European Parliament elections were held in France on 26 May 2019 (and on 25 May in parts of overseas France and for some nationals abroad), electing members of the 9th French delegation to the European Parliament as part of the elections held across the European Union. The election featured two major changes since the 2014 election: the return to a single national constituency and the increase in the number of French seats from 74 to 79 upon the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union. Officially, 79 MEPs were considered to have been elected, including five "virtual" MEPs who did not take their seats until the UK formally left the EU. The election featured 34 separate electoral lists, a record number at the national level.

It was the first national election in France since the election of Emmanuel Macron as president and therefore his first major electoral test, taking place amid dismal approval ratings. For his party, Nathalie Loiseau led the Renaissance list of La République En Marche!, Democratic Movement (MoDem), Agir, and the Radical Movement which ultimately arrived in second with 22.42% of the vote, behind the National Rally (RN) list led by the 23-year-old Jordan Bardella which received 23.34% of the vote, with a lower vote percentage but more overall votes than its 2014 result.

Turnout, at just over 50%, was the highest since the 1994 elections. Led by Yannick Jadot, Europe Ecology – The Greens (EELV) managed a surprise third-place finish with 13.48% of the vote, short of its score in the 2009 elections in which it also achieved a surprise result. At the same time, the list of The Republicans (LR) led by the 33-year-old Catholic philosopher François-Xavier Bellamy ended up with a historically poor result of just 8.48% of the vote and the loss of 12 MEPs despite expectations of a strong electoral dynamic created by Bellamy's selection as the party's lead candidate. Similarly, the results were also a significant disappointment for Jean-Luc Mélenchon's La France Insoumise, which fell far short of both its presidential and legislative results in 2017 with only 6.31% of the vote, narrowly ahead of the joint list between the Socialist Party (PS), Place Publique, and New Deal led by Raphaël Glucksmann (the first time in its history the PS did not lead an autonomous list), which managed to remain in the European Parliament with its score of 6.19% of the vote, slightly above the 5% threshold needed for seats.

Numerous other lists fell short of the 5% threshold, including Nicolas Dupont-Aignan's Debout la France (DLF) and Benoît Hamon's Génération.s, the scores of which (both slightly above 3%) nevertheless allow their campaign expenses to be compensated by the state. The two were closely followed by the centre-right Union of Democrats and Independents (UDI) led by Jean-Christophe Lagarde and the French Communist Party (PCF) led by Ian Brossat. The recently founded Animalist Party, an animal rights party, also created a small surprise with its score of 2.16%, comparable to some of the more prominent lists, despite its limited presence in the campaign. The only two notable pro-Frexit parties received 1.82% of the vote combined. Other lists included Urgence Écologie, consisting of several small green parties, led by Dominique Bourg (garnering 1.82% of the vote); Lutte Ouvrière with 0.78% of the vote; and a list of gilets jaunes which collected 0.54% of the vote.

Background Electoral system

Starting from the 2004 elections, France was divided into eight large regional electoral constituencies for the purposes of European Parliament elections with members elected by proportional representation. The electoral system changed ahead of the 2019 election, with broad support in the French political class for a return to a national vote. On 29 November, Prime Minister Édouard Philippe announced that all parties consulted except for The Republicans supported returning to national lists, and confirmed the intention of the government to prepare a bill to change the voting system to that end, which was officially unveiled on 3 January 2018, preserving the 5% threshold for representation and 3% for reimbursement of campaign expenses. The possibility of transnational lists following the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union was also considered. The return to national lists in effect benefits smaller parties which were previously disadvantaged by the system of large regional constituencies, while larger parties would win fewer seats.

The bill creating a single national constituency was approved by a vote the National Assembly vote on the first reading on 20 February 2018, and the Senate officially adopted the bill on 23 May 2018, which was promulgated on 25 June after its validation by the Constitutional Council.

Dates As the European elections are scheduled from 23 to 26 May 2019 and French votes are traditionally held on Sundays, the date of the 2019 European election in France was confirmed to be 26 May 2019. Declarations of lists and candidacies were to be submitted between 23 April and 3 May 2019, while voting in some of the overseas territories and for nationals in the Americas officially took place on 25 May 2019.

Number of seats On 23 January 2018, the European Parliament Committee on Constitutional Affairs adopted a proposal to reduce the size of the hemicycle from 751 to 705, splitting 27 former British seats between 14 underrepresented member states of which France was set to gain 5, increasing its representation from 74 to 79. On 7 February, the European Parliament voted 368 to 274 against the principle of reallocating British seats to transnational lists, though the idea's fate was ultimately in the hands of the European Council.

After the agreement on 10 April to postpone the British departure from the EU to 31 October, the participation of the United Kingdom in the European Parliament elections will mean that the number of elected MEPs will remain fixed at 74 until the eventual withdrawal of the UK. As a result, legislation to "provide for two phrases", one with 74 MEPs, and later with 79 in total, was tabled on 24 April; electoral lists will still require 79 candidates, of which 74 will take their seats immediately and the remaining 5 "virtual" MEPs upon the departure of the UK from the EU.

Broadcast campaign

The length of campaign clips for each list was determined by its declared support among national parliamentarians (senators, deputies, and MEPs), a change largely to the benefit of the governing majority at the expense of opposition parties.

From 15 April 2019, the Conseil supérieur de l'audiovisuel (CSA) ensured that all candidates receive a fair distribution of time in broadcast media, with the exact timing monitored by stations themselves and speaking time relayed every Monday until the elections. The campaign officially commenced on 13 May.

Televised debates Hamon appealed against his exclusion from the France 2 debate on 4 April on 27 March, questioning the choice not to invite him given the inclusion of other lead candidates; this came after the earlier non-invitation of Brossat and Lagarde. He was joined in his case by Philippot and Asselineau, with the Paris administrative court subsequently ordering France 2 to invite the three to its debate, judging France Télévisions's excuse that Hamon's views were sufficiently represented by the invitation of Glucksmann to have been insufficient.

France Télévisions contested this decision, and although the Conseil d'État ultimately ruled that France 2 was not obligated to invite the three, France 2 maintained its invitation out of courtesy. This first debate was watched by only 1.62 million viewers, representing an audience share of 9.8%.

On 9 April, just before the debate hosted by RFI and France 24, the RN announced Bardella would not participate in the debate, taking issue with its format and apparent lack of preparedness on the part of the hosts. As Mélenchon was unable to appear on the CNews debate on 10 April due to a planned campaign meeting, Adrien Quatennens was invited to take his place instead.

The decision to split the debate on 22 May, hosted by France 2 and France Inter, into two separate segments provoked consternation among those invited to the second part, as did the choice not to invite the lead candidates of three of the principal lists (Bellamy, Loiseau, and Bardella) but their party leaders (Wauquiez, Guerini, and Le Pen) instead. On 14 May, Brossat said he would file an appeal with the CSA to intervene in the debate, while Hamon castigated France Télévisions president Delphine Ernotte for the decision, with Lagarde, Dupont-Aignan, and Philippot also denouncing the arrangement. On 15 May, Hamon, Lagarde, and Dupont-Aignan held a joint press conference in front of the France Télévisions headquarters to announce that they would boycott the debate unless its format was modified, and Yahoo! later announced that the three would participate in a debate on its site before the debate that evening, hosted by Clément Viktorovitch. The LCI debate on 20 May was held in a similar fashion, with the first part dedicated to "small" lists and the later part of the evening reserved for the "main" ones.

Meanwhile, doubts about her performance meant Loiseau would not appear at the debate hosted by France 2, but rather Bayrou, while some considered inviting Canfin to the LCI debate. On 19 May, both Canfin and Loiseau demanded that the three final debates feature live fact-checking in spite of logistical difficulties.

Other events On 23 September 2018, the national congress of the Association of Rural Mayors of France (Association des maires ruraux de France, or AMRF) announced that they would refuse to directly transmit the results of the elections to the state on the night of the election to voice their discontent with the lack of attention given by the government to rural policy.

The 3 February 2019 edition of Le Journal du Dimanche revealed that Macron was interested in holding a referendum concurrent with the European elections on 26 May to conclude the grand débat national (great national debate) and end the gilets jaunes protests. The opposition, suspicious about the referendum's timing, expressed skepticism, and the idea also lacked support from members of the government.

Following the Notre-Dame de Paris fire on 15 April, several parties briefly suspended their campaigns for the European elections.

Outgoing delegation

The table below shows the composition of the delegation of France to the European Parliament as of 3 May 2019. MEPs marked with an asterisk (*) are not standing as candidates; those marked with two asterisks (**) are candidates, but only in a clearly non-electable position near the end of electoral lists.

Electoral lists Summary The table below is a summary of the main parties contesting the 2019 European elections in France. Party Lead candidate Outgoing MEPs Lutte Ouvrière (LO) Nathalie Arthaud French Communist Party (PCF) Ian Brossat La France Insoumise (FI) Manon Aubry Génération.s Benoît Hamon Socialist Party (PS) Raphaël Glucksmann Europe Ecology – The Greens (EELV) Yannick Jadot La République En Marche! (LREM) Nathalie Loiseau Union of Democrats and Independents (UDI) Jean-Christophe Lagarde The Republicans (LR) François-Xavier Bellamy Debout la France (DLF) Nicolas Dupont-Aignan National Rally (RN) Jordan Bardella The Patriots (LP) Florian Philippot Popular Republican Union (UPR) François Asselineau Other notable lists Urgence Écologie Dominique Bourg Animalist Party (PA) Hélène Thouy Alliance Jaune (AJ) Francis Lalanne

Lutte Ouvrière