Electoral scene
On Jun 12th and 19th, legislative elections took place in France to elect the MPs to the National Parliament. To general surprise, even the one of Rassemblement National (RN) itself, RN candidates obtained 89 seats (out of 577). In 2017, the RN only obtained 8 seats, being therefore unable to form a group (15 MPs minimum). This unexpected success gives them more political and financial power while bringing about new and old RN faces into the political arena. This testifies to the continued normalisation and mainstreaming of the party, as Macron’s party, which ended up losing its majority in the parliament, had based their campaign on the narrative of fighting both extremes, equalising and instrumentalising the “threat” posed by the far right and the left-wing coalition finally set up for these elections. In the cases when the left-wing coalition was directly competing with the RN at the second round, Macron’s party was, therefore, reluctant to clearly call to hinder RN candidates’ victories. Moreover, one can higher the number of far-right MPs to 91 with Nicolas Dupont-Aignan (DLF) and Emmanuelle Ménart, supported by the RN, renewing their mandates. However, Reconquête!, Éric Zemmour’s party failed to obtain a single seat.
Extra-parliamentary scene
In early June, four neo-Nazis from Alsace were arrested and charged after a Police operation. An enormous number of weapons and ammunition. Holocaust denialist and antisemitic literature was found, and one of the suspects is reported to have close connections with the identitarian group La Meute from Québec, Canada.
On June 11th 2022, Institut Iliade continued its European “tour”, after their Spanish event in May. They gave a presentation talk in Florence, Italy, with the collaboration of their partner publishing house Passaggio al Bosco, which has in the past translated Institut Iliade’s publications. In late May, Italy had already seen the visit of both Luminis Paris, a neo-fascist groupuscule, to visit Casapound activists in Rome, and the one of the student union Cocarde Étudiante to protest in Torino against EU institutions together with their allies from Fuan Torino. In Spain, neo-fascist Tenesoun from Aix-en-Provence met with the activist of Bastion Frontal.
On another note, Polémia, the think-tank close to Institut Iliade through its founder Jean-Yves Le Gallou, missioned and published an interview of Joana Cotar, and AfD MP, mainly on the theme of immigration. La Hallebarde, advertised as a “satirical magazine” from the French-speaking part of Switzerland, organised its first conference with two French guests: Jean-Eude Gannat, form Alvarium together with Abbot Matthieu Raffray, close to Academia Christiana and more generally to the ultra-conservative traditional catholic scene. The theme of the evening was: “how to take action for our own people?” and took place on June 18th in Lausanne.