Would she call herself right-wing? "I'd feel as if I were betraying my nature, deep down," Marine Le Pen said, speaking to Le Monde in December 2024. If she had to choose, she would place herself "at the center": "We are less right-wing than the right on economic issues and less left-wing than the left on immigration: It's not entirely crazy to say that we hold a central position." Yet now, the leader of the far-right Rassemblement National (RN) party seems ready to go against her nature to seize power.

On Wednesday, October 8, Le Pen opened the door to a "governing agreement" if another dissolution were to leave her party with only a plurality in the Assemblée Nationale. Her offer could only be taken up by part of the Les Républicains (LR) conservative party, those willing to ignore what remains of the "cordon sanitaire" line that once precluded the right from allying with the far right.

For now, the RN has been careful not to spell out any details of this recruitment strategy. The party has not yet decided what the main lines of any future agreement might be, nor whether those who join it could continue to sit in the LR group, nor the threshold at which Bardella would begin conducting negotiations, as it could range from just "a few" missing seats, according to some, to nearly 60, according to RN Vice President Sébastien Chenu.

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