Le Pen, Macron through to 2nd round in French elections

Exit polls show far-right leader and centrist will contest presidency on May 7; others concede; Le Pen hails ‘historic result’

By Agencies and ToI Staff 23 April 2017, 10:23 pm

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Far-right leader and candidate for the 2017 French presidential election, Marine Le Pen, cheers supporters on stage after exit poll results of the first round of the presidential election were announced, at her election day headquarters in Henin-Beaumont, northern France, Sunday, April 23, 2017. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

PARIS — Pro-Europe centrist Emmanuel Macron and far-right populist Marine Le Pen advanced Sunday from the first round of voting in France’s presidential election, setting up a winner-takes-all runoff on May 7.

The selection of Le Pen and Macron will present voters with the starkest possible choice between two diametrically opposed visions of the European Union’s future and France’s place in it.

An Ipsos/Sopra gave Macron 23.7 percent of the vote and Le Pen 21.7%, Reuters reported.

Both candidates will advance to the May 7 runoff after their rivals conceded defeat.

French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech during a campaign meeting in Nantes, on April 19, 2017. (AFP Photo/Jean-Sebastien Evrard)

For the first time in modern French history, no mainstream party candidate is advancing, upending the country’s political system.

“This result is historic, the first step has been taken,” Le Pen told cheering supporters. “It is time to liberate the French people.”

With Le Pen wanting France to leave the EU, and Macron wanting even closer cooperation between the bloc’s 28 member states, the projected outcome Sunday means the presidential runoff would have undertones of a referendum on France’s EU’s membership.

Voting took place amid heightened security in the first election under France’s state of emergency, which has been in place since gun-and-bomb attacks in Paris in 2015.

The race was seen as a litmus test for the spread of populism and could help determine Europe’s future. Closest behind the two frontrunners were far-left contender Jean-Luc Melenchon and conservative Francois Fillon.