Jean-Luc Mélenchon in the context of "2017 French legislative election"

Presidential elections were held in France on 23 April and 7 May 2017. Incumbent president François Hollande of the Socialist Party (PS) was eligible to run for a second term, but declared on 1 December 2016 that he would not seek reelection in light of low approval ratings, making him the first incumbent head of state of the Fifth Republic not to seek reelection. As no candidate won a majority in the first round, a runoff was held between the top two candidates, Emmanuel Macron of En Marche! (EM) and Marine Le Pen of the National Front (FN), which Macron won with a difference of more than 30% of the vote.

François Fillon of The Republicans (LR)—after winning the party's first open primary—and Le Pen of the National Front led first-round opinion polls in November 2016 and mid-January 2017. Polls tightened considerably by late January; after the publication of revelations that Fillon employed family members in possibly fictitious jobs in a series of politico-financial affairs that came to be colloquially known as "Penelopegate", Macron overtook Fillon to place consistently second in first-round polling. At the same time, Benoît Hamon won the Socialist primary, entering fourth place in the polls. After strong debate performances, Jean-Luc Mélenchon of La France Insoumise (FI) rose significantly in polls in late March, overtaking Hamon to place just below Fillon.

La France Insoumise (LFI or FI; [la fʁɑ̃s ɛ̃sumiz], lit. 'France Unbowed' or 'France in Revolt') is a left-wing political party in France. It was launched in 2016 by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, then a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) and former co-president of the Left Party (PG). It aims to implement the eco-socialist and democratic socialist programme L'Avenir en commun (transl. A Shared Future).

The party nominated Mélenchon as its candidate for the 2017 French presidential election. He came fourth in the first round, receiving 19.6% of the vote and failing to qualify for the second round by around 2%. After the 2017 French legislative election, it formed a parliamentary group of 17 members of the National Assembly, with Mélenchon as the group's president. In the 2019 European Parliament election in France, it won six seats, below its expectations.

Presidential elections were held in France on 10 and 24 April 2022. As no candidate won a majority in the first round, a runoff was held, in which incumbent Emmanuel Macron defeated Marine Le Pen and was re-elected as President of France. Macron, from La République En Marche! (LREM), had defeated Le Pen, leader of the National Rally, once already in the 2017 French presidential election, for the term which expired on 13 May 2022. It was a rematch of the previous presidential election. Macron became the first president of France to win a re-election bid since Jacques Chirac won in 2002.

In the first round Macron finished first with 28% of the vote, followed by Le Pen with 23%, Jean-Luc Mélenchon of La France Insoumise with 22% and Éric Zemmour of Reconquête with 7%. Valérie Pécresse of the Republicans received 5% of the vote and Anne Hidalgo, mayor of Paris and Socialist Party candidate, 2%. Both the Republicans and the Socialists, considered to be the dominant parties until 2017, received their worst results in a presidential election.