“Marine! Marine! Marine!” the room chants in one voice, before starting the countdown. The results appear on the giant screen: the RN is in the lead in the first round of the legislative elections. In Hénin-Beaumont (Pas-de-Calais), Marine Le Pen’s campaign evening capsizes.
Sitting in the first rows, a woman in her sixties holds back tears of joy. Her husband delicately places his hand on her shoulder, also moved.
She ends up shedding a few tears when the audience sings the Marseillaise.
The crowded room seems bewitched. In the background, a thirty-year-old in a white shirt and black tie frantically shakes the French flag which was given to him at the entrance.
At the very front, a two-year-old girl in a red dress is also waving her blue-white-red pennant, which she watches move above her.
“Bravo Steeve!” shouts a young woman when Steeve Briois, mayor of the town, appears, accompanied by Bruno Clavet and Bruno Bilde, respectively candidates in the 3rd and 12th constituencies of Pas-de-Calais.
The activists had barely sat down when the star of the evening, Marine Le Pen, who had been in the wings until then, came on stage. A few metres away from her, two men in their forties embraced vigorously, then listened to her with admiration.
Leaning on the bar, a man who is gulping down his champagne in large gulps reacts with loud cries when Marine Le Pen calls for the arrival of Bardella at Matignon: “Yeah!”, he shouts with his fist raised.
– “Take pictures!” –
“We want France!” shouts another, out of time, attracting the wrath of his neighbors who are all ears for their MP, who announces her re-election in the first round.
Her speech finished, Marine Le Pen provokes a movement of the crowd by going down to greet the public. Several people almost come across a lady in a wheelchair.
A little girl with a frilly blue-white-red headband, adorned with two small flags, approaches to within a metre of the MP.
“Marine!”, she says timidly, without managing to catch his attention. “Scream louder,” her sister tells her, before turning to a friend: “Grab my phone, take photos!”
Jean-Marie Le Pen’s daughter finally leaves the room, followed by a handful of supporters.
The others, encouraged by the magnitude of the victory, head towards the bar, where beers and glasses of champagne follow one another.
The absolute majority for the far-right party, everyone seems to believe it: at the gates of power, Jordan Bardella will have free rein, they want to believe.
In the room which is slowly emptying, the political leaders who appear on the giant screens are judged by the applause meter: boos for the members of the majority, loud applause – but less than for Marine Le Pen – during the speech by Jordan Bardella. Deep indifference for Eric Ciotti.
When Jean-Luc Mélenchon appears, a septuagenarian pretends to spit on the ground.
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