Basically, there are two radically opposed models. One, that of the left, nationalizes, and even personalizes the ballot excessively. It’s “all behind Jean-Luc Mélenchon”! The other, that of the Republicans, tries on the contrary to reduce the election to a purely local issue. In the first case, the watchword is therefore “Mélenchon to Matignon!”. A paradox, since the rebellious leader claims to restore Parliament with his Sixth Republic, and not only does he not appear in the legislative elections, but he presidentializes the deadline to the maximum. As if he wanted to take his revenge on his third failure in the presidential election last April.
He even tends to take himself a bit for the president. Wednesday evening, at a meeting in Paris, Jean-Luc Mélenchon launched: “In three weeks, if I am elected – although he is not a candidate, let us remember – Prefect Lallement is leaving!” Except that it is the president who appoints the prefects. On the proposal of the Prime Minister of course, but it is a prerogative of the Head of State.
First, avoid the demobilization of his supporters, and even create a dynamic. According to the polls, which should always be taken with caution, it works quite well. The left parties have only 70 outgoing deputies, including 17 rebellious, they can hope to double their quota. Beyond that, this strategy ensures the leadership of Jean-Luc Mélenchon on the entire left for the next five years. The downside is that this personalization can in turn arouse a mobilization of voters frightened by the prospect of Mélenchon’s arrival at Matignon.
The line therefore follows the exact opposite strategy. It has a hundred incumbents who mostly hide the logo of their party, the Republicans. They have no national leader to put forward. It is a purely defensive strategy. To save their skin, they rely on their notoriety, their local roots, sometimes playing with a certain ambiguity vis-à-vis Emmanuel Macron, not really for but not totally against either.
As for the majority, it adopted a half-way, very “at the same time” strategy. On the one hand, his main argument is institutional: the president needs a majority, whose face is very present on the campaign documents and who is starting to travel around the country again, Tuesday in Cherbourg, today in Marseille. On the other, the walkers rely on the establishment of their 300 outgoing new candidates. Not sure that this is enough to mobilize their voters.