'Without unity, we can't beat them'

MP seeks to rally French left for battle

- Angelique Chrisafis

At a busy market in Sevran, a low-income suburb north of Paris, the local MP, Clémentine Autain, was shaking hands and posing for selfies, arguing that only a left alliance could stave off the threat of a far-right president being elected in France in less than 18 months.

"The far right is high in the polls and riding an international Trumpian wave," said Autain, 52. "Without the left uniting behind a radical project, we can't beat them."

Autain, a regular face on TV whose Seine-Saint-Denis constituency is a leftwing stronghold, has announced she will run to be the presidential candidate for the left in a cross-party primary race next year.

Polling shows that Marine Le Pen's anti-immigration, far-right National Rally is the closest it has ever been to winning the presidency. Whether its candidate in spring 2027 is Le Pen (which depends on a January appeal trial after her conviction for embezzling European parliament funds) or her protege Jordan Bardella, the party is gaining ground amid voters' disillusionment with politics and anger at inequality, taxation and cuts to public services.

Autain said one elderly person had recently told her: "What this country needs is a French Donald Trump."

But Autain's conviction that the different parties on the French left - from radical left to centre - can overcome their policy disputes and personality clashes, take part in a joint primary race and unite behind a single presidential candidate is seen by some critics as a dream.