France’s Macron and Le Pen Head for April 24 Election Runoff

(Left) French presidential candidate Marine Le Pen posing during a photo session in Paris on Oct. 20, 2021. (Right) French President Emmanuel Macron posing for a photo session in Paris on March 7, 2017. Joël Saget and Eric Feferberg/AFP via Getty Images

PARIS—French leader Emmanuel Macron and his strongest challenger, Marine Le Pen, qualified on April 10 for a presidential election runoff on April 24, pitting a pro-European economic left-wing liberal against a right-wing nationalist.

Ifop pollsters predicted a tight runoff, with 51 percent for Macron and 49 percent for Le Pen. In 2017, he won with 66.1 percent of the votes.