Alliances on the left. The left decided on Monday to form a united front in the municipal elections in several major cities, reaching agreements with La France insoumise in Toulouse, Lyon, Strasbourg, Nantes, Clermont, Brest, Limoges, or Avignon for the second round on Sunday.
But not in Paris and Marseille. This will not be the case, however, in the top two cities in France. The outgoing mayor of Marseille, Benoît Payan, leading a left-wing union excluding LFI, withdrew his list for the second round at the prefecture, refusing any kind of backroom dealing. He definitively closed the door to any alliance with the candidate from LFI, Sébastien Delogu, who criticized it as an “irresponsible position” while Franck Allisio (National Rally) won 35% of the votes. In Paris, after an extremely tense campaign between socialists and Insoumis, it comes as no surprise that the candidate of the left-wing alliance excluding LFI, Emmanuel Grégoire, ruled out any alliance with Sophia Chikirou, who will continue her candidacy.
Bournazel throws in the towel in Paris. The Horizons/Renaissance candidate for Mayor of Paris, Pierre-Yves Bournazel, announced on France 2 on Monday a merger of his list with that of the LR candidate, Rachida Dati, while specifying that he personally would no longer be a candidate. “Why? Because a majority of Parisians are waiting for change and alternance,” he declared, adding: “I have done my duty, and in politics, you know, I have been elected in Paris for 18 years, you have to know when to turn the page at some point. Life is long and another life will begin for me.”
57.17%: historically low voter turnout in the first round. Voter turnout on Sunday in the first round of the municipal elections was 57.17%, the second lowest rate under the Fifth Republic after the 2020 election which took place during the Covid pandemic, according to the complete data from the Ministry of the Interior. The 2026 turnout is more than 15 points below the average turnout for a municipal election between 1959 and 2014 (72.35%).
