France’s Glucksmann notched a crushing primary victory. But he needs more allies to win the presidency.

PARIS — Raphaël Glucksmann’s unexpectedly decisive victory in France’s center-left primary may have won him the backing and resources of the once-powerful Socialist Party, but the 46-year-old MEP needs even more support if he wants to drive his distinctly pro-European platform all the way to the Elysée Palace.

All recent polls show Glucksmann is trailing far-right front-runner Marine Le Pen and her two main challengers for a spot in the presidential election’s second round: the far left’s Jean-Luc Mélenchon and center-right former Prime Minister Edouard Philippe. Mélenchon and Le Pen both want to fundamentally alter Paris’ relationship with Brussels, while Philippe is campaigning mostly on domestic issues.

If he wants to win the presidency, Glucksmann, the leader of the moderate left party Place Publique, needs to woo several constituencies at once: the undecided left-leaning voters considering throwing their support behind Mélenchon’s surging campaign as well as the centrist voters already struggling to choose between Philippe and Gabriel Attal, the head of President Emmanuel Macron’s party.

“We’re still a long way from the final list of candidates, and the political landscape is far from set in stone,” said Socialist MEP Christophe Clergeau, who had backed Glucksmann’s rival Olivier Faure in the center-left primary. “It’s up to [Glucksmann] to build momentum, unite the Socialist family … [and] reach out to all left-wing voters to demonstrate his ability to be our camp’s voice.”

But Glucksmann and his allies are confident that his strong showing in the primary — he won more than 66% of the vote in the first round, more than four times as many votes as his nearest competitor — is a sign of good things to come.

“All the citizens of the left who came, voted, took part have given me tremendous hope,” Glucksmann said in his victory speech. “The result is indisputable: I am tonight the candidate of the democratic left.”

Aurore Lalucq, a fellow S&D MEP and co-president of Place Publique, said the result “isn’t far from a landslide.”

“There is no doubt that his platform is widely supported, and that gives us the strength to rally others behind us,” she said. “The ability to unite comes from strength.”

The next battle

Glucksmann faces stiff competition from Mélenchon and his party, France Unbowed, for voters who lean left.

Glucksmann has long refused to work with France Unbowed. He has accused Mélenchon of using antisemitic tropes — an allegation that the presidential candidate has denied — as well as being insufficiently supportive of Ukraine and too friendly with China.

Mélenchon has been courting support from the French Greens, whose candidate Marine Tondelier is struggling in the polls. Glucksmann is also eyeing support from the Greens, who have frequently teamed up with the Socialists in the past, including during the early years of François Hollande’s presidency.

Tondelier is extremely critical of Glucksmann for his refusal to associate with France Unbowed and participate in a primary contest featuring the party. Her party, however, is increasingly torn between pro-Mélenchon and pro-Glucksmann voices.

An individual close to Glucksmann, who was granted anonymity to discuss campaign strategy, said the MEP is looking to build new alliances and argued that the French Greens “are not limited to Marine Tondelier.”

Then there’s the elephant inside the Socialist room. Hollande, the party’s last president who was elected in 2012 but chose not to run for reelection five years later due to dismal approval ratings, has dropped several clues about his plans to run for president again. He refused to take part in his party’s primary — instead waiting to see if the winner’s campaign would flail, giving him an opening to step in.

Glucksmann said in an interview Monday that Hollande had called him to congratulate him on his win, but the former president has not made a public statement since the primary results.

“I’ve known François Hollande for a long time … I’ll take him at his word, that he was waiting to see how things would look at the end of the year, and that if the momentum around the party’s primary candidate was strong, he wouldn’t undermine that momentum,” said Loïg Chesnais-Girard, the president of Brittany who backed Glucksmann in the primary.

“The focus right now is on building that momentum. And then we’ll see how things play out,” Chesnais-Girard said.