Overview
- A broad coalition of gilets jaunes, unions, high‑school and university students organised a nationwide mobilisation on Saturday, October 24, while authorities put roughly 70,000 police and gendarmes on duty across the country.
- Orléans is the highest‑risk flashpoint as the Rassemblement national holds its congress and organisers expect 20,000–30,000 anti‑RN demonstrators while about 3,000 police and gendarmes with armoured vehicles and water cannon are deployed to separate crowds.
- In Paris the prefecture changed the inter‑union march route at the last minute, provoking union refusal and an urgent legal challenge to the prefecture's order that protesters say increases the risk of confusion on the streets.
- The security posture includes military Sentinelle patrols, elite units such as RAID and GIGN, helicopters, dogs and water cannon, plus local curfews and bans that have been partly contested and overturned by administrative courts in places like the Bouches‑du‑Rhône.
- The government frames the day as a decisive test after the October 17 violence that authorities said drew about 550,000 people and left nearly 3,000 shops damaged, while rights groups warn that heavy restrictions risk eroding civil liberties and political fallout could shape the presidential campaign.