France’s far right gathers as Le Pen prepares her presidential campaign

Let's cross there now and bring in our reporter, Antonia Kerrigan, who's been following all of these developments. Now, Antonia, France's highest polling presidential candidate, Marine Le Pen, holding her campaign launch rally. Is it fair to say that she has a lot of reason to be confident? Yes. Well, it's fair to say she and her party are riding high. They've seen a bump in the polls since last Saturday, when, of course, protests degenerated in some places into vandalism and looting. They also claim, her leadership claims, that they have gained a 3% bump in membership figures. That's 5,000 people. It's not enormous in the grand scheme of the voting public. However, it's something that Marine Le Pen views as something of a vindication. she considers that French people who hadn't been perhaps affected by issues of public safety before had exited what she called a state of denial about these issues and she feels that her overall thesis has been proven right by what happened last weekend that although I should caveat that by saying of course yesterday protests across the country including here in Orléans came off completely peacefully with almost no issues getting out of control I should also say that the supporters of the national rally that we spoke to at yesterday's first day of the conference are extremely confident, feel that they are close to victory as they see it. Even though Marine Le Pen told her supporters to fight this campaign as though they were polling at 13 or 14 percent, not the more like 33, 34 percent where they actually are. Now, of course, this afternoon, we'll be hearing speeches starting at 3 p.m. from Eric Ciotti, who is a close ally, a dissident member of a four dissident former member of the Republican Party, followed by Jordan Bardella, who is their prime ministerial candidate, who has recently, as you say, just yesterday, been reelected as president of the party. coming back from a scandal in which an investigative media outlet, Mediapart, exposed him sharing anti-Semitic conspiracy theories by message in his younger years. He has come back from that and he considers this a characteristic show of unity from the National Rally Party. And then, of course, last but not least this afternoon, we'll hear from the presidential candidate herself, Marine Le Pen. Now, Antonia, the conference, party conference being held there has kind of brought the city to a standstill, hasn't it, such as the opposition to the far-right party? Yes, well, over the course of the weekend, it's still the case this morning, there are shops that have been boarded up. You see few people in the streets, apart from, of course, those 13,000, according to the authorities, 26,000, according to organizers, protesters, who marched through the streets of Orléans yesterday. there was of course an unprecedented police presence 3,000 members of law enforcement were present it's the first time a water cannon has ever been deployed to the city of Orléans I should say as far as we know it didn't need to be used at any point but nevertheless there was a huge amount of anticipation about how this could go the restrictions on traffic remain in place until 11pm this evening including bridges that are key arterial access points to the city which remain closed and the conference is being held in something resembling a watertight container security on entry is thorough even to the point and that's raised a lot of eyebrows to the point of drawing aside for further investigation women in attendance who are not wearing bras that's caused a lot of confusion and raised eyebrows as one wonders what exactly they're concerned about that but they're certainly concerned about their conference being affected, being disrupted or being attacked by members of the left. Such is the force of opposition and such is also the fear of the opposition to this party and this candidate, Marine Le Pen, who is, of course, Jean-Marie Le Pen's daughter. The National Rally, which is, of course, formerly known as the National Front, a party founded by, among others, a former SS officer. So that is the state of affairs in France today. It's extremely divided inside the conference. They're extremely confident outside the conference. They're extremely anxious and fearful of what that confidence could translate into for the country. Antonia, thank you so much for that update. Of course, we'll be checking in with you throughout the day.