This weekend, there is a run-off election in France. Marie LePen is challenging Emmanuel Macron. And her two major weaknesses are painfully apparent. Jennifer Rubin writes:
The weaknesses of far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen were on full display on Wednesday in her nearly three-hour debate with French President Emmanuel Macron. Two issues in particular show how difficult it is for Le Pen to be a mainstream candidate: her close ties to Russia and her disdain for religious liberty for minority groups.
Her most glaring weakness is her alliance with Vladimir Putin:
Macron was ferocious on the issue, attacking Le Pen for attempting to soften her pro-Russian tendencies. He said Le Pen’s positions today are contrary to her party’s “historical positions” and noted her refusal to condemn the annexation of Crimea in 2014. On her outstanding loan, he went for the jugular: “When you talk to Russia, you’re talking to your banker.” He added, “As soon as there are important and courageous decisions that need to be made, neither you nor your leaders are there.”
Her other glaring flaw is her position on religious freedom:
Le Pen also tripped herself up while promoting her proposal to ban Muslim women from wearing hijabs in public, falsely declaring that any woman wearing the headscarf does so against her will. Among the many problems with such an edict is that it would ban all such religious garb in public. The Times of Israel reported that “her plans to curtail religious freedoms to counteract the presence of Islam in French society would mean a ban on wearing headscarves and kippahs worn by Jews, she has acknowledged. She invited French Jews to make that ‘sacrifice’ for their country.”
Unsurprisingly, that caused a furor in the French Jewish community. The Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France, which lobbies the government on issues of concern to France’s small Jewish population, endorsed Macron. That move divided the Jewish community, which includes some Le Pen supporters. (She has tried to appeal to them with her virulent anti-Muslim positions.)
Le Pen has made a lot of hay by appealing to her countrymen's darker angels. On Sunday we'll know how ultimately successful she has been.
Image: nbcnews.com
