French President Emmanuel Macron declared Monday that he wants to “convince' a broad range of French voters to back his centrist vision, kicking off a two-week battle against far-right challenger Marine Le Pen ahead of the country's presidential runoff vote.
Last Updated Monday, April 11, 2022 3:39PM EDT
The two candidates came out on top in Sunday's first-round presidential vote, setting up an April 24 replay of their duel in 2017. Macron trounced Le Pen five years ago in the presidential runoff but all opinion polls show the leader of the National Rally is much closer this time to a potential win. “I'm here, and I'm determined to fight," the 44-year-old president said during his visit to the town of Denain, adding that he has heard the concerns of people who struggle to find a job and earn more money.For her part, Le Pen met with National Rally officials to plan her strategy for the runoff and visited a cereal producer in the Burgundy region to speak about rising prices and making “strong, urgent decisions to protect the purchasing power of the French.
Many of the 10 presidential candidates who were defeated in the first round Sunday encouraged voters to choose Macron in the second round, including conservative candidate Valérie Pécresse and the Green and Socialist candidates. Pécresse warned of “the chaos that would ensue” if Le Pen was elected. “Now everything is possible,” said Aurélien Lopez Liguori, a councilor with Le Pen's party in the southern city of Sete, adding that, compared with 2017, “now Macron has a record, a bad record.”
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