By Elizabeth Pineau

PARIS (Reuters) – Leaders of France’s far-right Rassemblement National said on Monday their party would block any prime ministerial candidate from the left-wing New Popular Front, limiting President Emmanuel Macron’s options to resolve the country’s political crisis.

Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella, the political double team behind the Rassemblement National, met on Monday with Macron, who is trying to break the political impasse created by the early parliamentary elections he called in July that produced inconclusive results.

After their hour-long meeting, Bardella said the New Popular Front – a broad alliance of parties ranging from the moderate Socialists to Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s radical left-wing “La France Inconquered” – was a “danger” to the country.

Bardella said his camp would immediately issue a vote of no confidence against any left-wing prime minister.

“The New Popular Front, with its program, its movements and the personalities that embody them, represents a threat to public order, internal peace and, of course, the economic life of the country,” Bardella told reporters. “We intend to protect the country from a government that would divide French society.”

A Macron aide said the president could name a prime minister by the end of this week. But it remains to be seen whether the person he chooses – someone with the broadest possible appeal – will win the approval of parliamentarians. If not, Macron will have to start all over again, which would deepen the political crisis.

No group emerged with a majority from the early elections; the votes were evenly distributed between the New Popular Front, Macron’s centrist bloc and the Rassemblement National.

The New Popular Front received more votes than any other party and argued that its candidate, a little-known civil servant named Lucie Castets, should be made prime minister.

Castets told Macron on Friday that the left had the right to form the next government.

Macron ignored the nomination of the New Popular Front, and a source close to him said he believed the balance of power was more towards the centre or centre-right.

According to sources, among the possible candidates Macron is considering are conservative regional president Xavier Bertrand and former Socialist Prime Minister Bernard Cazeneuve. French media recently named Karim Bouamrane, the Socialist mayor of an impoverished Paris suburb, as another possible candidate.

Le Pen suggested that Macron could call a referendum to show a way out of the chaos. She said she was against a so-called “technical” government of apolitical technocrats because “behind technical names there are only political governments.”

(Edited by Gabriel Stargardter and Andrew Heavens)