Ever the political opportunist, Le Pen next began raising “security concerns” with regard to immigration issues, mostly focusing on French Muslims of North African origin. This successfully tapped into unresolved post-colonialist feelings of the white French populace regarding the Algerian War. And to shield herself from charges of outright Islamophobia, Le Pen couched her rhetoric in economic and political terms—and steered away from cultural identity. This was effective, and further broadened her political base away from the racist fringe and into to the bourgeois mainstream. A public opinion poll published in Le Monde newspaper found that 46 percent of French people agreed that Marine Le Pen is “the face of patriotic conservatives, with traditional values,” while a lesser 43 percent believed that she leads the “nationalistic, xenophobic extreme right” fringe party in France.

XREF: Connects to broader literature on far-right mainstreaming and 'respectability politics' in European populism.

Arsalan Iftikhar, Fear of a Muslim Planet_ Gl…, loc. 495