“This year I was attacked. Last year my bike was stolen, and even before that I was hit. So, it will be the National Front now. » At the Tub stop in the Europe district, in the heart of a priority district of Saint-Brieuc, a woman explains, with a serious expression, why she voted for the National Rally (RN) during the European elections. Has she always voted for the far right? ” No it’s the first time. I was on the left before,” assures this local resident.
An unprecedented RN vote in the neighborhood
Just like her, the inhabitants of the Europe district had voted overwhelmingly in the 2022 legislative elections for the Nupes candidate, Marion Gorgiard. Two years later, on the occasion of these European elections, the change of political color in the polling stations on the Mazier campus was radical: the National Rally broke through the ceiling, with a score of 30%, far ahead of the Socialist Party of Raphael Glucksmann.
There was so much mess.
Elections are certainly different. In 2019, Europeans had already seen Jordan Bardella’s list take the lead in this district, but not to these proportions. So how can we explain such a shift? “There was so much mess,” comments Mélanie, 37, referring in particular to the riots which shook the city, and more particularly the neighborhood with the fire of the MJC in the summer of 2023. I even know Arabs who vote FN! » She deplores the breakthrough of the RN in this “multicultural district”, while saying she regrets a time when “people spoke to each other more easily. »
“They vote to the far right because they see the landscape changing”
Nostalgia for a time “when there was more mixing” also runs through Elong, 38 years old. Left for his studies, this real estate agent returned in 2016 to the neighborhood where he grew up. His parents are from Cameroon, but he has always lived in France. Today he fears the victory of the RN: “Le Pen was the Nazis when I was young! Some will let themselves go if they win…” With machine-gun delivery, he delivers his analysis: “They vote to the extreme right because they see the landscape changing. We hear more foreign languages on the bus… But they don’t deduce the good things from it. »
Will this series of feelings be reflected at the polls on June 30 and July 7?
