Biden looks to French elections to boost his political case — but it's complicated

WASHINGTON — As President Joe Biden faces increasing calls to leave the presidential race from members of his own party, he's sought to bolster his case for staying in by pointing across the Atlantic Ocean to another election that defied dire polling and panic on the center and left.

Speaking on MSNBC’s "Morning Joe" on Monday, one day after France’s right-wing National Rally party and its allies finished third in seats won in France’s snap parliamentary elections, Biden contrasted the French result with his own election this fall. The right lost despite leading after first-round voting and in public opinion polls.

"France rejected extremism," Biden said. "Democrats will reject it here as well."

Biden reiterated the point on a call with some of his biggest campaign donors and backers that same day, as a person on the call told NBC News. "One of the things that’s happening around the world is the extreme right, the extreme MAGA conservatives of France, the [Marine] Le Pen party and others, they're getting killed, they’re getting kicked because people are going, 'Whoa, we’re not going there,'" Biden said, according to the source. (His comment was first reported by The New York Times.)

But France's vote wasn’t as simple as the narrative Biden served up. The elections were a rejection of the far right but also of French President Emmanuel Macron and his centrist coalition. It’s the latest data point in a trend that is ricocheting around the world — one that experts say should have Biden very concerned. Voters, dissatisfied with the post-Covid economy and, in some cases, angered over influxes of immigrants, are dealing incumbents setback after setback at the ballot box.

And as Biden confronts intense political backlash