Meet French Candidate for the Status Quo: Emmanuel Macron

The results of the the first of two rounds in the French presidential election will pit the nationalist-populist Marine Le Pen and her platform of change against the independent centrist Emmanuel Macron — considered by supporters and critics alike to be a representative of France’s status quo.

Although Macron, a former member of the Socialist party, does not hail from a major French political party — in fact, he ran under the self-proclaimed centrist party En Marche! he created — Macron served in the administration of France’s current and unpopular president, François Hollande. Though he paints himself as a centrist, Macron holds many progressive and liberal views and has been backed by a handful of his defeated rivals and high-profile establishment politicians.

“If Le Pen is anti-establishment, Macron is the incarnation of the French establishment.”

“Emmanuel Macron, who is a sort of — I would describe as a sort of limousine liberal, sort of champagne socialist-type politician — is clearly the favorite to win the second round,” Nile Gardiner, a conservative British commentator and director of the Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom at The Heritage Foundation, said Sunday on Fox News. “But I think Macron really represents business as usual for France. I don’t think you’re going to see much change.”

Macron, 39, has never held an elected office before and is married to his former high school teacher, 63-year-old Brigitte Trogneux.

Macron rejected Le Pen’s desire to see France follow in the United Kingdom’s footsteps by considering a withdrawal from the European Union. In fact, he has called for a stronger EU and a more full-throated embrace of globalism. He has pushed back against Le Pen’s tough rhetoric warning against the threat of radical Islamic terrorism and mass immigration. Macron has also praised German Chancellor Angela Merkel for her “open door” refugee policy, which has been sharply criticized by conservative-populists.

[lz_jwplayer video=IyX0Emfx]

In his own concession speech, conservative establishment candidate François Fillon urged his voters to support Macron, saying, “There is no other choice than to vote against the far right. I will vote for Emmanuel Macron. I consider it my duty to tell you this frankly. It is up to you to reflect on what is best for your country, and for your children.”

Fillon hyperbolically claimed Le Pen’s party, the Front National, “is well-known for its violence, its intolerance, and [that] its program would lead our country to bankruptcy and Europe into chaos.”

Socialist French Prime Minister Bernard Cazeneuve also urged French citizens to turn toward Macron if only to “beat the Front National and obstruct the disastrous project of Marine Le Pen that would take France backwards and divide the French people.”

Although Gardiner predicted that Le Pen would be unable to pull off an ultimate victory against Macron in the May 7 election, he noted that “this is a time of tremendous change in Europe” and “nothing is absolutely certain.”

“And Le Pen, of course, is running on a platform of tighter border control, a hardline anti-Islamist platform, as well,” Gardiner said. “And of course France is in a state of fear at this time. I mean, this is a country that has undergone a series of major terrorist attacks. There is widespread concern with regard to the Islamic terrorist threat. François Holland, the French president, really has been far too weak in terms of standing up to the terrorist threat.”

Macron has suggested that a beefed-up European Union could be the real solution to the threat of Islamic terrorism.

“We must quickly create a sovereign Europe that is capable of protecting us against external dangers in order to better ensure internal security,” according to the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung.

Observers note that the contrast between the two candidates in the French presidential runoff could not be more distinct.

“The best way to look at Macron is as a kind of anti-Le Pen, or, to stretch the bounds of logic even further, a ‘populist from the top.’ If Le Pen is anti-establishment, Macron is the incarnation of the French establishment,” French analyst Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry wrote in a March 3 article for The Week.

During his victory speech, Macron told his supporters that he wants “to become the president of patriots against the threat of nationalists” while working to “bring together all French people.” Le Pen uses the term “patriots” to describe her voters.

“In two weeks, I hope I will be your president, the president of the whole of France, the president of the patriots,” Macron said. “You have showed us that in fact hope for our country was not a bubble or a dream, but a real determined will.”

[lz_related_box id=”786213″]

In her own victory speech Sunday, Le Pen told her supporters that they now “have the chance to choose real change” by bucking the French political establishment.

“This is what I propose: real change,” Le Pen added. “It is time to liberate the French nation from arrogant elites who want to dictate how it must behave. Because yes, I am the candidate of the people.”

Macron, on the other hand, has embraced the establishment mantra.

“Macron, whose core base of support consists of young, urban progressives, has tried to position himself in the political center, between the Socialists and the conservatives,” wrote Soeren Kern, a distinguished senior fellow at the Gatestone Institute, in an article published March 21 called “French Elections: Populist Revolution or Status Quo?”

“The choice for French voters is clear: Le Pen is the anti-establishment change candidate, and Macron is the pro-establishment status quo candidate,” Kern added.