French prime minister Gabriel Attal and far-right party leader Jordan Bardella clashed in a TV debate in which they presented radically different views of the European Union, ahead of the June 9 European Parliament elections, reports Swissinfo.
Accusations of lying abounded in a debate that held high stakes for both sides.
The eurosceptic National Rally (RN) party of Bardella and Marine Le Pen leads opinion polls by a huge margin, with as much as 33% of the vote, or about twice as much as what is forecast for Attal, and President Emmanuel Macron’s, centrist, pro-EU party.
The challenge for Attal, who stressed the benefits of the EU for French citizens, was to try and revert the polling trend.
The challenge for Bardella, whose party has often lost points in national elections, especially among older voters, because of its euroscepticism and doubts over its economic policies, was to prove its seriousness on those fronts – and to attack Attal and Macron on their track-record.
Throughout the debate, Attal aimed to show contradictions and loopholes in the RN’s EU policies.