French prosecutors have asked for prison time and a five-year ban from politics for far-right leader Marine Le Pen, potentially derailing her bid to become president in 2027.
Le Pen, her National Rally (RN) party and more than 20 of its members are accused of using European Parliament money to pay staff who were in fact working for RN in France, allegations they deny.
After almost six weeks of hearings at the Paris criminal court, French prosecutors announced on Wednesday that they were requesting a sentence for Le Pen of five years of imprisonment (with three years suspended) and the imposition of five years of ineligibility from politics.
The prosecution also asked that the RN should be fined €2 million ($2.1 million) and Le Pen herself €300,000 ($316,000).
The prosecutors also asked that the ineligibility sentence was given “with provisional execution,” meaning it would take place immediately and Le Pen could not stand for new elections during this period, even if appeals were filed against the court’s decision.
Speaking to journalists after the hearing, Le Pen claimed this was an attack on democracy and an attempt by the prosecutor to bar her from the political scene: “The only thing that interested the prosecution was ‘Marine Le Pen’… asking once again for her exclusion from political life and to deprive the French… of the ability to vote for whoever they want.”
Patrick Maisonneuve, a lawyer for the European Parliament, told reporters on Wednesday: “I often hear the elected members of the National Rally when it comes to a theft of €50, saying that justice must be swift, it must be firm, it must be severe.”
He added, “So, when we have embezzled, because that is what it is, €4.5 million to the detriment of the European Parliament, therefore of taxpayers and in particular French taxpayers. Let’s not cry scandal.”
Maisonneuve said that the prosecutors explained that case was not about preventing anyone running for election but establishing that every citizen was equal before the law.
Meanwhile, the severity of the proposed sentence prompted RN to launch the hashtag #jesoutiensmarine (“I am behind Marine”) on X that party officials have used with a photo of themselves with Le Pen.
The far-right leader also received support from her political allies and elsewhere. Italy’s Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini, who wrote on X that the prosecutors’ move was an attempt to “stop the popular will and the democratic wind of change.”
A more unexpected supporter of Le Pen was former French interior minister Gerald Darmanin who wrote on X that that it would be “deeply shocking” if she was deemed ineligible. “Fighting Madame Le Pen is done at the ballot box, not elsewhere,” Darmanin added.
Despite the support, an ineligibility sentence – if confirmed by the court decision – could be very bad news for Le Pen, who is seen as a prime contender in France’s next presidential elections in 2027.
Le Pen has already run in three presidential elections, and increased her share of the vote each time. She finished third behind François Hollande and Nicolas Sarkozy in 2012 with 17.9% of the vote. Then she lost to French President Emmanuel Macron in both 2017 and 2022 with 33.9% and 41.5% of the vote respectively.
Macron called a stunning snap election in June after his party was trounced by Le Pen’s RN in the European parliamentary elections. In the subsequent national vote a month later, the left-wing bloc New Popular Front (NFP) won the most seats but not enough for an absolute majority. Macron’s centrist Ensemble came second and Le Pen’s RN placed third.
Initially, RN was closer to the gates of power than ever before, then foiled mainly due to scores of left-wing and centrist candidates withdrawing from the second round of the election in a strategic bid to avoid splitting the vote.
The hung parliament led to months of stalemate before Macron finally revealed his cabinet in September, with a noticeable shift to the right.