For the first time in twenty years, the outgoing president has won the first round and, for the first time in more than forty years, the French have qualified in the second round for the same duel as in the previous presidential election.

By collecting 28.1% to 28.4% of the votes cast, Emmanuel Macron is in the high water level that the polling institutes promised him at the end of the campaign, higher than his 2017 score (24.01%).

A satisfaction?

If the same analysts counted a month ago on a potential of more than 30% of the votes for the outgoing president, a time beneficiary of a "flag effect" linked to the war in Ukraine, the staff of the macronie was not choosy Sunday evening after the last few days deemed complicated.

Biography and program elements of Emmanuel Macron Kenan AUGEARD AFP

"Emmanuel Macron has held up well, we find ourselves in a better configuration", rejoiced the senator LREM François Patriat, in the middle of hundreds of militants all smiles.

The Cassandres are at their expense: despite a campaign deemed late, sluggish and lackluster, with uncertain positioning, the unpleasant surprise feared by many executives of the campaign team did not take place.

"It is necessary to go out to meet the voters, to do some groundwork", however urged the Minister Delegate for Transport, Jean-Baptiste Djebbari, when the parsimony with which the favorite candidate agreed to travel before the first round may have surprised.

The call seems to have been heard: Emmanuel Macron will be in Hauts-de-France on Monday and a giant meeting is announced on Saturday in Marseille.

"Be the most unifying"

Is Emmanuel Macron the favorite for the second round?

“Yes, but”, answer certain lieutenants of the president, as the campaign between the two turns promises to be open.

Because the political landscape born of this first round is unprecedented: first, the historical weakness of the Socialist Party, the Republicans, but also the Greens, suggests a "republican front" stripped.

And, if Jean-Luc Mélenchon launched "not a single vote for Ms. Le Pen", he did not close the door to a blank vote, mechanically favorable to the RN candidate.

The French president and candidate for re-election of the liberal party La République en Marche (LREM) Emmanuel Macron greets his supporters during his first campaign rally at the Arena Paris La Défense, in Nanterre on April 2, 2022 Thomas COEX AFP

It is thus on the Melenchonist electorate that several Macronist tenors are now eyeing.

"There are things to put into perspective, forward, in the program", we whispered Sunday evening in the entourage of Emmanuel Macron, by listing the measures intended for "single-parent families, students, precarious" .

“The question is to be as clear as possible to be as unifying as possible”, we added.

The candidate of the National Rally can for her part count for the first time on a substantial reserve of votes, since Eric Zemmour has called to vote for the far-right candidate.

More generally, the Macron camp has been concerned in recent weeks, as Ms. Le Pen has risen in the polls, to see the daughter of Jean-Marie Le Pen succeed in correcting a hitherto divisive image, in favor of that of a stateswoman.

For the macronists, it is first of all a question of capitalizing on a good score promised to launch a new dynamic.

On the merits, the supporters of the Head of State intend above all to recall the extreme right fundamentals of Mrs. Le Pen, in an attempt to redemonize.

Whether on institutions, Europe or his vision of the world, the Macron camp wants more than ever to send Marine Le Pen back to his supposed "illiberal" conception of democracy, like the head of the Hungarian government Viktor Orbán - whom she congratulated on her reappointment last week, and her once proclaimed closeness to Vladimir Putin.

Similarly, Marine Le Pen's economic vision, deemed unserious, as much as her reversals during the health crisis, must fuel a trial of incompetence.

"Emmanuel Macron's program is the best, that's what needs to be put forward," suggested Secretary of State Cédric O.

Because "to think that activating this lever of the + republican front + against the far right will be enough on its own, it is an illusion", warned at the end of the week the director of the Jean-Jaurès Foundation, Gilles Finchelstein.

High point: the debate between the two rounds, scheduled for Wednesday, April 20.

"But it can't be worse than the last time, so we'll say it was better," fears someone close to the outgoing head of state.

© 2022 AFP