Marine Le Pen was banned from running for office for five years with immediate effect on Monday after she was found guilty in a Paris court of embezzlement of public funds, throwing her presidential ambitions into doubt.
“Je suis Marine!” wrote Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban a few minutes after the court read out its sentence against Le Pen over a fake jobs scam at the European Parliament. The sentence includes a four-year prison sentence, although half is suspended, and a €100,000 fine.
Ms Le Pen's supporters were quick to rally behind her, decrying a “judicial cabal”.
“Today, it is not only Marine Le Pen who is unjustly condemned, it is French democracy that is being executed,” said the leader of her National Rally party, Jordan Bardella.
In a signal of the significance of the trial, reaction from abroad was also swift. Italy's Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini describe the sentence as a “declaration of war by Brussels”. While Hungary is viewed as an outlier within the European Union due to its relationship with Moscow, Italy's far-right populist Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has managed to tread a fine line between keeping good relations with Brussels and other far-right leaders.
Moscow, which Ms Le Pen has been accused of courting despite the EU's sanctions over its war in Ukraine, said the court's decision was undemocratic. “More and more European capitals are going down the path of violating democratic norms,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
The decision was likely to have been a shock to Le Pen, 56, who left the court before her sentence was read out and was expected to discuss the decision on French television on Monday evening.
Before the verdict, she had expressed her scepticism about judges deciding to ban her from holding public office. Her political opponents in France welcomed the verdict, with Green leader Marine Tondelier saying that she “must serve her sentence” like all citizens.
Le Pen, currently a deputy in the National Assembly, was found guilty of personally embezzling €474,000 ($438,000) of EU parliamentary funds. Overall, nine figures from National Rally were convicted for a scheme where they took advantage of European Parliament expenses to employ assistants who were actually working for the party.
Twelve assistants were also convicted of concealing a crime, with the court estimating the scheme was worth €2.9 million. As an institution, the National Rally was fined €2 million.
The court decision is likely to cause further turmoil within French politics, which have suffered from instability since a snap election last summer.
While National Rally is currently presided over by 29-year-old Mr Bardella, Le Pen is widely viewed as the party's “natural candidate” in a presidential election. She has spent more than two decades ridding the party of the toxic reputation that surrounded its founder, her late father Jean-Marie Le Pen.
Recent polls show that for the first time, Le Pen has become France's most popular politician, with 37 per cent of the population saying they support her after years of campaigning against immigration and high costs of living.
'Contempt for truth'
In deciding whether it was necessary to bar Le Pen and other defendants from public office, the court weighed the risk of them repeating the crime of embezzlement, as well as the risk of public order disturbance. It was not an obligation but appeared necessary considering the “contempt for the truth” shown by the defence, which repeatedly denied the accusations, court president Benedicte de Perthuis said.
The court found that Le Pen and party members use EU funds to pay colleagues who rarely set foot in Brussels because of financial difficulties. While there was “no personal enrichment … this is a circumvention of party and democratic rules”, said Ms de Perthuis.
“It is a matter of ensuring that elected officials, like all those subject to justice, do not benefit from preferential treatment,” she added.
Appeals typically take a year to hear, so it is possible that Le Pen could be tried again in 2026, with a ruling made before the campaign, according to daily Le Monde. This means she may technically still be a presidential candidate in 2027, if the appeals court acquits her or the process takes a long time.
In November, in the last days of her trial, Ms Le Pen criticised the judges involved in her court case, saying that they wanted her “political death”. She described possibly depriving the French public of the choice of voting for her as a “very violent attack on democracy”.
She has denied accusations that she was at the head of the system meant to siphon off EU parliament money to benefit her party, which she led from 2011 to 2021.
She argued instead that it was acceptable to adapt the work of the aides paid by the European Parliament to the needs of the lawmakers, including some political work related to the party.
Hearings showed that some EU money was used to pay for Le Pen’s bodyguard – who was once her father's bodyguard – as well as her personal assistant.
Reports indicate that there appears to be no “plan B” in the event she is barred from running in 2027. Despite being the face of the party in a landmark win in European elections last summer, Mr Bardella is considered to be too inexperienced to run for president.
“The subject is taboo at the RN,” wrote Le Monde on Sunday, “especially around the group's president at the National Assembly [Ms Le Pen], who refuses to let anyone talk to her about it.”
