How France will help decide the 2024 European elections

With nearly 50 million eligible voters and more than 80 seats, France has a bigger say in choosing the next European parliament than any other country except Germany. As EU elections approach, RFI looks at who's running and how French electors are expected to vote.

While polls in other parts of the European Union open from 6 June, voting takes place in mainland France on 9 June.

It's open to all registered French citizens aged 18 and up, as well as EU nationals living in France.

The polls will decide who sits in the European parliament for the next five years.

They're also a chance for a mid-term clash between French rivals ahead of the next national elections in 2027, notably between President Emmanuel Macron's centrists and his challengers on the hard right. 

Here are the need-to-knows of the EU elections in France.

► How many seats does France get in the European parliament?

France will fill a record number of seats in the next EU parliament: 81, two more than it holds currently.

That's because the legislature is getting an extra 15 seats, which are meant to rebalance representation in line with the latest population counts. It also continues the process of restructuring the parliament since the UK left the EU in 2020, which saw some seats scrapped and others redistributed.

France is one of 12 member states to benefit from the latest rejig. It remains the second-biggest country in the parliament after Germany, which leads with 96 seats out of a total of 720. 

Seats are divided according to the size of EU members' populations, which means that Germany, France and Italy get the most and Cyprus, Luxembourg and Malta the fewest.

► What are the biggest French groups in the European parliament?

As of the last EU elections in 2019, the centrist delegation Europe Together is the biggest French group in parliament. 

It's made up of Macron's Renaissance party and a handful of smaller, liberal, pro-Europe allies. 

The list, which partners with other centrists across the EU as the international grouping Renew Europe, holds 23 of France's current 79 seats.

In second place is the National Rally, the French far-right party formerly known as the National Front.

With 18 seats, it is the biggest single French party in the parliament and one of the largest parties in the eurosceptic Identity and Democracy group, alongside Italy's League and the Alternative for Germany.

Behind them are the Ecologists and their regional allies, which together form part of the international Greens–European Free Alliance. They account for 12 of France's seats in parliament. 

The right-wing Republicans party (LR) holds seven seats. Along with its allies the Centrists (one seat), it makes up the French section of the conservative European People's Party parliamentary group.

The Socialists and other centre-left parties grouped into the EU-wide Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats hold seven seats, while radical-left parties led by France Unbowed – part of The Left in the European Parliament group – have six. 

France's remaining five seats are divided between independent candidates (four) and Reconquest (one), the far-right party founded by former pundit Eric Zemmour in 2021. 

His party didn't yet exist at the time of the last EU election, but gained its MEP when a sitting lawmaker from the National Rally switched allegiance mid-term.

► Who are the main French candidates?

France counts as a single national constituency in the EU elections, which means that everyone in the country chooses between the same candidates.

Each party fields a list of candidates, with any seats they win awarded from the top of the list down.

Heading Macron's list is the relative unknown Valérie Hayer, a Renaissance MEP who switched from local to European politics in 2019. 

She has made much of her EU credentials, as well her background in rural France.

Her main challenger is the National Rally's Jordan Bardella, who is also keen to portray himself as a friend of French farmers. 

The party's president – the young successor to Marine Le Pen – is equally a sitting MEP and insists he wants to change the EU from within. 

He is running on the promise to defend French interests, whether by setting national agricultural policy or imposing more restrictive immigration policies.

France's other candidates include environmental lawyer Marie Toussaint, heading the list for the Ecologists for the first time, and Manon Aubry, a former campaigner with the anti-poverty charity Oxfam who's standing for France Unbowed for the second election in a row.

The Republicans and the social democrats are likewise sticking with their respective 2019 picks: philosophy teacher-turned-MEP François-Xavier Bellamy and Raphaël Glucksmann, an ex-journalist who argues for using the EU's powers to protect workers and impose climate regulations.

Meanwhile Marion Maréchal, Marine Le Pen's niece and once a rising star in the family party, is running as Reconquest's first-choice candidate after switching her loyalties.

► How are Europeans in France predicted to vote?

For several months now, opinion polls have consistently put the National Rally in the lead. 

The latest surveys show it getting more than 30 percent of the vote, a significant gain from the 23 percent it won in 2019, and well ahead of Macron's centrists.

They are polling around 17 percent, some 5 percent less than they achieved in 2019.

The Ecologists are also expected to do worse, falling from 13 to around 8 percent.

The only other bloc that looks like it could make significant gains is the centre-left, which is polling between 13 and 14 percent – more than double the 6 percent it won last time. 

The Republicans and France Unbowed are forecast to remain roughly stable at around 7 percent each.

Reconquest is hoping to make its EU election debut on at least 5 percent of the vote, the minimum share required to win a seat. The latest polls indicate it will just about clear the threshold.

► How many people in France vote in EU elections? 

Part of the difficulty of making predictions about the European elections is that it's not clear who'll show up. Fewer voters typically take part than in national elections, and low turnout can provide an opening for parties that would struggle to get a foothold at home.

In 2019, just over 50 percent of eligible French voters took part – the highest turnout since 1994, partly driven by rising engagement among younger generations. 

Some 49.7 million people are eligible to vote in France this time round, including some four million first-time voters. They're expected to help continue the trend of growing participation – though how they'll vote is harder to predict.