The far-right party of Marine Le Pen will for the first time in its history be able to form a parliamentary group in the French upper house, election results showed Monday, a political breakthrough just over half a year before presidential polls.
The National Rally (RN) of Le Pen and a smaller allied party will have a total of at least 15 seats in the 348-seat Senate, well over the minimum 10 members needed to form a political faction in the chamber.
Forming a group allows the RN to be present on the influential committees that thrash out legislation.
The Senate, which has been dominated by the right and plays a key role in legislation alongside the lower National Assembly, is not chosen by universal suffrage but by local elected officials.
The results from the weekend election were published as a new poll showed that Le Pen would not only be way ahead in the first round of voting in the presidential elections to succeed President Emmanuel Macron, but was also on course to easily win the Elysee in the second.
Local elected officials vote for new senators for half the upper chamber every three years, each to serve a six-year term.
The far-right party entered the Senate for the first time with two seats in 2014, when it was known as the National Front, and won three seats in 2023.
The nine seats won by RN candidates, coupled with the three of its ally Eric Ciotti's Union of the Right for the Republic (UDR) party, boosted far right's numbers in the Senate to at least 15, the results showed.
"This is a historic victory, and a major milestone with the formation for the first time of a group in the Senate," Le Pen said on X.
RN party leader Jordan Bardella, who is eyeing the post of prime minister if Le Pen becomes president, added that the results confirm "the momentum of our movement as we approach the mother of all battles -- the presidential election".
"If our compatriots so desire, we will very soon govern France," he said.
A new Toluna-Harris survey for RTL and M6 published on Monday showed that Le Pen was set to win around 35-36 percent in the first round of voting on April 18.
In the second round on May 2, she would easily beat hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) leader Jean-Luc Melenchon, if he made the run-off, and is also well ahead of centrist frontrunner Edouard Philippe, it said.
The right, led by the Republicans (LR) party, is set to retain its dominance in the Senate despite the loss of seats, according to the initial results.
The 77-year-old Senate speaker Gerard Larcher, France's constitutional number two who would take over as president were Macron to be indisposed, is expected to keep his post.
The LFI won its first-ever seat.
Le Pen's anti-immigration party emerged as the single largest party in the National Assembly after Macron called snap polls in 2024, though it fell well short of a majority.
The Le Monde daily described the Senate elections as a "warning", adding the polls showed "the extent to which the RN has established itself within our institutions in barely ten years".
"The far-right breakthrough was expected, and the result does not alter the Senate majority... Yet a new threshold has been crossed," it added.