One is a pragmatist: a 47-year-old lawyer by training who has steered France’s far-right National Front (FN) from pariah status to mainstream.
On Sunday, Marine Le Pen and Marion Marechal-Le Pen - respectively the daughter and grand-daughter of the FN’s firebrand founder, Jean-Marie Le Pen - established themselves as major players in France's political landscape after the part scored an historic win in the first round of regional elections.
The voting placed the FN on track to break the grip of Socialists and conservatives, cementing the party’s grassroots’ rise across the country.
The FN came first with around 28 per cent of the vote nationwide and topped the list in at least six of 13 regions, according to estimates from the interior ministry.
Le Pen and Marechal-Le Pen both broke the symbolic 40 per cent mark in their respective regions, shattering previous records for the party as they tapped into voter anger over a stagnant economy and security fears linked to Europe’s refugee crisis. A grouping of right-wing parties took 27 per cent, the official estimates showed, while the ruling Socialist Party and its allies took 23.5 per cent.