PARIS — Protesters set fires as they blocked highways and gas stations across France early Wednesday as part of a new nationwide movement. Authorities deployed 80,000 police, who made hundreds of arrests and fired tear gas to disperse crowds.

The “Block Everything” movement was born online over the summer in far-right circles, but spread on social media and was co-opted by left-wing, antifascist and anarchist groups. It now includes France’s far-left parties and the country’s powerful labor unions.

Their joint day of unrest adds to the country’s political turmoil, after the collapse of centrist President Emmanuel Macron’s government earlier this week in a similar backlash over proposed budget cuts and broader anger at the political class.

Barricades were erected in several major French cities, including Lyon, Marseille, and Toulouse. Entry to an Amazon depot in northern France was also blocked as the country’s largest union said some 715 disruptions had been organized nationwide.

In the capital Paris, groups gathered and set up barricades at several entry points to the city. Demonstrations were expected to continue throughout the day, with travel disrupted as some of the main transport unions joined the strike.

Hundreds remained gathered outside Gare du Nord, one of the city’s main train stations, despite earlier attempts from police to disperse the crowds with tear gas.

“We are here, even if Macron doesn’t want us, we are here,” they chanted.

There were dramatic scenes outside a high school in eastern Paris, where police clashed with dozens of students who had blocked entry to the building.

“Police forced the opening of one of the doors to let students in and there was some violence with tear gas,” Ariane Anemoyannis, spokesperson for the youth group ‘Le Poing Leve,’ who was at the scene, told NBC News.

An earlier strike, organized by transport workers near the high school, was also broken up by police, said Anemoyannis.

“There were several hundred people who showed up in support of the workers,” she said, “the police charged against the picketline to break up the strike.”

Public anger in France grew when then-Prime Minister Francois Bayrou announced his plan to cut the budget by over $50 billion. He proposed striking two national holidays from the calendar, freezing pensions for 2026 and cutting billions in health spending.

The two extremes of the political spectrum joined forces in the National Assembly on Monday, causing the collapse of the French government in a no confidence vote fueled by opposition to the budget cuts.

But although Bayrou might be gone, the deep mistrust over his proposed austerity plan and the government as a whole remains.

Some are turning their sights on Macron, calling for his resignation before his tenure is scheduled to end in 2027. He named his fifth prime minister in less than two years on Tuesday, choosing close ally Sébasten Lecornu.

Many taking to the streets say they resent being asked to make sacrifices while those they describe as the ruling elite are increasingly disconnected from their reality and daily struggles.

For police, there’s an element of unpredictability: the demonstrations are decentralized and leaderless, with no specific union, organization or individual leading the charge.

On the eve of the demonstrations, the now-outgoing Interior Minister, Bruno Retailleau, said no violence would be tolerated and announced the deployment of 80,000 police and gendarmes — the French military police.

It’s a show of force not seen since the height of the Yellow Vests protests in 2018, sparked by Macron’s proposed fuel tax to curb carbon emissions.

The Bears lost their first game under new head coach Ben Johnson on an inconsistent night for quarterback Caleb Williams, and Johnson said after watching the tape that Williams had too many plays that he’d like to be able to re-do.

“It was up and down. We had mixed results,” Johnson said. “There were some things he did that were top notch and I would put him up there with some of the best in the NFL. He had a couple throws with guys in his face that he delivered on target that were very tough. . . . And yet there were still some that we would like to have back. There were probably three or four of them that we counted on tape, at a minimum, that we would want back. We chatted for a while and he’s very self-reflective on it and critical of himself. It’s a starting point for us so we’ll look to get better next week.”

The Bears’ first offensive drive was a thing of beauty, with Williams looking poised and in control while passing and ending up running the ball into the end zone himself. But after that, Williams went through a long stretch of poor play, brightened only by a late drive that proved to be too little, too late.

“Some good football on tape, but too much inconsistent football that popped up,” Johnson said. “Effort wasn’t an issue, those guys did a good job playing hard and competed the whole night, but the execution has got to improve, particularly there in the fourth quarter.”

In his second season after being the first overall pick in the 2024 NFL draft, the Bears need more consistency from Williams.

Rupert Murdoch, 94, has anointed Lachlan Murdoch, his oldest son, as leader for decades to come, of a conservative media empire that includes Fox News, the The Wall Street Journal and the New York Post as well as prominent outlets in the U.K. and Australia.

The elder Murdoch engineered billions in transactions to end a succession battle among his children and bolster Lachlan’s role in charge of Fox Corp. and News Corp.

Lachlan, 54, emerged as the winner Monday in a years-long rivalry with his brother James, 52, over who would control the family’s extensive holdings. The succession adds to the already bright spotlight that’s focused on Lachlan as he came to be seen as the most likely heir to preserve the conservative identity that defines his father’s portfolio.

But observers have long noted that Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch have distinct approaches.

“He’s a very different media proprietor than his father,” Paddy Manning, who wrote a biography of Lachlan, told NPR in 2022.

Noting Lachlan’s affinity for rock-climbing and tattoos when he was younger, Manning said the Murdoch heir isn’t likely to seek the “kingmaker” role in Republican political circles that his father enjoyed: “He’s kind of a little bit more hands-off.”

The question of how Murdoch’s fortune and business interests would be split among Lachlan and James, their older siblings Prudence and Elisabeth, and other relatives has played out in dramatic scenes in courtrooms and boardrooms, inspiring the HBO series Succession.

Here’s a quick bio and background on Lachlan:

Early ties to New York, and a move to Sydney

Lachlan Murdoch, seen here speaking in Hong Kong in 1999, grew up in New York City but has spent much of his adult life in Sydney, Australia.

Frederic J. Brown/AFP via Getty Images

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Frederic J. Brown/AFP via Getty Images

Lachlan Keith Murdoch was born on Sept. 8, 1971 — meaning the succession news emerged on his birthday. He was born in London, but within a few years, the Murdoch family moved to New York City, where Rupert began acquiring U.S. newspapers and magazines.

Lachlan had an elite education that included private schools in Manhattan, Massachusetts and Colorado, before graduating from Princeton University.

He started working at News Corp. in 1994, rising to the post of deputy chief operating officer, according to a Wall Street Journal profile. But in 2005, Lachlan left the U.S. to live in his father’s native Australia — a move seen as a form of voluntary exile.

“[Lachlan] was frustrated by what he saw as Rupert Murdoch’s unwillingness to prevent corporate machinations against him by some of his top executives, including Peter Chernin, then president of the company, and the late Roger Ailes, head of Fox News,” as NPR reported in 2021. “Rupert Murdoch wanted Lachlan to learn to fight and win his own battles.”

In 1999, Lachlan married Sarah O’Hare, a successful model who grew up in Australia and later worked in television as a host and producer. The couple have three children. As recently as 2021, the family’s main base was in Sydney, where the Murdochs’ children were attending school. He spends significant time there every year and has spoken of feeling more Australian than American; Lachlan’s father Rupert is a native Australian who built his media empire up from a single newspaper in Adelaide, on its southern coast.

Return to the U.S., and regaining momentum as heir

Rupert Murdoch arrives at a London church in 2016 to celebrate his marriage to Jerry Hall, accompanied by his sons James (right) and Lachlan (left). The struggle over control of the Murdoch family fortune and media empire inspired the HBO series Succession.

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John Phillips/Getty Images

Roughly 10 years after leaving the U.S. for Australia, Lachlan returned to an inside track to run the family empire. His brother had been badly damaged by scandal when the family’s British tabloids were found to have hacked into mobile phone voicemails and otherwise violated people’s privacy. The Murdochs subsequently split their enterprises between the publishing and television arms.

Both sons got prime jobs, with James named the CEO at Fox and Lachlan as co-chairman. 

Lachlan’s path to the top began to clear in 2017, when a mammoth deal was announced in which the Walt Disney Co. bought much of their Hollywood properties. James then left the newly renamed Fox Corp. and later resigned from the board of directors of News Corp., the newspaper and publishing wing. 

Both brothers have been involved in high-profile controversies during their careers. James was the family’s top figure in the U.K. when the tabloid scandal broke: total settlements have exceeded $1.5 billion.

And with Lachlan as CEO, Fox Corp. has faced defamation lawsuits from election machine and software companies over Fox News’ coverage of the 2020 election. Fox agreed in 2023 to pay $787.5 million to settle a lawsuit filed by Dominion Voting Systems; a lawsuit by Smartmatic is still awaiting a trial date. Evidence showed Lachlan feared alienating core Fox viewers — which is to say pro-Trump voters — by confronting them too directly with the facts that President Joe Biden squarely won the election.

That said, under Lachlan’s leadership, both News Corp. and Fox have enjoyed financial successes. For the recently concluded fiscal year, Fox reported revenues of $16.3 billion, a 17% rise from the previous year. And in a notoriously challenging time for print journalism, News Corp. reported revenue of $8.45 billion, a slight gain over the 2024 numbers.

Seeing Fox as “center-right”

Lachlan’s political beliefs have been the subject of speculation, although he is generally seen as being more conservative than his father.

Lachlan “describes his own politics as socially liberal but economically conservative,” Manning, the biographer, said in 2022. Manning noted that the Murdoch scion’s “biggest political donation was to the Senate Leadership Fund of Mitch McConnell.”

In 2021, Lachlan described Fox News as operating in “the center and right” in political news, opinion and analysis, speaking at an event hosted by the Morgan Stanley investment bank.

“We think that’s where America is,” he said, citing election results and adding later: “We’re going to stick to the center-right. We think that’s where our audience is.”

NPR’s David Folkenflik contributed reporting.