What do gains made by France’s far right party mean for the country?

HARI SREENIVASAN:

Turning now to news from Europe, there was voting today in local elections throughout France, and early indications are that the far right, led by the National Front Party leader, Marine Le Pen, made gains, along with former President Nicolas Sarkozy's party.

To explain what happened and what it means, we are joined now via Skype from Paris by Eleanor Beardsley of NPR.

So, Eleanor, we usually wouldn't care about a local election or local elections in France. Why did this one become so interesting?

ELEANOR BEARDSLEY, National Public Radio:

That's right. This is a local sort of canton elections. And people usually don't go vote in huge numbers.

It became very interesting because the National Front, the far-right National Front Party, was in the lead.

And so the other two mainstream parties on the left and right became very scared and told voters, you have got to go out and vote, because, if you don't vote, that's a vote for the National Front.

And, actually, what happened tonight is, there was not this huge wave of votes for the National Front.

The lead party was Nicholas Sarkozy's mainstream conservative party. So, the French did go out and vote.

About 50 percent of voters turned out on the first round of this poll. And they voted in the mainstream conservative party.

In second place was the Socialist Party. There has been a lot of disenchantment with Socialist President Francois Hollande. And in third place was the National Front with about 24 percent of the vote. They still had a decent score.

HARI SREENIVASAN:

And so, on that decent score, is that motivated in part by some of the recent terror attacks or immigration policies? What's been happening?

ELEANOR BEARDSLEY:

Absolutely.

After the Charlie Hebdo attacks in January, the National Front says their membership doubled.

And I just followed a candidate with the National Front in the South of France in the port city of Marseille. And he says, the feeling of insecurity and the feeling of laxism by the other parties, that they don't control immigration and crime, has really increased their numbers.

But another thing that added to the National Front's success during this campaign is, there's a lot of disenchantment with both mainstream parties, that they're the same thing, that they don't really do anything.

And so people are looking for an alternative.

And Marine Le Pen, the new leader for the National Front for the last four years — she took over from her father — she's really changed the image of the party.

It used to be sort of like a good old boys club of these former Algerian war fighters, with roots in anti-Semitism.

She has tried to bring in a lot of women and young people. And she has to a big degree.

And the National Front did have big wins in municipal elections in 2014 and in the European parliamentary elections. So, they actually have 12 mayors governing in France.

And they're not just a scare tactics party anymore. They actually have people on the ground governing.

And she points to that now, and she says, we can change things in France.

HARI SREENIVASAN:

OK. So, does that mean that she has a better chance of perhaps becoming a presidential candidate in a couple of years?

ELEANOR BEARDSLEY:

That's always what is thrown around.

And she wanted — the analysts say she wanted to use a big win today or in these local canton elections to use it as a trampoline to launch herself to the presidency.

I don't think she's going to become president of France, no. There's too many people against her.

But they — they could make big inroads in municipal, in local elections. They could run towns.

They could run cantons. So, they could have a bigger and bigger influence. I don't think she's going to be elected president any time soon, though.

HARI SREENIVASAN:

All right, Eleanor Beardsley of National Public Radio joining us via Skype from Paris, thanks so much.

ELEANOR BEARDSLEY:

Thank you so much.