Tensions over race, religion in France's presidential race

PARIS (AP) — From attacks on “wokeism” to crackdowns on mosques, France’s presidential campaign has been especially challenging for voters of immigrant heritage and religious minorities, as discourse painting them as “the other” has gained ground across a swath of French society.

French voters head to polls on Sunday in a runoff vote between centrist incumbent Emmanuel Macron and nationalist rival Marine Le Pen, wrapping up a campaign that experts have seen as unusually dominated by discriminatory discourse and proposals targeting immigration and Islam.

With Le Pen proposing to ban women from wearing Muslim headscarves in public, women like 19-year-old student Naila Ouazarf are in a bind.

“I want a president who accepts me as a person,” said Ouazarf, clad in a beige robe and matching head covering. She said she would defy the promised law should Le Pen become president, and pay the eventual fine.

Macron attacked Le Pen on the headscarf issue in their presidential debate Wednesday, warning it could stoke “civil war.” But polls put Le Pen closer to Macron than she was in their last runoff five years ago. And in the first round, far-right candidates Le Pen and Eric Zemmour together collected nearly a third of votes.

France has no hard data on voters' race or religion because of its doctrine of colorblindness, which sees all citizens as universally French and encourages assimilation.

Le Pen’s National Rally party, formerly called the National Front, has a history of ties with neo-Nazis, Holocaust deniers and militias who opposed Algeria’s war for independence from colonial France. Le Pen has distanced herself from that past and softened her public image, but a top priority of her program is to prioritize French citizens over immigrants for welfare benefits, which critics...