The election campaign to replace Macron in France is heating up as the summer vacation season ends

PARIS -- With the end of France's summer vacation season, the election campaign to replace Emmanuel Macron as president next May is bursting to life. An unusually large and broad field of candidates is forming to lead the European Union’s largest country, its second-largest economy and only nuclear-armed power, their appetites whetted by the fact that Macron is constitutionally barred from seeking a third consecutive presidential term himself.Some won’t get the support they will need from sponsors and their political camps to be on the starting line when the first round of voting is held on April 18. Still, a crowded field could boost far-right candidate Marine Le Pen — just as it did for Jean-Marie Le Pen, her father, in 2002. The record 16 candidates splintered the first-round vote, creating an electoral earthquake when the elder Le Pen qualified for the decisive second round.Socialist Party leader Olivier Faure became the latest to declare his candidacy this weekend. He joined more than two dozen others who say that they intend to stand or are contemplating a run in 2027.Here’s what to know at these early stages of what promises to be among the most consequential leadership vote...