PARIS — The candidates in France pivotal and polarizing legislative elections On Friday they gave their last efforts for the second and decisive round of voting after a three-week campaign marked by hate speech. Verbal abuse and physical attacks..
French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin said his ministry has recorded 51 verbal and physical attacks against candidates, their deputies or their supporters during the campaign for the high-stakes parliamentary elections which will end with the second round of voting on Sunday. Several attacks were “extremely serious,” Darmanin said in an interview with French broadcaster BFM on Friday.
At least 30 suspects “with extremely varied backgrounds” have been arrested, the interior minister said, adding that candidates and their supporters across France’s political spectrum have been targets of verbal and physical abuse.
“The National Rally candidates were violently attacked… (as were) the left-wing candidates,” Darmanin said.
Tensions are high as leftist and moderate groups try to prevent the National anti-immigration and nationalist demonstration obtain an absolute legislative majority, which would be a first and greatest historical change for France.
The National Group, under the presidency of the party Jordan Bardellawon the most votes in the first round of the June 30 legislative elections, but not enough to claim a general victory that would allow the formation of the first far-right government in France since World War II.
Darmanin said 30,000 police officers would be deployed on Sunday, including 5,000 in the Paris region, to ensure that the election results “are respected, whatever they may be.” He said gatherings outside the National Assembly, the lower house of parliament, have been banned.
A group called Paris-Suburbs Anti-Fascist Action called for a protest outside the National Assembly on Sunday night when the results are known.
Many people have expressed concern that the increase in voter support for the National Anti-Immigrant Rally has made people more comfortable using Racist, xenophobic and anti-Semitic language. in public.
The government agency that tracks racist acts had no recent data since the brief campaign began.
Candidates have complained about both. hate speech and physical violence during the campaign.
Government spokeswoman Prisca Thevenot, a candidate for the centrist Ensemble alliance led by President Emmanuel Macron, said she, a lawmaker and a party activist were putting up election posters in Meudon, near Paris, on Wednesday night when a group I attack them. The Thevenot MP and the party activist were taken to hospital.
Macron called surprise legislative elections on June 9 after his alliance suffered a heavy defeat at the hands of the National Rally in the French vote for the European Parliament, plunging the country into a sudden legislative campaign.
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