc International (previously Verrerie Cristallerie d'Arques), one of the biggest global glass tableware manufacturers. The glass industry in Arques is still one of the biggest private employers in the broader region, with around 5,000 employees today - half of what it was in the late 1990s/early 2000s. Saint-Omer proper, however, is a town whose last golden age came in the 19th century (its population peaked at 22,300 in 1872) and which 'missed' the Industrial Revolution, in part because of the obstinate opposition of local notables at the time. Instead, industry developed in the Aa valley and along the Neufossé Canal (which connects the Lys and Aa rivers). The glass industry in Arques boomed in the post-war era, until the 1980s-1990s, leading to the rapid demographic growth of communes like Longuenesse, with new housing projects. The glass industry has declined since the 2000s. In 2019, unemployment was over 27% in Saint-Omer, and 22% in Longuenesse and 17.6% in Arques. Demographically, the Audomarois is a working-class and fairly low-income region with a stagnating or declining population. Saint-Omer proper remains the region's commercial, administrative, educational and cultural centre.

Aire-sur-la-Lys and neighbouring Isbergues are also working-class, low-income towns. Isbergues grew around the steel industry, while Aire-sur-la-Lys, which never had heavy industries or coal mines, has been drawn towards neighbouring Isbergues but also to the glass industry in Arques (and, today, low-paying retail jobs in 'grandes surfaces', as elsewhere in declining post-industrial regions).

Finally, at the other end of the current constituency, is the former canton of Auchel, which is part of the mining basin and has suffered the same fate as other places in the mining basin - high unemployment (nearly 26% in 2019), low income (only 34% of households were taxed) and a working-poor population with low levels of education. It has few socioeconomic links with the other 'half' of the constituency, and is mostly turned towards Béthune. This former canton also includes Cauchy-à-la-Tour, birthplace of Philippe Pétain.

Politically, this constituency - like the Pas-de-Calais - has followed the #trends everyone talks about so much, at least at the presidential voting level: from a pretty left-wing constituency (without ever being a super stronghold, but fairly reliable outside of horrible years) since the 1970s, the left (again, mostly at the presidential level) has been sinking like a stone in recent elections, to the benefit of the far-right (and abstention). In 2022, Panzergirl won 37.6% in the first round, followed by Macron (25.5%) and Mélenchon (15.5%), and in the runoff she won the constituency with 56.8%. Five years prior, Panzergirl had won 32.9% in the first round against 20.1% for Macron, 18.8% for Mélenchon and 14.2% for Fillon. It was among the 45 constituencies that voted for her in the 2017 runoff, narrowly (50.7%). Panzergirl, in 2022, did best in Auchel (51.6%) and neighbouring Burbure (45%) but also did well in Isbergues (38%), Arques (39%), Blendecques (43%), Wizemes (38%) and Aire-sur-la-Lys (35%). She was weakest in Saint-Omer (27%), where Macron came out ahead with 31.2% (and then over 55% in the runoff). In the runoff, besides Saint-Omer and a few wealthier rural communes to the north of Saint-Omer, Panzergirl won just about everywhere, with up to 71% (!) in Auchel (61% in Isbergues, 58% in Arques, 54% in Aire and 50.7% in Longuenesse).

Since the 1970s, the Audomarois had been, on the whole, a fairly left-wing (Socialist) region, although Saint-Omer proper and its rural hinterland always tended to be more conservative (it voted for Giscard in 1974 and probably 1981, for Chirac in 1995 and Sarkozy in 2007). The industrial towns of the Audomarois as well as Aires and Isbergues were solidly Socialist (Jospin won over 70% in Isbergues and over 60% in Arques, Longuenesse and Blendecques in 1995; even in 2012 Flanby won those places in the runoff by similarly big margins). Auchel is a former Communist stronghold (although interestingly at the local level it's had right-leaning mayors since 2001), which voted for Robert Hue in 1995 (with 30.7%, and 36% in neighbouring Burbure). The PCF was, however, historically always weak in the rest of the present constituency, except for Isbergues - in 1995, Hue won only 7.8% in Arques, for example.

Over the past decade, the left-wing vote (far-left excluded) in presidential election has dropped from 43.6% in 2012 to 23.8% in 2017 and 23% in 2022. Mélenchon's support in 2022 showed few traces of past leftist strength in the region: he was stronger in historically more conservative Saint-Omer (19%) than in either Arques or Longuenesse (16%), he won only 18.6% in Isbergues and 15.5% in Auchel (where Roussel won 3.9%).

While the constituency is now a Panzergirl bastion at the presidential level, it's a rather recent trend. In 1995, Panzerdaddy was below his national average nearly everywhere in this constituency, getting just 12% in Auchel, 14.6% in Arques, 12.7% in Blendecques and 10.7% in Isbergues for example (so much for muh gaucho-lepénisme). Even in 2002, his support was not particularly high in this constituency - Jospin was ahead of him in most major towns, and peaked at around 18-19% in the industrial Audomarois. However, in 2007, Panzerdaddy's support held up best in this part of the country (again, so much for muh Sarkozy working-class appeal) as his support actually barely budged from 2002. Only with Panzergirl and her 'local' base in Hénin-Beaumont did the far-right's support really surge to high levels, beginning in 2012 (although Flanby was still ahead of her). She won 24.4% (second place) in this constituency in 2012, with 29% in Auchel and 27% in Arques.

At the legislative level, the eighth constituency, under different boundaries (notably excluding Auchel), was held by the PS from 1967 to 1968, from 1973 to 1986, from 1988 to 1993 and from 1997 to 2017. Michel Lefait, PS mayor of Arques from 1977 to 2001 and general councillor (1985-2015), was first elected in 1997 and reelected to three more terms. He was famous for being the only Socialist elected in the first round during the 2007 blue wave (which turned out not to be one in the runoffs). In 2012, under the new boundaries, he fell short of a first round victory again (48.6%) in part because the FG (PCF) won 8.5%, with the candidacy of René Hocq, PCF mayor of Burbure since 1989 and general councillor (2008-2015), who won the canton of Auchel. In the runoff, Lefait won his final term with 65.6%.

As elsewhere, things changed in 2017 (as Lefait retired). The left was divided - between Bertrand Petit, the PS mayor of Saint-Martin-au-Laërt/Saint-Martin-lez-Tatinghem since 2001 (the former merged with another commune to form the latter in 2016) and general councillor since 2008, who declared himself at the time to be "perfectly Macron-compatible"; the LFI and Hocq for the PCF. The left's divisions, here and elsewhere that year, cost them dearly and they were shut out of the runoff: LREM's Benoît Potterie, an optician in Saint-Omer, won 27% against 21.5% for the FN. Petit was just 33 votes from qualifying for the runoff, in third place, having won strong support in the Audomarois, particularly as a favourite son vote in Saint-Martin-lez-Tatinghem and surrounding communes. LFI won 11.4%, the LR-UDI won 7.8% and Hocq (PCF) won 5.1% although he still won over 50% in Burbure.

In 2022, Petit ran again, but this time as a PS dissident against the NUPES, which had endorsed a LFI candidate. In the first round, Auguste Evrard, the RN's 22 year old candidate, won 27.5%, and Petit finished in second with 22.5%. Potterie, the incumbent, was defeated, finishing third with 21.4%. The official NUPES candidate won 15.8%, making Petit one of the few PS/NUPES dissidents to beat the official candidates of the coalition. Petit's vote was concentrated in the Audomarois (although Potterie finished first in Saint-Omer), with 48% in his commune of Saint-Martin-lez-Tatinghem and around 26% in Saint-Omer, Arques, Longuenesse, Blendecques and 28.3% in Wizemes (he also did very well in more rural and wealthier communes to the north of Saint-Omer in the marais Audomarois). His support was lower in the rest of the constituency (14.8% in Aire, 10.1% in Isbergues and 9.3% in Auchel), where the NUPES' candidate finished ahead of him, with the notable exception of Burbure, where Petit won 33%, thanks to his suppléant, René Hocq, a choice that'd come back to bite him in the ass... In the runoff against the RN, Petit won comfortably with 55.8%, netting over 12,800 more votes since the first round, while the RN gained less than 6,000 more. Again, the geography of that vote was quite clearly regionally delineated: Petit did very well in Saint-Omer (69.5%) and much of the Audomarois (including 73.6% in his commune), as well as Aire (where he won 54%), while the RN won over 60% in Auchel -- again, though, Petit won in Burbure (with 53%).

After his election, despite having run as a dissident, Petit joined the PS group (unlike many PS dissidents who are now in the LIOT group). His election was invalidated because his suppléant, René Hocq, was already suppléant of a senator since 2018 and could not be suppléant to a deputy (this irregularity had already caused another by-election, in the Yvelines, in late 2022). The by-election is a rematch of 2022 between the top three candidates, although Petit is now the official NUPES candidate - a nomination that didn't go over well with local LFI activists, who dislike the incumbent because of his past comments about being Macron-compatible, and his close ties to local hunters and Willy Schraen, president of the national federation of hunters and all-around horrible person (hates animals, defends all kinds of brutal hunting methods etc.).

Petit is furious with Potterie, the former macronista incumbent seeking to make a comeback after being the one who challenged Petit's election, calling him a sore loser and vowing to take his revenge on him for getting his election invalidated. Macronismo, for whatever reason, also seems to be at least somewhat hopeful about its chances here, having dispatched interior minister Gérald Darmanin, public accounts minister Gabriel Attal and parliamentary group president Aurore Bergé on site to support Potterie (who also received the visit of Édouard Philippe, as he too is a member of Philippe's party now). The RN is running the same candidate, Auguste Evrard. There are 3 other candidates.

I would expect, besides very high abstention and its unpredictable consequences, a left-RN runoff which would favour Petit, again (whereas a macronista-RN runoff would likely favour the RN).

[Estrella]

Kind of off topic, but re: your mention of badly drawn constituencies – was there some kind of consistent gerrymandering logic to the Marleix redistricting?

[Oryxslayer]

Kind of off topic, but re: your mention of badly drawn constituencies – was there some kind of consistent gerrymandering logic to the Marleix redistricting?

I'm no expert, but the 2010 redistricting produced a map that at the time was drawn in favor of the conservatives. Which today mainly means France is left with unnecessarily ugly districts since the coalition shifts between then and today have wiped away the intended structural advantages in most (but not all) areas.

[Hash]

Kind of off topic, but re: your mention of badly drawn constituencies – was there some kind of consistent gerrymandering logic to the Marleix redistricting?

I wouldn't call the 2010 Marleix redistricting a gerrymander, even though it was definitely a very political process which, on balance, sought to benefit the right though not outrageously so, much like the 1986 Pasqua redistricting. On the whole, if the 2010 redistricting had any consistent logic, it was 'least change', only modifying the most egregious demographic imbalances (respect for basic demographic considerations being, basically, the only criteria of redistricting since 1986) and where seats were added or lost, as to avoid accusations of political bias and gerrymandering (charcutage électoral, or electoral butchering, as would be said in French) as much as possible. Several departments were not modified at all, and others were only minimally modified. The basic 'rules' of electoral redistricting, which are hardly set in stone but more general principles adhered to, also makes it a complicated exercise in several cases. The 2010 redistricting did not systematically benefit the right, although there were departments where the right was clearly seen as favoured by it (Tarn, Hérault with the horrendous butchering of Montpellier, Somme and of course the expat seats) but also some cases where the left was benefited (and, in general, Marleix took care to protect or shore up nearly all PCF and PRG incumbents at the time).

My general criticism of that redistricting (and the 1986 one) is less political and has much more to do with the fact that in so many places it needlessly divides cities and towns (Reims, Montpellier, Nîmes, Metz, Orléans, Amiens, Laval, Angers [not modified in 2010], Mulhouse, Perpignan, Limoges, Troyes, and smaller ones like Albi, Castres, Abbeville, Grasse, Istres, Carpentras, Bourg-en-Bresse) and that it ignores even basic socioeconomic and cultural realities like agglomerations/metro areas, roads, topography and natural regions. Even within cities that need to be split between more than one constituency - like Lille, Rennes, Toulouse, Lyon (where Marleix kept the rather pernicious 1986 map intact), Nice among others - the maps are badly drawn, largely ignoring neighbourhoods and urban socioeconomic patterns. The most caricatural examples would be the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence in 1986, not modified in 2010, and the 2010 map in Vaucluse with its fifth constituency (and some dishonourable mentions for the Nièvre, Corrèze and Saône-et-Loire in 2010). Maps which all scream 'we were drawn by career politicians and their technocratic staff in Paris, we're just lines on maps', which, of course, is to be expected in a country like France (the current regions being a quite infamous example). There are, to be fair, some perfectly fine and clean maps, like Charente and Indre, among others (or Gironde, a larger department with a rather decent-looking map).

The addition of 11 seats for French expats and the way those seats were drawn was the subject of much debate at the time and was quite obviously a ploy to benefit the right - one which badly backfired and hilariously failed in 2012. Marleix had much more leeway in demographic terms (the most populated constituency has over 230,000 voters, and the least populated one less than 90,000), although was also limited by not wanting to divide countries (although France and other countries already do so with consular constituencies). But his map was obviously intended to favour the right - by placing Israel in the seventh constituency to make it right-wing, by placing Monaco with the Iberian peninsula in the first constituency, by dividing Africa and the Middle East between the 9th and 10th constituencies with clear political considerations in mind. What at the time was widely decried as a nasty political ploy to gift 7-8 seats to the right of course turned out otherwise in 2012, when the right only won three constituencies (though it regained two in by-elections).

On the whole, it should be remembered that the 1986 and 2010 redistrictings, while both being political processes controlled and dictated by RPR/UMP apparatchiks (Alain Marleix in both, and Hervé Fabre-Aubrespy in 1986) with cursory consultation of the opposition and a limited role for parliament on the margins of it, were both immediately followed by legislative elections won by the left (albeit without an absolute majority in 1988) notwithstanding any structural advantages for the right (and, by 2007, the 1986 map in fact benefited the left more on balance). France's more unstable party system and quite sudden shifts in voter moods and coalitions and alignments makes it much harder to talk of gerrymandering like in the United States. More than actively malicious gerrymandering à la America, it's just a deeply flawed, opaque, top-down, largely unregulated and politicized process.

[Hash]

Quasi-finalized results in all three constituencies:

Charente-1:
Mesnier (Horizons/macronista incumbent) leads by 43 votes, with 35.6%, and will face Pilato (NUPES-LFI), 35.5%, in the runoff. The RN won 14.6%, while LR is just below 5% and a DVD candidate is not far behind them with just over 3.5%. The zemmourista won 2%. Unclear what turnout looked like, but the number 30% has been thrown around, which isn't that awful all things considered. Fairly positive numbers for the top two candidates, and the runoff is likely to be close, like in 2022.

Marne-2:
Frigout (RN incumbent) leads with 34.8% against 30% for Miller (macronista), while the NUPES candidate is eliminated, finishing third with 16%. LR is fourth with 11%. Turnout is very low, only 24%. There seems to have been an incumbency advantage for the RN incumbent, who is up over 12% on her 2022 result, not too unexpected in a low turnout context. Definitely not a very brilliant result for macronismo. Hard to predict the outcome, but the RN has a solid chance at holding this seat next week, which is definitely not good news for macronismo.

Pas-de-Calais-8:
Petit (PS-NUPES incumbent) is way ahead of anyone else, with 46.3%, and will face the RN (24%) in the runoff. Potterie, the former macronista deputy, is again in third, with 21%. Turnout is around 30%. Petit leads nearly everywhere except Auchel, where the RN has around 43% against 30% for Potterie (whose suppléant was the centre-right mayor). He is ahead of Potterie in Saint-Omer, and presumably got huge numbers in the rest of the Audomarois. Again, we see a big incumbency (and local notoriety) advantage for the incumbent in a low-turnout context. Petit should easily win in the runoff.

Insofar as any lessons can be drawn from low turnout by-elections, the results are on the whole favourable to incumbents, mediocre for the RN except where it has an incumbent, generally bad for macronismo except where it has an incumbent, half-decent for the NUPES except in the no-hope Marne seat (though obviously, in the Pas-de-Calais, it is much more about Petit and his local base than anything about the NUPES), basically terrible for LR everywhere.

For fans of meaningless low turnout by-elections, there will soon be two more by-elections which could both see sub-10% turnout because the elections in two expat constituencies - the second (Latin America & Caribbean) and the ninth (Maghreb and West Africa) - have been invalidated because of issues with voters not receiving their codes to vote by internet. The former seat is held by macronismo, the latter by the NUPES.

[Ethelberth]

Would it be possible to abolish those expat seats in next redistricting?

[Antonio the Sixth]

Would it be possible to abolish those expat seats in next redistricting?

It very much depends who's doing the next redistricting and in what context. If Macron's horrible idea for a constitutional reform passes (at this point pretty unlikely but not impossible) or if he still decides to go ahead and enough some awful PR/FPP hybrid (no idea honestly but I'd lean no given the circumstance) then there will have to be a redistricting given the overall reduction in seats. One can hope that the expat seats will be the first to be cut, but given that they're exactly the right demographic for Macron, I highly doubt it. Absent electoral reform, thought, the next redistricting will probably be in God knows how many decades, so who knows what comes out of it.

[Oryxslayer]

Pilato won Charente-2 by a tiny margin, Miller won Marne-2 by 4%, and Petit landslided the RN.

[Antonio the Sixth]

So that's a NUPES gain over Macronismo and a Macronismo gain over RN. Nice result, though it obviously doesn't mean much given the turnout.

[Hash]

Charente-1

Pilato (NUPES-LFI) 50.99% (+474)
Mesnier (ENS)* 49.01%

turnout 30.21% (+1.44)

Angoulême made the difference here for Pilato: he resoundingly won the city with 55.4% and took a lead of 840 votes in the city. He did also won several suburban communes though as well: Soyaux, La Couronne, Saint-Michel, Ruelle, Nersac, Gond-Pontouvre. Pilato likely benefited from good transfers from the RN.

Marne-2

Miller (ENS) 51.8% (+629)
Frigout (RN)* 48.2%

turnout 25.2% (+1.2)

Macronismo manages to take a seat it shouldn't have lost in the first place, overcoming a mediocre first round result and the RN's incumbency advantage. Miller owes her victory to Reims, where she won 62.1% (and a majority over 1,400 votes). Unsurprisingly, she got better transfers from the left and LR than the NUPES had gotten from macronismo and the right against the RN last year (the RN gained 2,359 votes, Miller gained 3,819).

Pas-de-Calais-8

Petit (NUPES-PS) 66.49%
Evrard (RN) 33.51%

turnout 27.93%

Unsurprising landslide victory for the incumbent.

In addition to the two expat seats, there will also be a by-election in Ariège-1, where the election was invalidated because of problems with RN ballots being mixed up. The constituency, which covers the Pyrénéean southern half of the department, has been held by LFI's Bénédicte Taurine since 2017 and is a left-wing stronghold, one of the few seats having only been held by the left since 1958 (PS, namely, until 2017). In theory, LFI shouldn't have much trouble holding it but open questions here include whether there will be another PS dissident (backed by Carole Delga) as in June 2022 (a dissident won the other Ariège seat but finished fourth here with around 18%) and whether the RN can make it to the runoff (they were only 8 votes away in 2022, and ballot mix-ups may have contributed to them falling short, hence the election being invalidated), which would be interesting given that the far-right has made some pretty significant gains in this constituency, particularly in the declining post-industrial Pays d'Olmes and upper Ariège valley.

[Mike88]

National Parliament after these by-elections:

https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1619800603185631233

[Hash]

The Constitutional Council has invalidated the election of Meyer Habib (Likud) in the 8th expat constituency. The Constitutional Council found that, in violation of electoral law, Habib's campaign posted messages on social media on the day of the election calling to vote for him (some of them from Israeli municipal councillors or 'relaying voting instructions from religious authorities') and Habib's campaign set up parallel phone hotlines/help centres (in addition to official government ones) for voters who had difficulties voting online and, during these calls, voters may have been offered to have somebody else vote in their place using their usernames and passwords (which is seriously illegal). Le Canard enchainé in June 2022 had already revealed all of this stuff, based on diplomatic cables accusing Habib of chartering buses and using the Shas party's machine for his election. Habib is lucky that he got off with only an election invalidation rather than being declared ineligible (pretty sure some incumbents have been declared ineligible for less serious stuff than this).

For those who don't know, this constituency includes Israel (which accounts for about three-fifths of eligible voters) as well as Italy, Turkey, Greece, Cyprus and Malta (Italy has about 35,000 voters, Turkey about 7,600 and Greece about 8,100), and Israel has obviously been the decisive factor in legislative elections in this constituency (and, needless to say, the French-Jewish expat electorate in Israeli is heavily right-wing). Worth noting that this constituency often has the lowest turnout of all expat constituencies - just 12.2% and 13.9% in 2022's two rounds, respectively. Meyer Habib, a longtime very close friend and ally of Benjamin Netanyahu (who has publicly endorsed him), was first elected in this constituency in a 2013 by-election and reelected in 2017 and 2022. Habib is a member of the UDI and now sits in the LR group, but for all intents and purposes he is effectively a Likud member, acting as a steadfast defender of his friend Bibi and the Israeli hard-right in France. He regularly uses religious language in his campaigns, and somehow nobody bats an eye about that in a country which loves to go wild over laïcité/'séparatismes'/'communautarisme'. Refer to his French Wikipedia article for an overview of his charming ideology and his long list of 'controversies' (to put it mildly).

In 2022 Habib was reelected against macronista candidate Deborah Abisror-de Lieme (who successfully challenged the result) by a narrow margin of just under 1.2% in the runoff (or 193 votes). Habib won with 66.9% in the Haifa consular constituency (northern Israel), 85.8% in Jerusalem (the city and Palestine) and 74.6% in Tel Aviv (the centre and south of Israel) while winning less than 40% of the vote in all other parts of the constituency. The June 2022 first round coincided with Shavuot, which may have prevented Orthodox Jews from voting, and Habib complained about the lack of polling stations in Eilat, Beersheba and Ashdod (and implied it was anti-Semitism/anti-Zionism to bring him down).

Incidentally, Habib's election was invalidated during Netanyahu's visit to Paris, in which Habib was actively involved. The Israeli media has spread a story according to which Netanyahu may appoint Habib as Israel's ambassador to France. If that doesn't happen, Habib will probably run again - to take revenge on Abisror-de Lieme, for one - and there's a strong chance he'd win again.

[Hash]

Coming up tomorrow:

Ariège-1 (Foix, Lavelanet-Pays d'Olmes, Sabarthès, Couserans)



Population: 69,672
Makeup: Former cantons of Ax-les-Thermes, La Bastide-de-Sérou, Les Cabannes, Castillon-en-Couserans, Foix-Rural, Foix-Ville, Lavelanet, Massat, Oust, Quérigut, Tarascon-sur-Ariège, Varilhes and Vicdessos

The first constituency of Ariège covers the south of the department, the mountainous Pyrenean region along the Spanish (and Andorran) border. It covers several natural regions and traditional pays - the Pays de Foix, the Sabarthès (along the upper valley of the Ariège, in the southeast of the department), parts of the Couserans (the southwest of the department), the Pays d'Olmes (Lavelanet) and smaller regions like the Donezan. The main city in the constituency is the departmental préfecture of Foix, the second-largest town in the department, with a population of 9,515 in 2020. The other major towns are Lavelanet (pop. 6,000), Varilhes (pop. 3,500) and Tarascon-sur-Ariège (pop. 3,000). This constituency's population is older and poorer than average.

Given the physical geography and historical isolation of the Pyrenean valleys, different parts of the constituency retain distinct socioeconomic and demographic characteristics, so it's worth describing them separately.

Foix is the préfecture of the department and its second largest city/town with a population of just over 9,500. It is a predominantly commercial and administrative town (the public sector writ large is a major employer). The Ariège's two largest cities, Pamiers and Foix, are increasingly closely connected, with substantial commuting flows between the two and other communes in between - for example, the department's main hospital is now located in Saint-Jean-de-Verges, in between Pamiers and Foix. The constituency extends north along the Ariège river, to the outskirts of Pamiers, including the communes of Varilhes, Verniolle and Saint-Jean-de-Verges.

The Pays d'Olmes, located in the Pyrenean foothills, is centered around Lavelanet. It is an old industrial region, characterized particularly by the textile industry in Lavelanet. The textile industry, hit hard by foreign competition, has declined markedly since the 1980s, leaving behind it a struggling post-industrial region with high unemployment (29% in Lavelanet in 2019) and precarious jobs. Lavelanet's population peaked at over 9,000 in 1975 and has declined since then.

The Sabarthès is a natural region, primarily around the upper valley of the Ariège river, upstream from Foix, although it also includes smaller Pyrenean valleys, notably the Vicdessos valley. The main town is Tarascon-sur-Ariège, at the confluence of the Ariège and Vicdessos, an important small industrial centre. Metallurgy and aluminium formed the industrial backbone of the town and its surroundings, until it declined in the 1970s and 1980s. The Péchiney factory closed in 2003 and the site was finally demolished in 2016, although an aluminium smelter - now owned by the Chinese - survives in the neighbouring commune of Quié. Tarascon-sur-Ariège's population also peaked in 1975 and now has high unemployment (22% in 2019) and precarious jobs. The Vicdessos valley was also industrial, with a Péchiney aluminium factory in Auzat from 1906 until 2003.

The Ariège river flows upstream through towns like Les Cabannes, Luzenac (known for its talc mines and talc factory), the spa resort of Ax-les-Thermes and the border village of L'Hospitalet-près-l'Andorre.

The constituency includes parts of the Couserans, though not the region's main town, Saint-Girons. The Couserans is a large mountainous region with several valleys (the Haut-Salan, Biros valley etc.). This was a predominantly agricultural/pastoral region which suffered from severe rural depopulation throughout much of the 20th century (many communes' population peaked in the 1850s and have declined heavily since). Since the 1970s, many communes in the Couserans - Massat, La Bastide-de-Sérou, Alzen, Seix etc. - saw an influx of néo-ruraux (neo-rurals): hippies, environmentalists, soixante-huitards, back-to-the-land etc. The néo-ruraux influx, in some places, reversed 100 years of depopulation or at least stabilized the population. Then néo-ruraux influence is clear in the strength of organic farming, the social economy, local community associations and mutual aid. Not without link, the anti-vaxx movement is also strong in these regions: the COVID-19 vaccination rate in the communauté de communes Couserans-Pyrénées is 67%, over 10 points below the national average.

The Ariège is an old left-wing stronghold, dating back to the Third Republic, and this constituency is one of the most historically left-wing constituencies in France: it has been  held by the left, without exception, since 1958 (even resisting the blue waves of 1968 and 1993), and even prior to that, single-member constituencies in the south of the department elected Socialists since 1928. Most of the former cantons in this constituency were consistently represented by the SFIO/PS since the 1940s, and prior to that by Radicals since the early 1900s. The left-wing strength owes both to the industrial areas and a strong left-wing republican tradition among poor small farmers/peasants, the memories of past struggles (the war of the Maidens in the Couserans in the 1850s) and wartime resistance. It is kept alive today by néo-ruraux.

Mélenchon won 27.4% of the vote in 2022, with Panzergirl in second with 22.9% and Macron in third with 19.5%. Jean Lassalle finished fourth with 8%, ahead of Zemmour (6%). Anne Hidalgo still managed 3.7% here... In the runoff, Macron only narrowly won with 52.9% against 47.1% for Panzergirl. In 2017, Mélenchon received 28% against 21.8% for Macron and 20.3% for Panzergirl. In 2012, Hollande won 36.2% in the first round and Mélenchon finished second (17.7%), just ahead of Sarkozy (17.4%) and Panzergirl (15.8%). He won two-thirds of the vote in the runoff. The far-right's substantial gains in this constituency are quite clear.

The far-right is strongest in the Pays d'Olmes, the depressed post-industrial textile region of Lavelanet. Panzergirl won 32% in Lavelanet and was strong in surrounding communes (38% in Bélesta, 33.6% in Villeneuve-d'Ormes and Montferrier). In the runoff, she won 56% in Lavelanet, 64% in Bélesta and 57% in Villeneuve-d'Ormes. The FN/RN has been relatively strong in this region for quite some time though (although it is now at its strongest): already in 1995, Panzerdaddy was winning 17% in Lavelanet (and 20.5% in 2002, second behind Jospin). The far-right is also increasingly strong in parts of the upper valley of the Ariège, most notably in Tarascon-sur-Ariège, where Panzergirl won 25.5% in 2022 (second behind Mélenchon, who won 27%) and carried it in the runoff with 50.8%. Panzergirl also did well in Quié (27.2%) and Luzenac (29.2%). The spa resort town of Ax-les-Thermes, one of the exceedingly few historically right-wing places in this constituency (Sarkozy carried it in 2007, though lost it by double-digits in 2012), voted for Macron (27.5%).

While the town of Foix itself remains left-leaning - Mélenchon won 31.3% in 2022, followed by Macron (21.1%) and Panzergirl (17.9%) - Panzergirl did very well in many of the lower middle-class suburban commuter towns around Foix and between Pamiers (a rather blue-collar town which voted for Panzergirl in both rounds) and Foix. She won 28.9% in Saint-Jean-de-Verges, 27.5% in Varilhes, 23.9% in Verniolle, 27.5% in Saint-Paul-de-Jarrat (located southeast of Foix).

The Couserans remains the most solidly left-wing region of the department. The néo-ruraux influence is quite obvious. Mélenchon won huge numbers in certain communes: 64% in Alzen, 49.6% in Massat, 61.7% in Montagagne (a tiny village which voted for José Bové in 2007!), 43% in Le Bosc, 48% in Le Port, 51.5% in Biert and 37% in La Bastide-de-Sérou. In the 2019 European elections, EELV placed first in several communes like Alzen and La Bastide-de-Sérou, while LFI placed first in Massat and Le Port, with EELV in second. While the far-right remains very weak here - Panzergirl remained in the single digits in several commues (she won just 0.6% in Alzen!) - Panzergirl did quite well in several communes in the 2022 runoff (even winning a few), albeit on the back of low turnout and a lot of invalid votes. Unsurprisingly, Mélenchon voters in these parts really didn't want to vote for Macron in big numbers (to some extent, I do think anti-vaxx sentiment probably played hard against Macron, among other reasons) - this local France 3 article does anecdotally show how many of the Mélenchon néo-ruraux voters are anti-politics and anti-system.

The first constituency was held by Socialists from 1958 to 2017. In 2017, LFI's Bénédicte Taurine won the seat by 143 votes in the runoff against LREM. In 2022, Taurine - now as the NUPES' official candidate - won 33.1% in the first round, followed by LREM with just a bit under 20%, qualifying for the runoff with a difference of just 8 votes with the RN. The Constitutional Council's decision overturning the election found that ballots in the name of the RN's candidate in the second constituency were mixed with ballots in the name of the RN's actual candidate in Tarascon-sur-Ariège and 136 votes of these votes (for the RN's candidate in the other seat) counted as invalid (there were an abnormally high number of invalid votes in the commune in the first round, 7.77%). The NUPES coalition was opposed by a lot of PS apparatchiks in the region and department, most famously regional president Carole Delga, but also the president of the departmental council, and Delga (along with other anti-NUPES Socialists) supported dissident candidates. Martine Froger, the PS dissident, won 18.1%. In the second constituency, the PS dissident Laurent Panifous actually qualified for the runoff against the LFI incumbent and went on to defeat him in the runoff by double-digits. In this constituency, however, the LFI incumbent enjoyed a comfortable victory against macronismo in the runoff, with 55.3% of the vote -- although one could note that Taurine failed to get all of the PS dissident's votes.

The by-election is a rematch of 2022: the top four candidates (LFI-NUPES, Ensemble, RN and PS dissident) are all running again. Froger is supported by the PS federation of the Ariège, as well as Carole Delga, Christine Téqui (president of the departmental council), Jean-Pierre Bel (former president of the Senate) and the mayor of Foix as well as national figures of the PS like former prime minister Bernard Cazeneuve. The national PS leadership officially supports Taurine as part of the NUPES. Jean-Luc Mélenchon visited to support Taurine. While the RN is rather optimistic and upbeat about its chances (they stand a strong chance of making the runoff), macronismo seems to have largely given up. The current social context with the pensions reform, the massive protests and article 49.3 should play in favour of Taurine (and perhaps the RN to a lesser extent). I would think that the most likely outcome is a LFI-RN runoff with a clear victory for the LFI next week. In the less likely scenario of a Taurine-Frogier runoff, the outcome could be more uncertain (although given the context again, I'd think Taurine would still win narrowly).

[Hash]

Registered 57297
Valid votes 21737
Abstention 60.40%

B Taurine (LFI-NUPES)* 31.18% (-1.94)
M Froger (PS 09/diss.) 26.42% (+8.35)
JM Garnier (RN) 24.78% (+4.84)
AS Tribout (ENS) 10.69% (-9.27)
FX Jossinet (REC) 2.77% (-0.86)
R Claraco (ind.) 2.20% (new)
G Lapeyre (LO) 1.96% (+0.62)

To my relative surprise, it will be a Taurine-Froger runoff - with a more uncertain outcome than a LFI-RN runoff. A rather mediocre result for the LFI/NUPES, which doesn't really seem to benefit much at all from the national context, but a very good result for the PS dissident (backed by the local party establishment). The RN does well but will be very frustrated that it once again missed out on making the runoff by such a small margin (355 votes); from numbers posted online it seems as if the RN topped the poll in Tarascon, Lavelanet and Varilhes as well as Bélesta and Villeneuve-d'Olmes, confirming the far-right's growing strength at all levels in this constituency. Truly a catastrophic result for macronismo: clearly badly hurt by the national context, it falls to just over 10%. It's hard to make any conclusions in by-elections, but these numbers would suggest that a lot of macronista voters from 2022 voted for Froger, the PS dissident, in the first round, either as a 'vote utile' (strategic vote) or a shift to the (soft) left after being disgruntled by FBM's recent bullsh**t.

Turnout is quite good: nearly 40% turnout in a by-election which didn't get a lot of media attention. Granted, rural Southwest constituencies have higher turnout. You need to go back to 2015 to find a by-election in metropolitan France with a similarly high level of turnout (Doubs-4 in February 2015, which got a lot more national attention).

This runoff matchup is difficult for the LFI incumbent. As I mentioned in my effortpost above (please read it!), in 2022 the neighbouring second constituency had a similar matchup between the LFI incumbent and the PS dissident which was easily won by the latter, on the back of transfers from RN and macronismo (the dissident candidate gained over 9,000 votes, the LFI incumbent gained fewer than 3,000 new voters). Tribout, the macronista candidate, has endorsed Froger without mentioning her by name (by calling on her supporters to defeat Taurine using the only ballot left) while also saying that she would be a useless deputy. I'd now expect Froger to win next week

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The three expat seat by-elections are being held this weekend - on Saturday for the 2nd constituency, on Sunday for the other two. Online voting has been kept, even though two of the by-elections were caused by major problems in the online voting in June 2022.

2nd constituency (Latin America and the Caribbean)

The second constituency covers Latin America and the Caribbean. It is the least populated of the expat constituencies, with a 'population' of 90,423 (citizens registered on the consular lists). Mexico has the largest community (21,700 in 2022), followed by Brazil (16,000), Argentina (11,000) and Chile (10,730).

Macron won 45.9% of the vote in 2022, followed by Mélenchon (22.7%), Zemmour (9.1%) and Jadot (6.3%). Macron won over 50% of the vote in Mexico (and over 60% in the Monterrey consular constituency) and over 43% in Brazil (he did best in the Rio and São Paulo constituencies, covering southern and southeastern Brazil, while Mélenchon won the Recife constituency, which includes the northeast - and has far fewer voters). Macron won 48-49% in Chile and Argentina, and 40% in Colombia. Mélenchon won only one country - Bolivia, with its 288 votes cast. Zemmour did best in the Bahamas (30.9%, albeit just 58 people voted), Paraguay (27.6%), the Dominican Republic (20.9%) and Panama (20.8%) -- countries where the expat population is right-wing (presumably wealthy, old, tax dodgers plus assorted anti-vaxxers/Nazis in Paraguay).

The seat was won by Franco-Chilean Sergio Coronado (EELV) in 2012, defeating the UMP's candidate by 7% in the runoff. In 2017, standing with the support of EELV and LFI, Coronado was defeated by nearly 22 points in the runoff by macronista candidate Paula Forteza. Forteza quit LREM in 2020 and joined the new Écologie démocratie solidarité group, formed largely by left-leaning macronista dissidents (like Cédric Villani and Matthieu Orphelin), and did not seek reelection last year. Éléonore Caroit, a macronista consular councillor elected in Geneva in the 2021 consular election (but who grew up in the DR), won 34.6% in the first round, followed by Christian Rodriguez (LFI-NUPES) who won 28.2%. The LR candidate finished third with 12.3%, followed by the zemmourista (6.3%), a Franco-Brazilian resident in Paraguay standing as an independent environmentalist (6.1%) and the scammy/spoiler fake green 'presidential majority' jokers (4.7%). In the runoff, Caroit won 57.4%, defeating Rodriguez by 1,741 votes. Turnout was, of course, low: 14.9% in the first round, 16.3% in the runoff.

The election was invalidated because of serious problems with the online voting: only 11% of voters in Argentina had received their online voting passwords by text message when voting opened.

There are 10 candidates standing, including both the incumbent, Caroit, and her NUPES challenger, Rodriguez. LR's candidate is also the same as in 2022. The other candidates include Tatiana Boteva-Malo (who lives in... Bulgaria), the candidate of 'Égalité Europe Écologie', the latest misleading name of the scammy fake greens 'presidential majority' jokers (now trying to apparently to trick people into thinking they're EELV or something?), who have now made the news for obviously Photoshopping the campaign posters of their candidates since 2022 (unless all three got a lot younger and better looking):

https://twitter.com/CerfiaFR/status/1638187421148889090

8th constituency (Israel, Greece, Turkey and Italy)

I've mentioned the details about this constituency in an earlier post, but to restate: this constituency includes Israel, which accounts for about three-fifths of eligible voters, as well as Italy, Turkey, Greece, Cyprus and Malta (Italy has about 35,000 voters, Turkey about 7,600 and Greece about 8,100). The constituency has a population of 137,660, with 81,200 in Israel and Palestine, and 33,000 in Italy.

Politically, Israel is the decisive factor in this constituency. The French expat population in Israel and the West Bank is heavily Jewish, and politically very right-wing (following the trends of the Jewish vote in France, which has shifted heavily right). In 2012, Sarkozy won over 80% of the vote in Israel in the first round and in 2017, Fillon won 60%. In 2022, Zemmour won 53% in Israel and 44% in the West Bank. Overall, he won 20.9% in this constituency, finishing second behind Macron (43.2%). The other countries in the constituency are more 'normal'. Italy and Greece voted for Macron with large numbers (49.6% and 53.3% respectively), with Mélenchon a very distant second, while Mélenchon won in Turkey with just over 35%. The Zemmour Jewish-Israeli vote did not go to Panzergirl: Macron won 86% of the vote in Israel in the runoff (the FN/RN remains, understandably, weak among Jewish voters).

The seat has been held since a 2013 by-election by the (in)famous Meyer Habib, Benjamin Netanyahu's closest friend and politically ally in France (who has publicly endorsed him in elections). In every election, Habib has won thanks to massive (quasi-unanimous) results in Israel while being very weak in the rest of the seat. The constituency was won by the PS in 2012, a surprising fluke result given that it's very right-wing (Sarkozy won 49% in the first round in the constituency in 2012), taking advantage of the right's divisions at the time (if I recall, mostly Israel-related). Habib defeated the UMP's candidate in the 2013 by-election, winning 53.4%. In 2017, Habib was easily reelected in 2017, winning 58% of the vote in a runoff against LREM. In 2022, Habib was reelected against macronista candidate Deborah Abisror-de Lieme (who successfully challenged the result) by a narrow margin of just under 1.2% in the runoff (or 193 votes). Habib won with 66.9% in the Haifa consular constituency (northern Israel), 85.8% in Jerusalem (the city and Palestine) and 74.6% in Tel Aviv (the centre and south of Israel) while winning less than 40% of the vote in all other parts of the constituency (although his numbers in the rest of the constituency were quite a bit better than they were in 2017). Habib won 74% of his first round votes and two-thirds of his runoff votes in Israel. The June 2022 first round coincided with Shavuot, which may have prevented Orthodox Jews from voting, and Habib complained about the lack of polling stations in Eilat, Beersheba and Ashdod (and implied it was anti-Semitism/anti-Zionism to bring him down).

All this being said, it's worth noting that this constituency often has the lowest turnout of all expat constituencies - just 12.2% and 13.9% in 2022's two rounds, respectively. Turnout, in fact, is particularly low in Israel: just 9% in the 2022 runoff.

Habib is a member of the UDI and sat in the LR group, but for all intents and purposes he is effectively a Likud member, acting as a steadfast defender of his friend Bibi and the Israeli hard-right in France. It'd be too long and tedious to revisit all his controversies, scandals and political views, and his French Wikipedia page does a good job at that. Habib's 2022 reelection was invalidated because, in violation of electoral law, Habib's campaign posted messages on social media on the day of the election calling to vote for him (some of them from Israeli municipal councillors or 'relaying voting instructions from religious authorities') and Habib's campaign set up parallel phone hotlines/help centres (in addition to official government ones) for voters who had difficulties voting online and, during these calls, voters may have been offered to have somebody else vote in their place using their usernames and passwords (which is seriously illegal). Le Canard enchainé in June 2022 had already revealed all of this stuff, based on diplomatic cables accusing Habib of chartering buses and using the Shas party's machine for his election. As I wrote earlier, Habib is quite lucky that he got off with only an election invalidation rather than being declared ineligible.

The by-election here is a rematch of 2022, with Habib keen to take his revenge on Deborah Abisror-de Lieme for getting his election invalidated. Deborah Abisror-de Lieme is secretary-general of the Renaissance (LREM) group in the Assembly and previously worked as chief of staff for Brune Poirson and Olivier Véran. Abisror-de Lieme complains that Habib has made the by-election an 'Israeli election' by talking only about Israeli politics, and accuses him of using the same dirty tricks/irregularities that got his 2022 election invalidated.

There are a total of 8 candidates. The NUPES' candidate is Yael Lerer, a Franco-Israeli left-wing activist and founding member of Balad, whose campaign lit says she'd oppose far-right governments in Israel and Italy, stand in solidarity against the judicial reform in Israel, the defence of democratic rights in Turkey and 'pacific resistance to occupation'. The 'Égalité Europe Écologie' candidate here is Juliette de Causans, who got a big Photoshop job done since 2022 (see her campaign poster in the tweet above).

9th constituency (Maghreb and West Africa)

The ninth constituency covers the Maghreb and West Africa (except Nigeria, Benin, Togo and Ghana). It has a population of 158,872. The largest communities, by far, are in Morocco (52,600), Algeria (32,000), Tunisia (21,000), Senegal (21,000) and Côte-d'Ivoire (17,500).

This is the most left-wing constituency of all the expat seats. It was the only constituency that Mélenchon won in 2022, with 39.8% against 38.3% for Macron (Zemmour won third with 6.2%). The strong left-wing vote likely has a lot to do with the fact that a lot of French citizens here are dual citizens: according to official numbers, 68.4% of French citizens in North Africa are dual citizens, as are 40.5% of those in Francophone Africa. Algeria is the most left-wing part of the constituency, with 55.3% for Mélenchon in 2022. In 2012, Hollande had won 87% of the vote in the runoff against Sarkozy in Algeria! Mélenchon also won in Morocco (40.2%), Senegal (38.6%), Mali (47.8%), Burkina Faso (36.2%), Niger (41.2%) and Mauritania (42.8%) while Macron won in Tunisia (46.1%), Côte-d'Ivoire (36.8%) and Guinea (46.8%). Côte-d'Ivoire was the most right-wing country in the constituency, voting for Fillon in 2017 (and over 60% for Sarkozy in 2012), which likely has to do with the French business presence in the country and France's role in the Ivorian conflict in the 2000s. Morocco shows an interesting divide within the French community: Mélenchon won the consular constituencies of Tangier (54.5%), Fez (52.8%), Rabat (47.6%) and Casablanca (41.7%) in northern Morocco, Macron won in the constituencies of Marrakesh (40.3% vs. Mélenchon 25.1%) and Agadir (34.3% vs. Mélenchon 28.3%) in southern Morocco. Marrakesh, Essaouira and Agadir are famous as popular retirement destinations for wealthier French people, and unsurprisingly French expats there lean to the right (in 2017, Fillon won nearly 42% in Marrakesh). French citizens in the rest of Morocco likely include a lot more Franco-Moroccan dual nationals. Tunisia's numbers may also be explained by French retirees, but the mainstream right was much weaker in Tunisia than in Morocco, pre-2022. In 2017, when Macron's vote had a bit more left-wing 'roots' than in 2022 and when he did much better with Muslim voters, Macron had done much better in Algeria (52%) (his comments on the Algerian war/colonization that got lots of attention in 2017 may have helped him here too) and Mélenchon much weaker.

This constituency has had a rather interesting political history. In 2012, it was easily won by the PS' Pouria Amirshahi with over 62% in the runoff. Amirshahi later became one of the left-wing 'frondeurs' against Valls and the government, and didn't run for reelection in 2017. The 2017 election was a hot mess, with over 25 candidates, and no official macronista candidate: the party's original candidate, MoDem senator Leila Aïchi was dis-endorsed by LREM after her comments critical of French/Moroccan policy in Western Sahara, with the Moroccan government alleged to have played a role in her deselection. M'jid El Guerrab, of Moroccan descent, also claimed the label of the presidential majority. Aïchi and El Guerrab won 20.3% and 18.9% in the first round respectively, as the rest of the field split the remainder. El Guerrab was elected in the runoff with 59.7%, thanks to a large victory in Morocco. El Guerrab is close to the Moroccan government and strongly advocates for the Moroccan position on the Western Sahara conflict.

El Guerrab is also a lunatic. In August 2017, he hit a PS member (an old acquaintance turned enemy after El Guerrab left the PS in early 2017) on the skull with a motorcycle helmet, causing him head trauma and a cerebral hemorrhage. He needed to be hospitalized and spent three days in the ICU. El Guerrab claimed that he was insulted with racist taunts, which the victim denied, saying that they had exchanged only "Moroccan pleasantries". El Guerrab was sentenced to one year in prison and two years political ineligibility in May 2022, and has appealed the sentence. Because of the crazy helmet-bashing, El Guerrab left the LREM group in September 2017. El Guerrab sought reelection in 2022 but dropped out before the vote.

The 2022 election attracted over 20 candidates again. Karim Ben Cheïkh, a Franco-Tunisian and member of Génération.s (the party founded by Hamon), was the NUPES' candidate and won 40% in the first round, far ahead of macronismo's star candidate, Élisabeth Moreno, the junior minister for gender equality, diversity and equality of opportunities since 2020 (Moreno was born in Cape Verde), who won 28.1%.

The election was invalidated because of problems with the online voting. Here again, many voters in Algeria did not receive their password by text message.

There are 15 candidates in this by-election. Karim Ben Cheïkh (G.s-NUPES) is running again. The official macronista candidate is Caroline Traverse, who lives in Dakar and previously lived in Morocco, but El Guerrab is back, running (officially) as an independent, though still close to macronismo. Macronismo, according to Politico, at first considered implicitly supporting him, calculating that his strong base in Morocco (and his links to the regime there?) made him the strongest candidate against the left, but the controversy and scandal that'd bring convinced them otherwise. Now, the party/group has said that he would not be allowed to join the macronista group if elected.

...

I'll avoid making predictions for what will be very, very low turnout by-elections. I think Habib and Ben Cheïkh will probably be reelected in the end, leaving only the second constituency as a bit of an incognito. It'd appear as a possible left-wing pick-up opportunity, but it's hard to predict a low turnout expat by-election.

[Oryxslayer]

I wonder if the situation in Israel will dramatically affect turnout or voting patterns,  especially since the current environment is similar (certainly not identical or directly comparable) in both countries right now. There's a line of thought that Habib is about to receive his best result yet, and there is another possibility that if the cracks in the likud foundation presently being expressed in national polls even partially work against him, then REM could stand to benefit.

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Ariège-1 by-election:

M Froger (PS diss.) 60.19%
B Taurine (LFI-NUPES)* 39.81%

Turnout seems slightly lower than last week.

As expected, Froger wins in a landslide. Taurine gained only 998 votes while Froger gained over 6,000 votes... the bulk of both RN and macronista voters who cast valid votes went for Froger, quasi-unanimously. LFI should perhaps ask itself why it is such a turn-off for other voters in runoffs, but thankfully for them, the two other strong parties in the current system, RN and macronismo, are also big turn-offs for other voters...

Still waiting on results from the other three by-elections, but turnout numbers have already been published: 8%, 8.82% and 6.49% in constituencies 2, 8 and 9 respectively. One word: lol.

[Oryxslayer]

https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1642594554518855683?s=20

Froger wins by a lot. Despite all that has happened, it doesn't seem like LFI has changed the perception the median voter had of them 2022.

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Expats-2

E Caroit (ENS) 38.95% (+4.38)
C Rodriguez (LFI-NUPES) 26.23% (-1.97)
B Dupont (LR) 13.38% (+1.13)
Y Thorailler (REC) 6.15% (-0.16)
T Boteva-Malo (fake green scam) 5.42% (+0.7)
M Vandamme (RN) 3.36% (+1.2)
D Abrial (GRS) 3.11% (+1.84)
C Bompard (LMPA) 2.11%
S Ribeiro (ind) 0.67% (+0.45)
P Guanaes Netto (RS) 0.62%

Turnout 11.92% (-3.01)

Strong performance for macronismo and disappointing result for the NUPES. Would not read too much into it, it's a low turnout expat by-election, likely to be far removed from trends in France (and macronista expats are probably unlikely to be turned off by the pension reform stuff). Macronismo should hold the seat in the runoff without too much troubles.

Expats-8

M Habib (UDI-LR) 38.35% (+9.5)
D Abisror-de Lieme (ENS) 24.67% (-3.11)
Y Lerer (LFI-NUPES) 15.67% (-3.17)
J de Causans (fake green scam) 7.37% (+2.37)
H Lehmann (GRS) 6.23% (+3.26)
S Siksik (REC) 5.92% (-0.99)
M Odelin (LMPA) 1.58%
F Chaouat (ind) 0.21%

Turnout 11.55% (-0.68)

Great performance by Meyer Habib who should hold his seat again in the runoff, with a more comfortable margin than last year. Habib won 55.9% in Haifa, 79.2% in Jerusalem and 68.3% in Tel Aviv, and got about 44% of his votes out of Israel -- so he has made significant improvements in his vote outside of his Israeli base.

My turnout numbers in my previous post referred only to the internet vote, so that's why the final turnout here is a bit higher.

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and Expats-9

K Ben Cheikh (Gs-NUPES) 43.24% (+3.25)
C Traverse (ENS) 16.31% (-11.75)
M El Guerrab (macronista diss.) 15.4%
A Chouk (REC) 6.09% (+0.59)
E de Castellan (LR) 5.55% (+0.93)
O Ba (MoDem diss.) 3.82%
S Herbal (fake green scam) 2.71% (+1.46)
N Oufkir (ind) 1.99%
F Sagna Sow (DVC) 1.43%
T Bruni (Cap21) 1.19%
all others under 1%

Turnout 10.22% (-4.49)

The NUPES incumbent is way ahead on low turnout, while the official macronista candidate makes the runoff by 112 votes ahead of El Guerrab the skull-cracker. Should be an easy reelection next week for Ben Cheikh.

So all three expat by-elections will likely see comfortable reelections for the incumbents on very low turnout.

In non by-election but election-related matters, Paris was organizing a referendum on e-scooters today. Turnout was extremely low (103,000 voters out of 1.38 million, around 7.5%) but 89% voted to ban e-scooters.