EU’s future at stake as French race goes to runoff

PARIS — Centrist Emmanuel Macron and far-right populist Marine Le Pen advanced Sunday to a runoff in France’s presidential election, remaking the country’s political landscape and setting up a showdown over its participation in the European Union.

French politicians on the left and right immediately urged voters to block Le Pen’s path to power in the May 7 runoff, saying her virulently nationalist anti-EU and anti-immigration politics would spell disaster for France.

The absence in the runoff of candidates from either the mainstream left Socialists or the right-wing Republicans party — the two main political groups that have governed postwar France — also marked a seismic shift in French politics.

Macron, a 39-year-old investment banker, made the runoff on the back of a grassroots campaign without the support of a major political party.

With a wink at his cheering, flag-waving supporters in his election day headquarters in Paris, Macron promised to be a president “who protects, who transforms and builds” if elected.