Macron said Le Pen “lied” to voters about her manifesto’s “racist” program, which includes banning the Muslim headscarf, and accused her of “complacency” in her ties to Russian Vladimir Putin. He said in an interview with Le Parisien that Le Pen’s social policies were aimed at “dividing society in the most brutal way”. will create mass unemployment and scare foreign investors. and that its cost-of-living policies were ‘funded by virtual currency’. As for Putin, he said: “I am never complacent. “Something that did not always apply to Marin Le Pen, who is financially dependent on Vladimir Putin and his regime and who was always complacent with him.” The war in Ukraine remains the second most important issue for French voters after fears of overcoming it amid the cost of living crisis. Le Pen, whose far-right party borrowed 9m euros from a Russian bank in 2014 for a local election campaign, said the “violence” of Macron’s comments showed panic. He said he had condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine and that Macron was “very aggressive” in the campaign, which betrayed his own “nervousness”. Lepen told a happy final rally in her party’s southern stronghold, Perpignan, that she had never been so close to power. He compared Macron to a “stunned boxer”. Marine Le Pen is campaigning in Narbonne, in the south of France. Photo: Chesnot / Getty Images Final polls suggest Macron and Le Pen are the two candidates most likely to reach the second round on April 24, but hardline left-wing Jean-Luc Melanson is also gaining support. The latest OpinionWay-Kea Partners poll showed Macron at 26% in the first round and Le Pen at 22%. Mélenchon had risen steadily to 17%. An Ifop poll showed similar trends: Macron had fallen from a high of more than 30% in March to 26.5% with Le Pen rising to 24%. Mélenchon was in third place, but winning. The continuous rise of Le Pen last week is significant. This is her third presidential candidacy and in previous elections she had lost ground in the polls last week. Elabe’s latest BFMTV poll, released on Friday, showed that if Macron faced Le Pen in the final second round on April 24, he would have won 51% compared to Le Pen’s 49% – her highest position never in elections. This lead is so small that it is on the verge of error and pollsters said there is now a mathematical chance that Le Pen will win the presidential election. It will all depend on the outcome and turnout of Sunday’s first round and whether supporters of other parties will regularly vote to end the far right, as they have done in the past. In 2017, Macron won Lepen with 66% after voters from the left and the ruling right moved to stop the politician of the National Coalition. Le Pen became France’s second favorite political figure this month, behind former Prime Minister oudouard Philippe. Her ten-year public relations campaign to detoxify her party’s image has paid off in recent weeks as she focused on the cost-of-living crisis. The presence in the campaign of a new opponent, far-right television expert Éric Zemmour, worked in Lepen’s favor, as his inflammatory comments and beliefs in inciting racial hatred allowed Lepen to be described as more moderate, even more modest, remains the same and would give priority to the French over non-French for housing, jobs and allowances. Asked by RTL if he was afraid of losing, Macron said: “Nothing is taken for granted. [but] “I have a spirit of conquest more than a spirit of defeat.” Sunday’s vote is expected to mark another step in the transformation of national politics in France. The two parties that ousted power from the post-war period until five years ago – the Socialists and Nicolas Sarkozy’s Republicans in the right-wing Goliath – total only 10%. Socialist Party candidate Anne Indalgo, the mayor of Paris, was expected to receive 2%, confirming her party’s fall on the national stage. The Les Républicains could explode if their candidate, Valérie Pécresse, head of the Île-de-France district that includes Paris, sank to 8% as predicted by the Elabe poll. Zemmour runs on the same level as Pécresse, fighting for his position to take part in the reconstruction of the French right, forming an extreme right-wing group of what he calls a “patriotic bourgeoisie” and working-class voters. Yannick Jadot of the Greens is at 4%.
