Wall Street Journal: “Our country is caught in a vice, held hostage between violence and powerlessness,” Le Pen said. “In six months, the French people will be able to choose a different path—one of authority and restored security.”
The approach has given Le Pen an air of inevitability as she pursues France’s highest office.
“It’s as if she’s at the office, already at the Élysée Palace,” said Adélaïde Zulfikarpasic, a pollster at the French polling firm Ipsos Bva.
Le Pen’s long-running focus on law and order, Zulfikarpasic said, allows her to position herself as a guarantor of stability when democracy itself is in crisis.
“People no longer have confidence in the state to ensure their protection and meet their needs. And she’s contrasting with that,” she said…