STORY: In the racially mixed Paris suburb of Le Plessis-Trevise, left-wing parliamentary candidate Adel Amara is going door-to-door, hoping to persuade people to vote and turn the constituency leftward.

Amara, who is of Algerian heritage, says he worries for France's minority communities if Marine Le Pen's far-right National Rally - or RN - wins the upcoming election.

The RN is currently leading in opinion polls... and in European Parliament elections last month, came out on top in the area with 25% of the vote, lower than its national score but high for the Paris region.

Amara says the Popular Front - a leftist alliance - can lead here if they mobilize voters who stayed home in the past.

"It may seem crazy, but I think we can get this victory."

In the small working-class estate were Amara is door knocking, only 497 people - or 43% of eligible voters -cast a ballot in 2022.

Abstention is high in these areas because of distrust in the political class, Amara says.

"What causes and what fuels abstentionism in my opinion is really the feeling (people have) of voting for a project and ending up with the opposite project."

He references the last election where he says people voted for French President Emmanuel Macron to block the far-right, only for (quote) "Macron to prop the far-right up."

Members of minority communities interviewed by Reuters say they worry a victory for the RN could lead to a rise in racism.

The RN denies it is racist but proposes policies that it says prioritize French nationals.

It wants to limit access to health and welfare benefits for foreigners, to restrict citizenship and to ban the wearing of the hijab by women in public.

Social worker Celia Ngala says she will cast a ballot in a parliamentary election for the first time over worries about the far-right.

She says, "I have daughters who are small and I tell myself that I don't want to leave them in a world where they are going to be stigmatized, to be discriminated against."

France's national election takes place over two rounds on June 30 and July 7.