President Joe Biden said Monday that French President Emmanuel Macron had not been available to take his call offering congratulations for his reelection win.
Biden explained that he had called, but had spoken to staff members because Macron had been busy <a href="https://dailywire.com/news/french-president-macron-wins-second-term-over-right-wing-candidate-le-pen/">celebrating his win</a>.
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BIDEN: &quot;I tried to talk to [Macron] last night. We spoke with his staff, but he was uh, at the Eiffel Tower having a good time.&quot; <a href="https://t.co/eJsr7l3N2W">pic.twitter.com/eJsr7l3N2W</a>
&mdash; Townhall.com (@townhallcom) <a href="https://twitter.com/townhallcom/status/1518622335267397635?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 25, 2022</a></blockquote>
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&#8220;I tried to talk to [Macron] last night. We spoke with his staff, but he was uh, at the Eiffel Tower having a good time,&#8221; Biden told reporters on Monday.
Macron <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/24/europe/french-election-results-macron-le-pen-intl/index.html">won 58.5% of the vote</a> during a runoff election that took place on Sunday. He and far-right challenger Marine Le Pen had advanced from a field of 12 candidates to the runoff after the April 10 election, and Sunday&#8217;s final vote made Macron the first French President in two decades to win reelection.
Macron acknowledged during his victory speech that some had voted for him not because they liked him but because they had concerns about the far-right position taken by his opponent — and he promised to address their concerns and unite France going forward.
&#8220;An answer must be found to the anger and disagreements that led many of our compatriots to vote for the extreme right,&#8221; Macron said as he declared victory on Sunday. &#8220;It will be my responsibility and that of those around me.&#8221;
President Biden also offered his congratulations to Macron in a tweet late Sunday, saying, &#8220;Congratulations to @EmmanuelMacron on his re-election. France is our oldest ally and a key partner in addressing global challenges. I look forward to our continued close cooperation — including on supporting Ukraine, defending democracy, and countering climate change.&#8221;
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Congratulations to <a href="https://twitter.com/EmmanuelMacron?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@EmmanuelMacron</a> on his re-election. France is our oldest ally and a key partner in addressing global challenges. I look forward to our continued close cooperation — including on supporting Ukraine, defending democracy, and countering climate change.
&mdash; President Biden (@POTUS) <a href="https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1518361861661544448?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 24, 2022</a></blockquote>
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Macron reportedly did take a call from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, however. &#8220;Macron spoke to Zelenskiy tonight, who congratulated him on his re-election, the Elysée says,&#8221; Reuters reporter Michel Rose tweeted.
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Macron spoke to Zelenskiy tonight, who congratulated him on his re-election, the Elysée says
&mdash; Michel Rose (@MichelReuters) <a href="https://twitter.com/MichelReuters/status/1518365599088447489?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 24, 2022</a></blockquote>
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The French President is not the first world leader to miss a call from the White House in recent weeks, either.
&#8220;This is the second world leader in just months who ignored Joe Biden’s phone calls,&#8221; New York Post reporter Jonathan Levine <a href="https://twitter.com/LevineJonathan/status/1518621181187874817">tweeted</a>, going on to share an article about leaders from both Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates who declined to take phone calls from President Biden amid the Russian war on Ukraine.
&#8220;This was March,&#8221; he added in the caption.
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This was March <a href="https://t.co/7KDNhPObXh">https://t.co/7KDNhPObXh</a>
&mdash; Jon Levine (@LevineJonathan) <a href="https://twitter.com/LevineJonathan/status/1518621682348564480?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 25, 2022</a></blockquote>
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According to a <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/saudi-emirati-leaders-decline-calls-with-biden-during-ukraine-crisis-11646779430">report</a> from The Wall Street Journal, Saudi and UAE leadership indicated that they would not help President Biden address rising gas prices unless he agreed to support them in Yemen.

Election Night With Emmanuel Macron’s Supporters During France’s 2022 Presidential Race Results

‘He Was, Uh, At The Eiffel Tower’: Biden Says French President Wasn’t There To Take Congratulatory Call

Emmanuel Macron

France

Joe Biden

Marine Le Pen

Ukraine

Volodymyr Zelensky

A man stabbed a Catholic priest several times and injured a nun at a French church on Sunday after shouting, “We have to kill Macron.”
Both the priest and the nun <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/world/france-nice-knife-attack-catholic-priest-stabbed-nun-injured">survived</a> the attack, which took place at a church in Nice beside the French Riviera. The motives of the suspect, who was taken into custody by police, are still unclear, although his mental faculties had been under watch.
The nun, Sister Marie-Claude, was injured while trying to stop the attacker from stabbing the priest, Father Christophe. Her actions were praised as heroic and she was credited for having “extraordinary courage.”
Both were at the Église Saint-Pierre-d&#8217;Arène de Nice Catholic Church when the assault unfolded.
“Speaking with reporters at the scene, Nice Mayor Christian Estrosi described the suspect as a mentally unstable French national who was born in Fréjus, a port town on the Côte d&#8217;Azur in southeastern France,” Fox News reported. “Bernard Gonzalez, the prefect of the Alpes-Maritimes department of southeast France, added that according to the preliminary investigation, the suspect had no criminal record and was unknown to police services.”
The outlet also noted that the attacker had reportedly been under psychiatric monitoring. Before attacking the priest, the French outlet Le Figaro <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/nice-attack-priest-nun-macron-b2064380.html">reported</a> that the attacker said, “We have to kill Macron.”
“I was the first on the scene once I was alerted to the incident by my assistant and the local police,” Estrosi <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/nice-attack-priest-nun-macron-b2064380.html">told</a> reporters. “Both local and national police were swiftly on the scene together to neutralize the disturbance.”
Estrosi also provided an update on the status of Father Christophe.
“I want to thank the emergency services even though the priest is currently in the emergency care unit, he&#8217;s being well taken care of and we are in constant contact with him and despite everything he is doing well and is awake and alert,” he said.
The attack came the same day as citizens across France <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/french-president-macron-wins-second-term-over-right-wing-candidate-le-pen">voted</a> in the second round of the country’s presidential elections. Incumbent President Emmanuel Macron defeated right-wing challenger Marine Le Pen.
“President Macron is expected to take 58.2% of the vote to Le Pen’s 41.8%, according to an analysis of voting data by pollsters Ipsos &amp; Sopra Steria conducted for broadcasters France Televisions and Radio France,” CNN <a href="https://www.cnn.com/europe/live-news/macron-le-pen-french-election-results-04-24-22-intl/index.html">reported</a> Sunday.
Le Pen has conceded to Macron, stating that France missed a chance to make a move for freedom throughout the country.
“A great wind of freedom could have blown over our country, the fate of the ballot box wanted otherwise,” she said. “I will not abandon the French! Vive la France.”
Le Pen favored restrictions on immigration, reducing the country’s connections to NATO, and hoped to introduce a ban on headscarves being worn in public by Muslim women.

The sun rises behind a Christian cross

Catholic Priest, Nun Injured In Stabbing Attack At French Church

Catholicism

Crime

Europe

French President Emmanuel Macron has won a second term, according to pollsters&#8217; projections, fending off another challenge from a right-wing candidate.
Macron faced off against Marine Le Pen in a runoff election held Sunday in France. Pollsters predicted an hour before voting closed in the country that Macron would easily win, beating Le Pen by nearly 17 points.
“President Macron is expected to take 58.2% of the vote to Le Pen&#8217;s 41.8%, according to an analysis of voting data by pollsters Ipsos &amp; Sopra Steria conducted for broadcasters France Televisions and Radio France,” CNN <a href="https://www.cnn.com/europe/live-news/macron-le-pen-french-election-results-04-24-22-intl/index.html">reported</a> Sunday.
Shortly after the predictions, Le Pen conceded, stating, &#8220;A great wind of freedom could have blown over our country, the fate of the ballot box wanted otherwise.”
She concluded her concession speech promising to continue fighting for France. “I will not abandon the French! Vive la France,” Le Pen said.
Le Pen gained support as a nationalist candidate who focused on an extreme France-first agenda, standing against NATO and immigration. She also vowed to ban Muslim women from wearing headscarves in public, something Macron quickly criticized as dangerously xenophobic. &#8220;I&#8217;m telling it in a very clear manner: I think the headscarf is a uniform imposed by Islamists,&#8221; Le Pen said, according to the Daily Mail.
The race became heated last week when, during a <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10738501/Marine-Le-Pen-slumps-polls-pledging-BAN-Islamic-headscarf-TV-debate-Macron.html">debate</a> on Wednesday night, Le Pen pledged to ban headscarves in public and Macron accused her of being “in the grip of Russia.” Macron claimed that Le Pen is still paying back money to a Moscow bank as Russia invades Ukraine. &#8220;War is raging on the continent,&#8221; Macron said during the debate.
&#8220;Times are very dangerous indeed. Russia is strengthening its offensive, and this will lead to more human disasters,&#8221; he added.
After the debate, polls showed Le Pen drop among voters. “Survey results published hours after the face-off showed Macron on 59 per cent of the vote, and his right-wing right rival on 39 per cent, with 2 per cent abstentions,” the Daily Mail reported.
The two political rivals also faced each other in the 2017 election when Macron beat Le Pen by an even larger margin than what pollsters are predicting for Sunday&#8217;s outcome. In 2017, Macron won nearly two thirds of the vote to Le Pen’s 33%, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/04/24/world/french-election-runoff-results">per</a> The New York Times.
The Times also wrote that Macron becomes the first French president to be reelected since 2002. 
The French president has been criticized for his harsh words toward those who wish to remain unvaccinated against COVID-19. In January, he doubled down on saying he wanted to “piss off” unvaccinated people, The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/french-president-macron-doubles-down-on-comment-to-piss-off-the-unvaccinated">reported</a>.
“When some make from their freedom … a motto, not only do they put others’ lives at risk, but they are also curtailing others’ freedom,” Macron said in January. “That I cannot accept.”

French President Macron Wins Second Term Over Right-Wing Candidate Le Pen

Election

Politics

The results of the parliamentary elections for the European Union were a loss for the European Union itself. Despite pro-EU parties <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/26/eu-election-results-greens-and-euroskeptics-gain.html">reportedly</a> maintaining two-thirds of seats in the parliament, euroskeptics and nationalists solidified their power and made gains, signaling division and challenges soon to come.
In Italy, the anti-immigration and nationalist party, Lega Nord (League) Party, reportedly secured a victory of 28 seats. Following the win, the leader, Interior Minister Matteo Salvini <a href="https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1132447/european-elections-latest-news-matteo-salvini-league-lega-italy-democratic-party-brexit">said</a>, &#8220;A new Europe is born.&#8221;
&#8220;As far as I&#8217;m concerned, if the League wins nothing changes in Italy, everything will change in Europe, starting from tomorrow,&#8221; he added. 
In the United Kingdom, the 6-week-old Brexit Party led by Nigel Farage, had a comfortable victory, securing a majority with 31.7% and 29 seats. Farage called the results &#8220;one hell of an achievement.&#8221;
In an <a href="https://metro.co.uk/2019/05/27/nigel-farage-become-prime-minister-brexit-party-9695684/">interview</a>, Farage said if the U.K. does not leave the European Union by October 31, his party will &#8220;go on to a general election and stun everybody there too.&#8221;
Farage repeated his warning on Twitter. &#8220;Never before in British politics has a party just 6 weeks old won a national election,&#8221; he wrote. &#8220;If Britain does not leave the EU on October 31, these results will be repeated at a general election. History has been made. This is just the beginning.&#8221;
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Never before in British politics has a party just 6 weeks old won a national election.
If Britain does not leave the EU on October 31st, these results will be repeated at a general election.
History has been made. This is just the beginning.<a href="https://t.co/J7xqwdwZin">pic.twitter.com/J7xqwdwZin</a>
&#8212; Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) <a href="https://twitter.com/Nigel_Farage/status/1132794993758941185?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 26, 2019</a></blockquote>
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In France, Marine Le Pen&#8217;s far-right and anti-EU National Right party performed worse than it had in 2014, but still managed to win 22 seats. Le Pen&#8217;s party slightly outperformed President Emmanuel Macron&#8217;s party, which won 21 seats.
&#8220;The French people have clearly punished the president tonight, and taught him a lesson in humility,&#8221; said Jordan Bardella, the 23-year-old who led the party&#8217;s list. &#8220;Tonight, it&#8217;s him and his policies who have been rejected.&#8221;
Macron&#8217;s party did not frame the results as a loss and instead pointed to the environmental Green party making gains as encouraging. 
&#8220;It is clear from this result that the environment is a real concern for the French people,&#8221; said Amélie de Montchalin, the secretary of state for European affairs, according to <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/france-far-right-beats-emmanuel-macron-green-surge/">Politico</a>. &#8220;The president made it the first priority of the Renaissance list, and we will be able to work with the Greens.&#8221;
German Chancellor Angel Merkel&#8217;s coalition, concerned about the results, is holding &#8220;crisis talks&#8221; on Monday, reported <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/20190527-merkels-coalition-crisis-talks-after-eu-vote-debacle">France 24</a>. Merkel&#8217;s coalition was given their worst score in European election history due to the environmental party, the Greens, receiving significant support.
Voter turnout from the 2014 election to this year&#8217;s election was reportedly up from 43% to 51%. 
Pope Francis expressed his concerns about the results of the elections and warned against fearing migrants. 
&#8220;The signs of meanness we see around us heighten our fear of &#8216;the other&#8217;, the unknown, the marginalized, the foreigner,&#8221; he <a href="https://www.straitstimes.com/world/europe/pope-francis-sounds-racism-alarm-as-eu-nationalists-win-big">said</a> on Monday, which also happens to be the World Day of Migrants and Refugees.
&#8220;To some extent, the fear is legitimate, also because the preparation for this encounter is lacking,&#8221; the Pope said of Europe&#8217;s approach to the migrant issue. &#8220;But the problem is not that we have doubts and fears. The problem is when they condition our way of thinking and acting to the point of making us intolerant, closed and perhaps even &#8211; without realising it &#8211; racist.&#8221;

EU Elections: Nationalists And Euroskeptics Are Here To Stay

European Union

Nigel Farage

Following the French election, the majority of French Jews <a href="https://www.algemeiner.com/2017/05/07/french-jews-relieved-by-le-pen-election-defeat-still-cautious-about-future/">took</a> a sigh of relief when Emmanuel Macron defeated Marine Le Pen. A staggering 90% of the French Jewish community opposed <a href="http://www.dailywire.com/news/10983/marine-le-pen-takes-enormous-lead-french-polls-joshua-yasmeh">Le Pen</a>, whose father was a known Holocaust denier. Le Pen won <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/62d782d6-31a7-11e7-9555-23ef563ecf9a">34% of the votes</a> throughout the country. The Jewish People Policy Institute in Jerusalem mentioned that while French Jews were happy that Macron won, the majority remained skeptical of their safety in France.
Over the past few years, tens of thousands of French Jews <a href="http://forward.com/news/breaking-news/328789/the-real-reason-french-jews-are-leaving-france-in-record-numbers/">left</a> the country to make aliyah to Israel following a series of anti-Semitic incidents and terrorist attacks that rocked the French nation. The most infamous cases of anti-Semitic violence included a <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-17426313">massacre</a> at a Jewish school in Toulouse and the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/paris-kosher-market-seized-in-second-hostage-drama-in-nervous-france/2015/01/09/f171b97e-97ff-11e4-8005-1924ede3e54a_story.html?utm_term=.5425b2f28fb7">shooting</a> in the kosher Hyper Cacher grocery store following the Charlie Hebdo massacre. More recently, French Jews have nearly had their <a href="http://www.dailywire.com/news/13841/attackers-try-saw-jews-fingers-paris-suburb-hank-berrien">fingers sawed off</a> by attackers and an Orthodox Jewish woman was <a href="http://www.dailywire.com/news/15202/orthodox-jewish-woman-paris-stabbed-thrown-out-hank-berrien">stabbed and thrown out a window</a> as late as April. Following the election, Macron&#8217;s offices were defaced with anti-Semitic graffiti.
Enter <a href="http://www.dirshu.org/">Dirshu</a>, a Jewish educational organization that has more than 50 centers in the United States that represent a support system for Jews to provide opportunities for them to study and nourish their souls. On May 15, members of the group will travel to Israel before heading to France on a goodwill mission to give support to the French Jewish community. Once they arrive in Israel, they will meet with French Member of Parliament <a href="http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/139039/netanyahu-meyer-habib-france">Meir Habib</a>, the first observant Jew to hold office in the French National Assembly.
Dirshu will then travel to France along with Habib to meet with several government officials, the head of security for one of the Jewish communities in France, and various student groups to let them know that they are available to support them. In light of the troubling times in France, their goal is to give French Jews a sense of security that the Jewish communities will remain empowered and safe. The goal is to lend faith and hope to French Jewry and to encourage Macron to bring positive change to that community.
Dirshu&#8217;s American spokesman Pesach Tropper spoke with The Daily Wire to explain why it is important for Dirshu to lend support to the French Jewish community and why Americans should pay attention as well:
<blockquote>
After we were attacked on 9/11 it meant a lot to Americans when other countries showed us their support. When a community is going through a tough time, it is good to know others in the world care about you.
</blockquote>
In times like these, just a singular gesture of goodwill will give comfort to a community that needs it most. While it remains unknown as to what Macron&#8217;s tenure as President will mean for the French Jewish community and for France as a whole, it is encouraging to see that the Jewish people are coming together to take the darkness and bring it into the light.
Follow Elliott on <a href="https://twitter.com/ElliottRHams">Twitter</a> and <a href="https://www.facebook.com/ElliottRHams/">Facebook</a>

Jewish Organization Dirshu Goes On Goodwill Mission to France

Anti-Semitism

Jews

On Sunday, Emmanuel Macron was elected as the youngest president of France. At just 39 years old, Macron will replace unpopular socialist president Francois Hollande. Some have called the fresh-faced Macron France&#8217;s JFK. Others have called him France&#8217;s Obama due to his oratorical gifts. To his critics, particularly those who supported his challenger Marine Le Pen, Macron is a &#8220;globalist&#8221; sellout who will give France on a silver platter to Islamist forces.
So what&#8217;s the truth?
Here are five things you need to know about the new president of France:
1. U.S. media outlets have characterized Macron as a &#8220;centrist.&#8221; The truth is more complicated than that. Before running for president, Macron served as the economy minister (August 2014 &#8211; August 2016) for the socialist government of Prime Minister Manuel Valls and President Hollande. But given widespread discontent with the country&#8217;s current government, Macron, who had never before held public office, decided to rebrand himself as a &#8220;centrist,&#8221; a healthy medium between the leftist disappointment of Holland and the (European-style) rightist immigration policies of Le Pen. (It&#8217;s worth noting that on economic policy, Macron is to the right of Le Pen. Le Pen favors a large welfare state as part of a larger project of economic nationalism).
To top off the rebranding, Macron founded his own political party called &#8220;En Marche,&#8221; or &#8220;Forward.&#8221; Tapping into his experience as an investment banker, Macron campaigned for looser regulations on businesses, lower taxes, and stronger free-trade agreements. It&#8217;s unclear how Macron will govern, however. Previous French presidents, including Jacques Chirac and Nicholas Sarkozy, promised fiscal reform but quickly discovered that labor unions, entrenched bureaucracy, and the French social model of &#8220;equality&#8221; served as formidable obstructions against expanding the free market.
2. Macron is staunchly pro-Europe. The new president is an invariable Europhile, but has expressed a willingness to push for reforms. With the United Kingdom on its way out of Europe, Macron has had to concede some ground to Euroskeptics (like Le Pen) who have begun to beat the drums of Frexit.
As The Guardian <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/09/emmanuel-macron-france-reform-eu-britain">notes</a>, the election of &#8220;liberal centrist&#8221; Macron &#8220;committed to a less austerity-driven eurozone and refusing to reimpose internal borders with EU partners, [is] an event of continent-wide significance. Macron&#8217;s desire to reform the EU to make it work better may seem &#8216;Anglo-Saxon&#8217; in some ways.&#8221;
And still, Macron is quite comfortable with the European bureaucrats in Brussels. Indeed, he was supported by world leaders (including German Chancellor Angela Merkel, former U.S. President Barack Obama, and former Republican French presidential candidate Francois Fillon), who were committed to the preservation of the liberal international order and the institutions it fostered. 
3. Macron is a foreign policy novice. The young rising star has spent most of his life in finance. In fact, Macron&#8217;s work as a civil servant, namely his job as an economy minister, entailed dealing with matters related to domestic politics. With little experience on the world stage, Macron may experience a sharp learning curve ahead of the NATO summit in Brussels on May 25.
During the presidential campaign, Macron&#8217;s inexperience was evident to voters as he stumbled on questions of great importance to European geopolitics.
&#8220;But the list of Macron&#8217;s advisers on security and foreign affairs read less like a guerrilla army and more like a who&#8217;s who of the French policy establishment,&#8221; <a href="http://www.politico.eu/article/emmanuel-macrons-foreign-policy-doctrines/">explains</a> Politico, before noting that Macron&#8217;s foreign policy team largely failed to impress enough knowledge on the young politician before sending him to the lion&#8217;s den to face off in a series of debates against a more polished Marine Le Pen.
Politico <a href="http://www.politico.eu/article/emmanuel-macrons-foreign-policy-doctrines/">reports</a>:
<blockquote>
Despite the marquee names, the foreign policy group was widely seen by those who participated in meetings as something of a failure, with many saying it contributed to Macron&#8217;s poor performance during the foreign policy segments of the debates. Alarm bells rang after that,&#8221; said a senior campaign adviser. &#8220;But little was done to change things.&#8221; Twice, a major foreign policy interview was scheduled with a newspaper, only to be canceled, with sources suggesting the team wasn&#8217;t confident enough to carry it through&#8230;
&#8220;Ask him what the new pensions regime will be and he would explain it in five minutes &#8212; beautifully and luminously,&#8221; said [François Heisbourg, chairman of the council of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, who has been advising Macron on defense and security]. &#8220;But ask him what his policy is on Syria and he will line up sentence after sentence and speak for fifteen minutes in a way that people will have difficulty understanding. It shows on television. But this doesn&#8217;t worry me &#8212; it&#8217;s called the learning curve.&#8221;
Given the new president&#8217;s relative unfamiliarity with the issues, Macron&#8217;s foreign policy is expected to be heavily shaped by his foreign minister. He has as yet to make a decision on who will be his man in the Quai d&#8217;Orsay. Who is eventually selected will depend on the coming June legislative elections, sources said.
</blockquote>
Nonetheless, Macron is expected to take a stronger stance than Le Pen against Russia. Le Pen, who argued for rapprochement with an increasingly aggressive and imperialist-minded Vladimir Putin, was quietly supported by Kremlin insiders. In fact, Russian hackers are believed to have targeted Macron&#8217;s largely innocuous emails just days before Sunday&#8217;s election. In contrast to Macron, Le Pen has called for a reconsideration of NATO commitments, expressing skepticism about U.S.-French security cooperation.
4. Macron has sent mixed signals about France&#8217;s Muslim immigration question. Over the last two years, France has fallen victim to a large number of Islamic terrorist attacks. Some attacks were initiated by French-born, second generation, young Muslim men who have failed to assimilate properly and adopt Western values. Others, particularly sexually-based attacks, were initiated by asylum-seekers and refugees from majority-Muslim countries. These incidents have only compounded France&#8217;s cultural fears and anxieties about the country&#8217;s changing demographics, prompting a voter demand for alternative choices to the political establishment.
With a weak national security infrastructure, lax immigration policies, and a judicial system obsessively committed to &#8220;liberty&#8221; at the expense of common sense, France has left itself vulnerable to terrorist attacks. The fact is, many of the men who have carried out terrorist attacks were already being monitored by the French police. That means that many lethal attacks were preventable.
While Macron has sought to address these glaring security failures, he has also paid lip service to failed European multiculturalism, often emphasizing tolerance toward Muslim migrants over well-planned policy solutions to France&#8217;s dire security issues.
In an April interview with RTL, France&#8217;s most popular radio station, Macron said &#8220;<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/04/23/the-leading-french-presidential-candidates-emmanuel-macron-and-marine-le-pen-in-their-own-words/?utm_term=.737b3a760f44" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">The zero-risk option doesn&#8217;t exist</a>,&#8221; insisting that any potential solution to the terror threat involves costs and benefits.
5. Macron married his high school drama teacher, a woman who is 24 years his senior. Brigitte Trogneux, the soon-to-be first lady of France, is 64 years old. Macron is just 39, making him the youngest person to every occupy the office of the French presidency. &#8220;In a book called Emmanuel Macron: A Perfect Young Man, French journalist Anne Fulda says that Macron was 15 when he met Trogneux. Macron vowed to marry her at 16,&#8221; <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/articles/2017-05-07/10-things-to-know-about-emmanuel-macron">reports</a> USA Today. &#8220;After Trogneux&#8217;s relationship with her first husband ended, the pair married in 2007.&#8221;

5 Things You Need To Know About New President Of France Emmanuel Macron

Francois Hollande

En Marche&#8217;s Emmanuel Macron will be the next president of France. After a contentious first round, which led to a run-off vote, Macron secured more than enough votes Sunday to win the second-run elections against former National Front leader Marine Le Pen. It wasn&#8217;t even close. In fact, Macron slightly outperformed the polls, winning a whopping 65.1% of the vote against Le Pen&#8217;s measly 34.9%. Macron&#8217;s huge victory comes one day after the 39-year-old&#8217;s campaign team alleged that it had been the victim of a massive cyber attack. 
&#8220;The En Marche! Movement has been the victim of a massive and co-ordinated hack this evening which has given rise to the diffusion on social media of various internal information,&#8221; read a <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-election-macron-leaks-idUSKBN1812AZ">statement</a> released by Macron&#8217;s self-founded political party. Early indications suggest that Russia may have been behind the attack. In an effort to undermine pro-NATO, pro-European Union candidate Macron, Russian hackers may have leaked Macron&#8217;s largely innocuous emails. Le Pen placed rapprochement and better relations with Russia at the centerpiece of her foreign policy campaign, drawing quiet support from Kremlin officials. 
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<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/BREAKING?src=hash">#BREAKING</a> &#8211; Emmanuel <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Macron?src=hash">#Macron</a> elected president of France (with 65.1% of the vote) <a href="https://t.co/4Vod8NNBm4">pic.twitter.com/4Vod8NNBm4</a>
&#8212; FRANCE 24 English (@France24_en) <a href="https://twitter.com/France24_en/status/861279279996391426">May 7, 2017</a></blockquote>
While the numbers are currently in flux, they will likely stick relatively closely to what has been initially reported.
Le Pen <a href="http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/ct-france-presidential-election-20170507-story.html">conceded</a> defeat shortly after the polls closed, suggesting that the country has &#8220;chosen continuity&#8221; over radical change.
As The Daily Wire <a href="http://www.dailywire.com/news/15701/does-le-pen-really-have-chance-winning-france-joshua-yasmeh">noted</a> after the first round runoff election on April 23, dark horse Le Pen&#8217;s probability of winning was quite low, if not negligible.
With just two candidates remaining in the running, Macron was always expected to secure a double-digit victory. Nearly every poll across Europe had him at at least 60%.
For example, here&#8217;s the Ipsos poll from April 23:
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First Ipsos poll on the second round: 
62% Macron 
38% Le Pen
&#8212; Frederik Ducrozet (@fwred) <a href="https://twitter.com/fwred/status/856238543840178178">April 23, 2017</a></blockquote>
The Ipsos poll was within the margin of error, in terms of accuracy. 
While it&#8217;s true that pollsters got both Donald Trump&#8217;s unexpected presidential victory and Brexit wrong, that never meant that history would repeat itself in France.
With Le Pen dealt a stinging defeat, the powerful winds of populism didn&#8217;t cross the English Channel and hit French shores.
&#8220;A Macron victory would mark the third time in six months &#8212; following elections in Austria and the Netherlands &#8212; that European voters have shot down far-right populists who want to restore borders across Europe,&#8221; <a href="http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/ct-france-presidential-election-20170507-story.html">reports</a> The Chicago Tribune. &#8220;The victory of a candidate &#8212; Macron &#8212; who championed European unity could strengthen the EU&#8217;s hand in its complex divorce proceedings with Britain, which voted last year to leave the bloc.&#8221;
For now, Le-Pen&#8217;s brand of welfare-state promoting, xenophobic far-right European populism (<a href="http://www.dailywire.com/news/4057/european-far-right-nationalism-rises-against-joshua-yasmeh">not to be confused with American conservatism</a>) and Euro-skepticism has been stopped in its tracks, waiting to fight another day in the years to come. 
&#8220;Many French voters backed Macron reluctantly, not because they agreed with his politics but simply to keep out Le Pen and her far-right National Front party, still tainted by its anti-Semitic and racist history,&#8221; <a href="http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/ct-france-presidential-election-20170507-story.html">adds</a> the Tribune.
If Macron fails to stabilize the economy, build a strong coalition and fortify France&#8217;s national security infrastructure against Islamic terrorist attacks, then Le Pen&#8217;s popularity will only surge, giving her a realistic shot at unseating him in five years (French presidential elections used to be held every seven years. Now, they&#8217;re held every five years). 
Notably, Le Pen&#8217;s performance so far has taken the far-right National Front mainstream, a political feat inconceivable last election cycle. Even if she loses (and all indications suggest that she likely will lose in a landslide), Le Pen and her opposition movement (anti-Islamist, anti-immigrant, anti-EU, anti-globalization, anti-trade) won&#8217;t be going anywhere anytime soon. The National Front has shown that it could compete at the highest level of French electoral politics, thanks in large part to the refugee and terrorism crises plaguing the country.
This isn&#8217;t to say, however, that this election was simply about immigration. In fact, most voters listed economic concerns as their top priority.
In a battle between Le Pen&#8217;s socialist-inspired economic nationalism and Macron&#8217;s European-minded globalization, the latter ultimately won out.
A supporter of free trade, Macron &#8220;promised to cut corporate tax rates gradually to 25% from the current 33%,&#8221; according to CNN Money. &#8220;He also wants to slash local housing taxes for the majority of French people.&#8221;
&#8220;He has pledged to cut public spending by &#8364;60 billion ($64 billion) a year, partly by making the government more efficient,&#8221; <a href="http://money.cnn.com/2017/04/23/news/economy/french-election-macron-le-pen-eu-nationalist/">adds</a> CNN. &#8220;He said he would cut up to 120,000 government employees by not filling positions as workers retire.&#8221;
In his victory speech on Sunday, Macron embraced his &#8220;En Marche,&#8221; or &#8220;forward,&#8221; message, declaring that &#8220;a new page of our longer history is turned&#8221; in France.
We&#8217;ll have to wait and see how that translates into economic, immigration, and national security policy.

Macron Wins French Presidential Election In Massive Landslide Against Le Pen. It Wasn’t Even Close.

Some have called centrist French candidate Emmanuel Macron France’s Barack Obama. But that characterization doesn’t seem all that accurate given Macron’s lack of support among the French youth. Whereas Obama galvanized millions, perhaps slightly naïve young people to rally around the banner of Hope and Change, Macron has largely failed to capture the imagination of young voters.
At just 39, Macron would be the youngest person to ever occupy the office of the French presidency. And yet, despite his young age, polls indicate that he’s losing to rival Marine Le Pen when it comes to younger voters. Macron appears to holding a lead overall because the WWII generation fears the rise of a far-right populist leader:
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Seems like Le Pen would be at roughly Trump levels of support without the WWII generation:<a href="https://t.co/6Pbq4JHPqW">https://t.co/6Pbq4JHPqW</a>
— Ross Douthat (@DouthatNYT) <a href="https://twitter.com/DouthatNYT/status/859875292927721472">May 3, 2017</a></blockquote>
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In addition, Le Pen enjoys an advantage with demographic groups traditionally sympathetic to populist movements. According to the latest IFOP French poll, Le Pen wins 55% among lowest educated group:
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1/ Crosstabs from latest IFOP French poll of interest. Strict education break: LePen wins 55 among lowest educated group (&lt;baccalaureate).
— Henry Olsen (@henryolsenEPPC) <a href="https://twitter.com/henryolsenEPPC/status/859872870851383296">May 3, 2017</a></blockquote>
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However, the former National Front leader appears to be out of favor with the most educated elements of the population.
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2/ and 50% among only baccalaureates. But drops to 19 and 18% among most educated.
— Henry Olsen (@henryolsenEPPC) <a href="https://twitter.com/henryolsenEPPC/status/859873165744496642">May 3, 2017</a></blockquote>
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While Le Pen has steadily gained overall support since the first-round election, the latest numbers suggest that Macron still has a major advantage over his rival less than a week before the second-round, final election.
With voters set to head to the polls on Sunday, Le Pen trails Macron by nearly 20 points. Here are The Telegraph’s latest polling averages:
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If It Weren’t For Older People, Le Pen Would Win The French Election

The Harris interactive poll, which accurately predicted the results of the first round of voting for the president of France, announced new results on Monday in which National Front leader Marine Le Pen <a href="http://news.sky.com/story/marine-le-pen-gaining-on-emmanuel-macron-in-french-election-polls-10858899">gained six points</a> on En Marche candidate Emmanuel Macron. Macron had been enjoying a massive 34-point lead, 67%-33%, before the latest poll.
According to <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-39641442">BBC News&#8217;</a> composite of the five most recent national polls, Macron leads Le Pen 60%-40%.
But an additional factor is in play for Le Pen; the Harris poll was conducted prior to Le Pen&#8217;s announced alliance with right-wing Debout la France candidate Nicolas Dupont-Aignan, who finished sixth in the first round but could give Le Pen a 4.7% voting bloc. That prompted division in Dupont-Aignan&#8217;s own faction; vice-president Dominique Jamet <a href="http://www.lemonde.fr/election-presidentielle-2017/article/2017/05/01/apres-le-soutien-de-dupont-aignan-a-le-pen-defections-en-serie-au-sein-de-debout-la-france_5120521_4854003.html">announced his withdrawal</a>, tweeting, &#8220;Nicolas Dupont-Aignan supports Marine Le Pen. I leave Dupont-Aignan&#8217;s party.&#8221;
On Saturday, Le Pen and Dupont-Aignan released a joint statement with a modified manifesto, which included a less-strict promise implementing French membership in the EU.
Macron is polling best in western and south central France; Le Pen is strong in the northeast and along the southern coast.

Le Pen Gaining In France

French presidential candidate Marine Le Pen has announced that she will <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-39696861?ns_mchannel=social&amp;ns_campaign=bbc_breaking&amp;ns_source=twitter&amp;ns_linkname=news_central">step down</a> as leader of her National Front (FN) party. Le Pen told TV channel France 2, &#8220;This evening I decided to take my leave of the presidency of the National Front. I will be above partisan considerations.&#8221; Le Pen added that France is headed toward a &#8220;decisive moment.&#8221; Attempting to widen the range of her voters past the parameters of the National Front&#8217;s traditional constituencies, Le Pen <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/24/world/europe/french-election-macron-le-pen.html?_r=0">announced on television</a>, &#8220;Tonight, I am not the president of the National Front, I am the presidential candidate, the one who wants to gather all the French around a project of hope, of prosperity, of security.&#8221;
Le Pen also tweeted the news:
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&#8220;Je me mets en congé de la présidence du Front National : je ne suis plus que la candidate à la présidentielle.&#8221; <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/JT20h?src=hash">#JT20h</a>
&#8212; Marine Le Pen (@MLP_officiel) <a href="https://twitter.com/MLP_officiel/status/856574900697432064">April 24, 2017</a></blockquote>
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On Sunday, Le Pen won 7.6 million votes, the most ever for a National Front candidate. Positions taken by her party include drastically reducing immigration by implementing an immediate moratorium; &#8220;automatically&#8221; expelling illegal immigrants and cutting immigration to 10,000 per year; closing &#8220;extremist&#8221; mosques; stifling free trade; changing France&#8217;s relationship with the European Union; fixing retirement age at 60 and instituting a 35-hour work week.
Le Pen is facing a united front of foes across the political spectrum. France&#8217;s Prime Minister, Bernard Cazeneuve, urged voters to vote for Emmanuel Macron, who slightly bested Le Pen and will be facing her in a two-person run-off:
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BREAKING: French prime minister calls on voters to reject far-right leader Marine Le Pen in runoff and vote for Emmanuel Macron.
&#8212; The Associated Press (@AP) <a href="https://twitter.com/AP/status/856212073285660672">April 23, 2017</a></blockquote>
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Fox News contributor Nigel Farage, one of the leaders of the successful Brexit movement in Great Britain, tweeted:
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The entire global establishment are backing Macron in France. That should tell you everything you need to know. <a href="https://t.co/And0FW34wm">pic.twitter.com/And0FW34wm</a>
&#8212; Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) <a href="https://twitter.com/Nigel_Farage/status/856524869571416065">April 24, 2017</a></blockquote>
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On Monday, polls showed roughly 60 percent of voters would support Macron; less than 40 percent would vote for Le Pen. They are scheduled to debate on television on May 3.

BREAKING: Le Pen Steps Down From National Front

Sunday&#8217;s election was undoubtedly a win for the anti-elite populist, both from the left and the right. However, that doesn&#8217;t mean that second-place Marine Le Pen of the welfare-state friendly, hyper-nationalist National Front has a good shot at winning the presidency in the second-round of voting. She&#8217;s still a longshot.
In the first round runoff election, Le Pen obtained 21.3% of the vote, a couple points shy of Macron&#8217;s 24%. The French electoral system requires the winning candidate to secure the majority (as opposed to plurality) of the vote, so the two top vote-getters must face off again in a second-round runoff set to take place on May 7. At that point, either Le Pen or Macron will walk away with at least 50% of the vote and a key to the president&#8217;s office.
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In a crowded field of candidates, Le Pen may have been able to carry out an impressive performance, but a head-to-head runoff is a different beast altogether.
Already, Francois Fillon, the mainstream conservative candidate in the race, has conceded defeat, throwing his support behind Macron, despite significant policy differences with the former socialist economic minister.
There&#8217;s &#8220;no other option but to vote against the far right,&#8221; said Fillon during a concession speech.
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France&#8217;s Fillon concedes defeat, endorses Macron, says there is &#8220;no other option but to vote against the far right&#8221; <a href="https://t.co/vvXBTwKGMs">pic.twitter.com/vvXBTwKGMs</a>
&#8212; AFP news agency (@AFP) <a href="https://twitter.com/AFP/status/856222017602957312">April 23, 2017</a></blockquote>
The French political establishment is ardently opposed to a far-right populist candidate like Le Pen, imposing radical changes on the country. As a result, leaders from both the mainstream left and right will rally against Le Pen, consolidating their support behind centrist Macron.
It&#8217;s not surprising then that in a head-to-head election, Macron is predicted to win by double-digits.
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First Ipsos poll on the second round: 
62% Macron 
38% Le Pen
&#8212; Frederik Ducrozet (@fwred) <a href="https://twitter.com/fwred/status/856238543840178178">April 23, 2017</a></blockquote>
Hardcore National Front supporters and &#8220;anti-elite&#8221; populists are rejecting these projections, however, citing the egregious inaccuracy of polling data across Western countries, including the United States and the United Kingdom. While it&#8217;s true that pollsters got both Donald Trump&#8217;s unexpected presidential victory and Brexit wrong, that doesn&#8217;t mean that history will repeat itself in France.
It goes without saying that France is a different country. For months now, pollsters, demographers, and pundits have tracked Le Pen&#8217;s political insurgency with due diligence, registering the country&#8217;s widespread discontent with the ruling parties. It&#8217;s no secret that socialist French President Francois Hollande is widely unpopular. He knows that and his party knows that. That&#8217;s why he chose not to run for another term. 
Assessed together, these variables have allowed French pollsters to accurately predict the results of Sunday&#8217;s first round runoff. No, they didn&#8217;t say that Le Pen would lose in a landslide. They predicted an impressive performance, one that was underscored by the thousands of Frenchmen the National Front attracts at its rallies. 
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French polls were spot-on. 
Poll Average / Actual Result: 
Macron: 24 / 24 
Le Pen: 22 / 21 
Fillon: 20 / 20 
Melenchon: 19 / 20 
Hamon: 8 / 6
&#8212; Matt McDermott (@mattmfm) <a href="https://twitter.com/mattmfm/status/856463636272959488">April 24, 2017</a></blockquote>
And yet, given France&#8217;s runoff voting system, Le Pen is highly unlikely to pull a come-from-behind win out of her hat. Her chances aren&#8217;t good any way you slice it. But that doesn&#8217;t mean she doesn&#8217;t have her eyes on the next presidential election in 2022. If Macron fails to stabilize the economy, build a strong coalition and fortify France&#8217;s national security infrastructure against Islamic terrorist attacks, then Le Pen&#8217;s popularity will only surge, giving her a realistic shot and unseating him in five years (French presidential elections used to be held every seven years. Now, they&#8217;re held every five years). 
Notably, Le Pen&#8217;s performance so far has taken the far-right National Front mainstream, a political feat inconceivable last election cycle. Even if she loses (and all indications suggest that she likely will lose in a landslide), Le Pen and her opposition movement (anti-Islamist, anti-immigrant, anti-EU, anti-globalization, anti-trade) won&#8217;t be going anywhere anytime soon. The National Front has shown that it could compete at the highest level of French electoral politics, thanks in large part to the refugee and terrorism crises plaguing the country.

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Does Le Pen Really Have A Chance of Winning In France?

In a Monday segment examining the impact of Islamic terrorism on French voters’ political calculus, CNN’s Chris Cuomo described contemporary jihadist murders as “flurries of terrorist activity”.
Speaking with his colleague Christiane Amanpour, Cuomom was seemingly inquiring about <a href="http://www.france24.com/en/20170421-champs-elysees-attack-what-we-know">last week’s Islamic terrorist attack</a> in Paris, France, and its impact on yesterday&#8217;s French election:
<blockquote>“It was interesting that this first set of numbers seemed to reflect that those flurries of terrorist activity last week seemed to send a flight to a calmer head. Could’ve cut either way, right? It could’ve made people even more afraid [and] want something even more extreme.”</blockquote>
Amanpour’s response seemed to imply that Islamic terrorist attacks in large European cities amounted to a new normal across the continent. She also attempted to distinguish Islamic terrorism originating among European residents – which she described as “gangster neighborhood terrorism” – from those directed by ISIS abroad (emphasis added):
<blockquote>&#8220;Well here’s the thing. I know that every time something like that happens, we all go into a massive panic and a meltdown. But if you look at what happened in Britain, we had the same kind of maniac who mowed down people on Westminster Bridge, knifed a policeman to death, and then he was shot to death. It didn’t actually change the body politic here, people understood that it was limited, that we’re living in this era, right now. And as one of the French politicians said, we’re in an era now of sort of gangster neighborhood terror. Nobody believes that this was a planned ISIS attack. This man in France was known to the authorities, he was known to the authorities, he had threatened police before, and clearly people in France took it for what it was: scary, something that has to be sorted out, but it wasn’t a terrorist attack that affected the vote.&#8221;</blockquote>
<a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3801018/Terror-attacks-parcel-living-big-city-claims-London-mayor-Sadiq-Khan.html">Last September</a>, London&#8217;s mayor Sadiq Khan echoed Amanpour&#8217;s suggestion that Islamic terrorism amounted to a new normal across large Western cities, describing such attacks as &#8220;part and parcel of living in a big city.&#8221;
Opposition to the European Union was described by Amanpour as an “anti-Europe” position; she and other left-wing news media figures regularly use the terms “Europe” and “European Union” interchangeably.
Speaking on behalf of Europe, Amanpour said the continent wished to see Le Pen defeated.
Earlier in the segment, Amanpour described France’s National Front and its leader Marine Le Pen as “very, very far right, extreme right,” adding that it held a “barely concealed racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, anti-immigration” platform.
Amanpour seemed to draw from comments made by Hillary Clinton <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8rG1H2ZfAk">last September</a>, in which the former first lady described a plurality of then Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s supporters as generalized bigots: “They’re racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic, you name it.”
Amanpour and Cuomo both suggested a connection between the alleged bigotry of Le Pen and her supporters with the politics of Trump and his supporters.
<div class="embed video fluid-video">Both Cuomo and Amanpour neglect to qualify the terrorism in France and across broader Europe as Islamic.</div>
Weeks after last year&#8217;s presidential election, Amanpour <a href="http://www.dailywire.com/news/11062/amanpour-calls-media-jihad-against-trump-robert-kraychik">called for the news media to unify</a> in its opposition of the Trump administration.
Amanpour presents herself as a politically objective and non-partisan news media figure. CNN likewise presents itself as a politically-objective and non-partisan news media outlet, billing itself as &#8220;The Most Trusted Name In News.&#8221;
Follow Robert Kraychik on <a href="https://twitter.com/kr3ch3k">Twitter</a>.
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