The center cannot hold: What the elections in France and the United Kingdom mean for America

Published June 21, 2024 6:22am ET



Summer’s here, and the time is wrong for voting in the booths. The personal ratings of British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and French President Emmanuel Macron have never been lower. The British and French economies are feeble, and Sunak and Macron’s parties are deeply unpopular with their publics. Yet both leaders have called snap elections in an attempt to head off challengers to their right. In both Britain and France, a centrist has set his party on the path to electoral destruction by popular demand. 

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