France’s Macron Appoints First Woman Prime Minister in Three Decades- Vigour Times

Ms. Borne is the second woman to become prime minister of France after

Edith Cresson,

who briefly held the office in the early 1990s during the presidency of Socialist leader

François Mitterrand.

She takes over from

Jean Castex,

a former member of France’s conservative party, who resigned Monday.

Five years of pro-business policies—from Mr. Macron’s loosening of labor rules to his reduction of unemployment benefits and taxes—have helped the French president secure strong support among conservative voters and the urban elite. But they have alienated middle- and working-class voters who mainly cast ballots for far-left firebrand

Jean-Luc Mélenchon

and far-right leader

Marine Le Pen

in the first round of France’s presidential elections.

Mr. Macron’s party is expected to win a majority of the National Assembly’s 577 seats because candidates from a newly elected president’s party usually ride his coattails to office.

The biggest threat to Mr. Macron’s majority, however, is now coming from leftist forces, some of whom backed the former investment banker when he was first elected in 2017. Earlier this month, Mr. Mélenchon reached agreements with the Socialist Party, the Green Party and France’s Communist Party to divy up district races across the country. That will give voters the choice of a single leftist candidate in the June election as opposed to the many leftists who appeared on the presidential ballot.

Polls show Mr. Macron’s recently renamed party, Renaissance, and its allies winning between 300 and 350 seats, compared with the 346 they currently hold. Mr. Mélenchon’s coalition stands to win 105 to 168 seats, while Ms. Le Pen’s National Rally could win 52 to 80 seats, polls show. The same polls indicate France’s conservative party, Les Républicains, garnering 30 to 48 seats.

Ms. Borne faces an uphill battle in uniting a country deeply divided along economic and geographical lines. The first challenge lies in demonstrating she has a different approach to governance than Mr. Macron, whose self-proclaimed “Jupiterian” style—a reference to the Roman god, in which he sought to remain above the fray and step in to impose order—has at times angered the public.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Europe’s plans to wean itself off Russian oil and gas have helped produce record-setting surges in fuel and food prices, squeezing France’s poorest households. Those economic pressures come three years after the yellow vest crisis, which began as a series of protests against the rising costs of fuel. The movement, in which demonstrators donned yellow high-visibility vests, morphed into riots that rampaged down the Champs-Élysées Avenue, leaving stores shattered, cars torched and the Arc de Triomphe defaced.

Mr. Mélenchon, who nearly qualified for the presidential runoff with 22% of the votes in the first round, isn’t running for a parliamentary seat. His coalition, however, is campaigning for a higher minimum wage and a price cap on essential goods. The issue of Islam’s place in French society will also loom large.

Mr. Mélenchon and others have repeatedly criticized Mr. Macron’s measures that they say stigmatize France’s Muslim minority community, one of Europe’s largest. Last year Mr. Macron’s legislative majority approved a bill that allows the government to close mosques and other religious organizations with limited judicial oversight.

The city council of Grenoble, in southeastern France, was expected to vote Monday on a proposal to allow women to wear head-to-foot swimsuits—dubbed “burkinis” by many French—at public swimming pools. French women would also be allowed to swim topless under the new rules.

The planned vote has angered conservative leaders and some members of Mr. Macron’s party, who say the swimming attire is a symbol of radical Islam and a threat to the nation’s republican values of liberty, equality and fraternity.

France’s ban on wearing headscarves and other religious symbols applies to civil servants inside government buildings and to students and teachers at schools, but it hasn’t been extended to swimming pools or many other public places. Most municipal pools in France currently require men to wear swim briefs and women to wear bikinis or one-piece swimsuits, citing hygiene and safety.

Éric Piolle,

Grenoble’s Green Party mayor, has defended the proposal, saying women should be free to wear whatever they want—for religious reasons or not—in public.

Mr. Macron, meanwhile, has tried to frame his next five years as a break from the previous term.

“The French people didn’t prolong my previous mandate,” Mr. Macron said in his inaugural address earlier this month. “This new people, different from five years ago, has given a new president a new mandate.”

Many French remain skeptical. According to a recent Elabe poll, 68% of French people believe Mr. Macron won’t change his style or method of governing during his second five-year term in office. About 89% of the supporters Ms. Le Pen and 78% of people who backed Mr. Mélenchon in the April elections say they expect Mr. Macron’s second five-year term to be a continuation of his first.

Write to Noemie Bisserbe at [email protected]