France elects its president in two rounds: a crowded first round on April 18 cuts the field to the top two - no one will win outright - and the survivors meet again on May 2. Elabe has Le Pen at 34% to 35.5% in round one depending on who else runs, far clear of the pack, then beating every potential runoff opponent it tested. The new poll comes on the heels of a Nomura report which showed Le Pen with a commanding first-round lead. 

The rest of the field is fighting over second place. Édouard Philippe, the former prime minister and the most plausible face of the post-Macron center, leads that pack at about 17% when he stands alone. Jean-Luc Mélenchon is on 14% to 14.5%, having lost his summer lift. Raphaël Glucksmann, now in the race, is between 11.5% and 14%. Gabriel Attal's presence mainly splits the moderate vote.

According to the poll, here's Le Pen:

versus Philippe: 52.5% to 47.5%

versus Attal or Glucksmann: 57% to 43%

versus Mélenchon: 69.5% to 30.5%

For a generation, French presidential politics assumed a front républicain: a cross-party second-round squeeze that would keep the National Rally out of the Élysée. It elected Chirac 82-18 over her father in 2002 and Macron twice over her; yet the margin has narrowed every time. According to the Elabe poll, that squeeze is no longer automatic. Le Pen is not only first in April. She is ahead in May against every opponent Elabe put up. Even against Philippe, the closest of them, she leads by five points.

Le Pen's popularity has perhaps been boosted by her status as a martyr - created by what some might consider establishment efforts to throw her off track. On July 7 the Paris court of appeal upheld her embezzlement conviction in the European Parliament assistants case. It shortened the ban on holding office enough for her to stand and imposed a year of house arrest with an electronic tag. Her appeal to the Cour de Cassation freezes that sentence while she campaigns. The court has said it aims to rule before the first round. A confirmed tag would not take her off the April ballot. It would frame the May runoff. Le Pen herself has said she could not campaign tagged - though sentence remission could free her by early 2027 either way. Jordan Bardella remains the party's designated stand-in.

At the summer gathering of MEDEF (France's main employers' federation) at Roland-Garros on August 27 she set out a €125 billion savings path and a plan to let long-tenure workers retire at 60 to 62, costed at about €9 billion and described as a "societal choice." French banks are still wary of financing National Rally campaigns. On these numbers, voters are less so.

Bond markets are pricing the wider strain - as French 10-year yields have been near 4.1%, their highest since late 2008. The extra yield over German Bunds is about 80 basis points, the wide end of a 59-to-85 range over the past year. That premium reflects a hung Assembly, a government that has already stumbled on the budget, a 2027 finance bill due in October that may not pass in ordinary form, a deficit still near 5% of GDP, and IMF debt figures already around 118.5% this year and through 120% in 2027.