The Le Pen Curse | Philippe Lemoine & Richard Hanania

Philippe Lemoine returns to the CSPI Podcast to discuss his prediction for the 2022 French Presidential election. This episode was recorded on April 22nd, two days before Macron’s victory on April 24th, because Philippe was so confident in his forecast that he didn’t think it was necessary to wait until after the election to discuss the results. 

He and Richard talk about the differences between French and American politics, right-wing ideology in France, class and age as predictors of voting for conservative candidates, and why Éric Zemmour’s campaign failed. They also discuss how best to think about the behavior of low information voters, why the far right doesn’t win French presidential elections despite strong anti-immigration sentiment among the public, and how people who criticize the Islamic veil are actually being PC. Philippe explains why Le Pen staying in politics means the Right can never win the French presidency, and the two conclude by discussing what to expect from Macron over the next five years. A transcript of some of the best parts of the conversation is available here.

Philippe Lemoine, “Will Zemmour Bring a Right-Wing Revolution in France?” 

Eric Zemmour, “Le Premier Sexe.” 

Simone de Beauvoir, “The Second Sex.” 

Sam Wang, “Why I Had to Eat a Bug on CNN.” 

Philippe’s tweets predicting the election:

https://twitter.com/phl43/status/1512550945309306885?s=21&t=GsfmAceOj5Sg2xuayZIWog



Sign up for CSPI’s Substack newsletter: https://cspi.substack.com.

Follow CSPI on Twitter: https://twitter.com/CSPICenterOrg.

Subscribe to our YouTube for video podcasts: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvs4ugq0xSvbvwArpFJG6gA.

Learn more about CSPI: https://cspicenter.org.