President Emmanuel Macron of France has won a second term, defeating the far-right leader Marine Le Pen in a close competition and becoming the first French president to be re-elected in 20 years.
Early projections showed Macron, a centrist, gaining 58.5 percent of the vote to Le Pen’s 41.5 percent. His victory was much narrower than in 2017, when the margin was 66.1 percent to 33.9 percent for Le Pen, but wider than appeared likely two weeks ago.
The contest hinged on economic issues, and Macron, distracted by his fruitless Russia diplomacy, seldom showed real concern for the financial difficulties many French have faced during the pandemic and the war.
But his promise of stability and his effective stewardship over the Covid-19 crisis appear to have prevailed over the strong temptation of an extremist lurch toward nationalism.
Le Pen, the leader of an anti-immigrant movement, tried to focus on economic policy in an effort to sanitize her image without softening her xenophobic program, and brought the extreme right closer to power than at any time since 1944.
The election has profound effects on the war in Ukraine. Le Pen, who owes millions to a Russian bank, is a longtime Moscow ally and heads a party hostile to NATO. European officials immediately expressed their relief after Macron’s victory.