Green party leader Marine Tondelier's jacket has become so famous that leaders of the left-wing Nouveau Front Populaire (NFP) alliance are struggling to meet discreetly with her this week. "We're looking for safe places," away from journalists, confirmed Tondelier, as the press has been tracking down left-wing leaders Manuel Bompard (LFI, radical left), Olivier Faure (Socialist) and Fabien Roussel (Communist) all over Paris. On the evening of the first round of the snap parliamentary elections, TV crews chased the armored car of the far-right Rassemblement National (RN) president Jordan Bardella, as if he were already prime minister. Since the NFP's victory in the second round on Sunday, July 7, the press' focus has shifted.

It all happened so fast! Two days ahead of the second round, Faure expressed doubt about their chances: "We don't believe in victory ourselves." The Socialists ended up doubling their number of lawmakers in the Assemblée Nationale compared to 2022. On Sunday evening at the Elysée Palace, even President Emmanuel Macron was stunned to discover that the NFP had won the most seats in the Assemblée, ahead of the presidential camp and the RN. The leaders of the NFP parties were also bewildered.

Taken by surprise, none of the NFP leaders considered proposing a "republican defense" government on Sunday evening. Their success was largely due to the strong barrier erected by the French to keep the far right out of power, but no one attempted to come up with a statement that would break free from the electoral coalition. At 8:05 pm, LFI leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon appeared triumphant, sounding like someone who had, alone, won an absolute majority, even though the alliance of some 182 elected lawmakers fell far short of the 289 threshold. "The whole program, nothing but the program." That's what the LFI members are constantly reminding us, sometimes getting carried away, as MEP Manon Aubry did on French television channel BFM-TV when she suggested to "repeal the pension reform" by "decrees" when in reality, such a reform would need a law.

After the TV appearances, the four party leaders – Tondelier, Bompard, Faure and Roussel – met late into the evening in a soulless room at the Socialist headquarters in Ivry-sur-Seine, a southern Paris suburb. They gathered round square tables in a private room, away from cameras. The main goal was to figure out how to govern alone, without negotiating a coalition with Macron's camp, by gathering votes text by text. This seemed unrealistic. Above all, they need to find a suitable candidate for prime minister as quickly as possible.

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