Marine Le Pen has opened up a commanding lead in the race to succeed Emmanuel Macron as French president, according to a new poll that projects the National Rally leader winning both rounds of next year’s election.
The survey, conducted by Elabe with eight months to go before voters head to the polls, shows Le Pen taking between 34 and 35.5 percent of the first-round vote — a margin that would put her well ahead of the rest of the field and on track for a historic victory.
Le Pen’s Dominance Extends to Runoff
Le Pen’s lead is not confined to the first round. The poll predicts she would defeat every current opponent in a head-to-head runoff, with her narrowest margin coming against former prime minister Édouard Philippe, whom she would still beat by 52.5 percent to 47.5 percent.
Her largest projected victory would come against far-left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon, with the survey estimating a staggering 69.5 percent to 30.5 percent result. She would also comfortably beat centrist Gabriel Attal and leftist MEP Raphaël Glucksmann by a 57–43 margin in hypothetical second-round matchups.
The poll also found that Le Pen is drawing significant support from voters who previously backed the centre-right Les Républicains party, with one in five of those defectors moving to her camp.
Centrist Vote Splits as Attal Slips
Behind Le Pen, the race for second place is shaping up to be a battle between two former Macron prime ministers. Édouard Philippe, now the mayor of Le Havre, is projected to take between 17 and 20.5 percent of the first-round vote, while Gabriel Attal has seen his support slide over the past month to between 12 and 12.5 percent.
The survey suggests Attal’s continued candidacy could prove critical as a spoiler against Philippe, potentially splitting the centrist vote and allowing Mélenchon to sneak into the second round.
Mélenchon, the 75-year-old leader of La France Insoumise, still holds 14 to 14.5 percent of voting intentions despite a recent decline. Some of his support appears to be shifting toward Glucksmann, a younger and more media-friendly leftist who has climbed to between 11.5 and 14 percent.
Right-Wing Challengers Fade
Le Pen’s rivals on the right have failed to gain any serious momentum. Former interior minister Bruno Retailleau is projected at just 6–7 percent, while Reconquête leader Éric Zemmour trails at 4–4.5 percent — both far below the threshold needed to advance to the second round.
The poll’s findings reinforce Le Pen’s position as the clear front-runner, despite what observers describe as decades of hostility toward her and her family from the Paris press and political establishment. The results suggest her anti-mass migration platform is resonating with a significant share of the French electorate.
National Rally Pledges Immigration Referendum
On Friday, Le Pen’s deputy and likely prime minister if she wins, Jordan Bardella, announced that a National Rally government would immediately hold a nationwide referendum on immigration.
According to Bardella, the referendum would ask the French people to decide on abolishing birthright citizenship, restricting welfare benefits to citizens only, and the “systematic expulsion of foreign offenders and criminals.”
“Immigration threatens our security and our public finances,” Bardella said. “Of the 500,000 people who enter France legally each year, only 50,000 have an employment contract. The others are a burden on the taxpayer: this is no longer acceptable! We will finally restore order.”
Should Le Pen prevail and implement a hardline immigration agenda, the outcome could reverberate across the European Union. Analysts have long noted that a Le Pen victory would break the taboo against nationalist-populist parties that advocate stricter border controls, challenging the open-borders consensus that has dominated EU politics and the so-called cordon sanitaire firewall against such movements.
With the election still eight months away, the political landscape could shift, but for now, Le Pen’s path to the Élysée Palace looks clearer than ever.
Source: www.breitbart.com — https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2026/08/30/marine-le-pen-holds-commanding-lead-in-french-presidential-election-to-replace-macron/