An analysis of the voting patterns that barrelled François Hollande to victory on May 6 as the first Socialist president of France since 1995 shows that this overthrow was due in large measure to Muslims, who voted for him in overwhelming numbers.

The French vote marks the first time that Muslims have determined the outcome of a presidential election in a major western European country; it is a preview of things to come.

As the politically active Muslim population in France continues to swell, and as most Muslims vote for Socialist and leftwing parties, conservative parties will find it increasingly difficult to win future elections in France.

According to a survey of 10,000 French voters conducted by the polling firm OpinionWay for the Paris-based newspaper Le Figaro, an extaordinary 93% of French Muslims voted for Hollande on May 6. By contrast, the poll shows that only 7% of French Muslims voted for the incumbent, Nicolas Sarkozy.

An estimated 2 million Muslims participated in the 2012 election, meaning that roughly 1.7 million Muslim votes went to Hollande rather than to Sarkozy. In the election as a whole, however, Hollande won over Sarkozy by only 1.1 million votes. This figure implies that Muslims cast the deciding votes that thrust Hollande into the Élysée Palace.

Keep in mind that some fraction of the car-be-que demographic isn’t Muslim, but is Christian or animist black. The poll doesn’t ask about race or ancestry, just religion.

I’d point out that the neoconservative Sarkozy would have been re-elected if he’d done as well among National Front sympathizers as Hollande did among Muslims. In the two-man Presidential runoff, Hollande seems to have carried somewhere between 25% and 32% of National Front sympathizers. That’s a fairly big number in a close election.

This suggests that a broad Right coalition could win in France by downplaying neoliberal economics in favor of being the Core party.