French presidential candidates Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen will advance to the second round of voting, according to initial projections. Macron, a liberal centrist, is projected to have finished with around 24 percent of the vote, while Le Pen, the far-right candidate, came in a close second with 22 percent of the vote. Le Pen has the support of Europe’s populists, and President Donald Trump tacitly backed Le Pen in an interview last week, calling her the “strongest” candidate.
The vote happened amid heightened security in France, just days after another terror attack in Paris resulted in the death of a police officer. As many as 50,000 police officers and 7,000 French troops were stationed at polling places nationwide. Read more at BBC NEWS.
{Matzav}
