French Protest Turnout Falls to 35,000 From 60,000 as Italy Puts Soldiers in Milan and Pensioners March in Madrid

Since the Oct. 17 riots that led French President Emmanuel Macron to address the nation on television, the country has spent a week bracing for a repeat. As of this morning, Saturday, Oct. 24, the first numbers are lower than last week's.

Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez said turnout across France was about 35,000, compared with 60,000 last Saturday. He said authorities counted 136 public street actions, down from 264 the previous weekend.

The government has put 70,000 police officers and gendarmes on the streets.

Paris and Orléans

The main Paris march follows a 1.5 km route from Porte d'Italie to Porte de Vincennes. A coalition of unions, the CGT, CFDT, FSU and Solidaires, organized it alongside student federations. The crowd includes young people, families, office workers and retirees.

In Orléans, thousands are marching against Marine Le Pen's National Rally congress. Demonstrators carried banners reading "All united against fascism" and "Long live the revolution."

Fox News correspondent Jonathan Hunt described the Paris march as peaceful so far. He noted that last week's violence came in the later hours, when looting and fires broke out in cities across France. Hunt said the organizers do not want a repeat and believe their cause was hijacked by people who wanted to commit violence.

A State Department assessment reviewed by Fox News Digital warned that antifascist groups were planning a "potentially more confrontational protest" this weekend. Those groups have announced a separate protest Sunday near the congress venue.

The protests began as high school demonstrations over understaffed, dilapidated schools. They have since widened into complaints over the cost of living, public services and pensions.

Milan gets more soldiers

Italy is bracing for its own repeat. Premier Giorgia Meloni announced 500 additional soldiers for Milan, on top of the hundreds already stationed there. They will support about 5,000 police and other law enforcement personnel.

Meloni also announced tougher penalties for minors, who police say made up a large part of last weekend's violent protesters. Milan police say the looting involved about 2,000 very young people. They said many were "naturalized, second-generation Italians," alongside foreign nationals. Police arrested 45 people over two days, 34 of them minors.

Authorities are using drones, checks at railway stations, rapid-response units and online monitoring for calls to violence. Officials say the security zone extends beyond the city center in case protesters try to avoid the heavily policed areas. Luxury boutiques including Omega, Tiffany and Gucci boarded up their windows.

The soldiers come with limits. Defense Minister Guido Crosetto said in a social media post that troops lack key public-order tools. He said they were only recently allowed to use plastic restraint ties, and only around train stations. They are not authorized to carry pepper spray or tasers.

Valter Mazzetti, secretary general of the Fsp police union, told the Associated Press that soldiers can supply immediate reinforcement but cannot fix police staffing shortages. He said managing demonstrations requires specialized police training.

Milan Mayor Giuseppe Sala said he is worried about a repeat and supports sending more soldiers.

The city's welfare councilor, Lamberto Bertolé of the center-left Democratic Party, offered a different diagnosis than tougher penalties. "Many young people increasingly lack a sense of belonging and prospects for the future. Part of our society feels excluded, amid social and economic inequalities," he told the AP. He said more investigation is needed into the backgrounds and motives of the young looters.

Rome and Madrid

Rome locked down luxury shopping streets and tightened controls around the Circus Maximus and Piazza del Popolo. Members of right-wing student groups marched through the city in a demonstration called "Unlock Everything," organized in opposition to recent left-wing student protests. An anti-war march was scheduled to start in the early afternoon at Piazza della Repubblica.

In Madrid, thousands of pensioners are marching from Atocha station toward Calle Alcalá. Their demands include pension increases tied to actual inflation, a minimum pension matching the minimum wage, an end to the gender pension gap and protection of the public system from privatization. The CGT also wants easier early retirement without penalties for workers with at least 35 years of contributions, and repeal of pension reforms introduced since 2011.

The Madrid protests come as teachers in the city are on an indefinite strike over pay and conditions. Tent camps over housing costs have covered Puerta del Sol for weeks. Similar housing protests are running in Portugal.

What is driving it

Sacha Cossi, a 27-year-old concert stagehand in the Madrid tent camp, said low salaries and high rents have created continent-wide exasperation. "We are tired of everything," he said. Maria Silvestre, a sociology professor at the University of Deusto, said young Europeans feel "a strong sense of uncertainty and a lack of control."

The fiscal backdrop is the same in most of these countries. Pension and welfare costs are rising, defense budgets are growing as the U.S. pulls back, and governments of the right in Italy, left in Spain and center in France have no shared answer.

Whether the lower French numbers hold through the evening, when last week's violence broke out, remains to be seen. A second test comes Sunday, when the antifascist protest near the National Rally congress in Orléans is expected to go ahead.