French far-right leader Marine Le Pen has been found guilty of embezzlement of public funds and has been deemed ineligible to run for public office, a ruling that could derail her 2027 campaign to succeed Emmanuel Macron as French President.
The ruling, announced in Paris on Monday, found that from 2004 to 2017, Le Pen, 8 members of the European Parliament, and 12 assistants from her Rassemblement National (RN) party, then called the Front National (FN), illegally siphoned off European Union funding to bankroll RN activities within France. The court estimated the damages at just over $3 million (€2.9 million). The case concerned EU funds allotted to Le Pen and her party when she was a member of the European Parliament. The fraud came mainly in the form of no-shows: Staff hired with money from Brussels were, in reality, working for her party inside France. Le Pen had denied any wrongdoing.
Le Pen appeared in court on Monday but left before sentencing was complete.
A three-time presidential candidate, Le Pen is head of France’s official opposition, and a leading contender to succeed President Emmanuel Macron in elections in two years. In her last two attempts, Le Pen made it to the final run-off, losing to Macron. Term limits mean Macron, who has served as president since 2017, is ineligible to run again.
Earlier in the trial, Le Pen said a ban on public office would mean her “political death.” She argued such a move would be “deeply anti-democratic,” with the courts overruling the will of the electorate.
She has previously said she would appeal if convicted. But given France’s slow-moving legal system, a new trial is unlikely before 2026, just months before the presidential election, giving Le Pen little time, even if her conviction is overturned, to mount a campaign.
Le Pen is at the forefront of a growing right-wing movement across Europe. Giorgia Meloni took power as part of a right-wing coalition in Italy in 2022. Elections in Germany earlier this year saw the far-right Alternative for Deutschland (AfD) party double its share of the vote, coming second with 20.8 percent.
Prosecutors called for a five-year prison sentence for Le Pen, with three of those suspended, a fine of up to $350,000 (€325,000), and a five-year ban, effective immediately, on running for public office.
Le Pen’s disqualification is certain to draw attacks from Washington. Vice President JD Vance has been outspoken in his criticism of European countries for their supposed suppression of right-wing voices. Moscow has already responded, with Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Monday decrying the verdict, claiming “more and more European capitals are taking the path of violating democratic norms.” Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, another prominent European far-right figure, tweeted his support of Le Pen, posting “I am Marine!” on X.
The natural successor to Le Pen within the RN is her 29-year-old protégé Jordan Bardella, who has seen his status rise with several slick media appearances during last year’s election campaign.
During the trial, prosecutors claimed Le Pen used EU funds to bankroll her political “war machine,” breaking the law to build up RN’s presence in France. At the time of the crimes, the RN was a much smaller and poorer party than it is now, with few elected officials. French banks boycotted RN’s campaigns, refusing to provide financing. Le Pen took out a loan from a Russian bank in 2014, which she repaid shortly after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Her 2022 presidential campaign was backed in part by a loan from Hungary, which she repaid shortly after the election.
RN was the big winner in last year’s snap election, taking 123 seats, making it the single-largest opposition party in France’s parliamentary assembly. France’s public financing system, which allocates funds to political parties based on the number of elected offices held, means RN is entitled to a reported $15 million (€14 million) in public financing over the legislative term, more than double its previous allotment.
In a key decision on Friday, March 28, France’s Constitutional Council, ruling on a separate case, upheld the principle of political ineligibility, but stressed such bans had to be “proportionate” and take into consideration “the preservation of voters’ freedom.”
This isn’t the first time the French courts have ruled against a prominent national politician. In a similar case last year, 8 members of France’s MoDem party, including former Minister of Justice Michel Mercier and MoDem president François Bayrou, were found guilty of misappropriation of European public funds. Mercier was given a suspended sentence and banned from running for public office for two years. Bayrou was acquitted on appeal and later became Prime Minister of France.
In 2021, former French President Nicolas received a three-year prison sentence, including two years suspended, and was banned from holding public office for three years after being found guilty of corruption charges.
