Marine Le Pen, the face of France’s far-right, has said in a television interview that she intends to run for president next year for her National Rally (RN) party.
This comes after an appeals court upheld his corruption convictions but rejected his ban on holding public office, making it possible for him to run wearing an electronic monitoring device on his ankle. She reiterated her plans to appeal again to France’s top court, the Court of Cassation in Paris, and said she considered herself “innocent.”
“I want to pursue all legal avenues to defend my innocence in this case. I am a candidate tonight,” Le Pen told the TF1 TV channel in a prime-time interview.
Le Pen had previously said she would not flee if sentenced under legal supervision and had already left the courtroom without speaking to reporters.
“I said I would not campaign wearing an electronic monitoring bracelet,” she told TF1. “But since I have the option to file an appeal at the Court of Cassation … and that appeal suspends the effect of the decision, I will campaign without the electronic monitoring bracelet,” Le Pen said.
If the 57-year-old daughter of former French far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen runs, it would be her fourth try for the presidency, after coming second to Emmanuel Macron in 2017 and 2022 and failing to make the runoff vote in 2012.
The Court of Cassation had indicated earlier that evening that it expected a decision on whether to hear Le Pen’s appeal before next week.
Regarding her protégé Jordan Bardella, who is seen as her stand-in in the event that she cannot or will not run, Le Pen said they would create a “trusted prime minister and presidential partnership.”
What happened in court on Tuesday?
In a long-awaited decision, an appeals judge upheld his 2025 corruption conviction, but reduced his sentence.
Le Pen, 57, was sentenced by a lower court last year to a five-year ban from public office, as well as four years in prison over a fake jobs scandal when she was a member of the European Parliament.
As per Tuesday’s ruling, his ban on standing in elections has been reduced to 15 months, and his prison term has been reduced to three years – two suspended and one with electronic monitoring.
This means she can still be in the running for the post, but only with an ankle tag.
DW’s decision from the courtroom
Paris correspondent Lisa Lewis said the long queue in front of the old Palais de Justice courthouse in central Paris was a sign of how closely the verdict is going to be watched in France and abroad.
“The first national and international journalists reached here at 5 in the morning,” he said. “I arrived two hours later – but was still one of the happy few to get a seat in the courtroom.”
Noting that Le Pen currently tops opinion polls, Lewis pointed out that even if the ruling forces her to withdraw from the presidential race, “There is a plan B – 30-year-old party chief Jordan Bardella is waiting in the wings… and his ratings are even higher than Le Pen’s.”
In which case was Le Pen convicted?
As a member of what was then called the National Front, Le Pen was a Member of the European Parliament from 2004 to 2017.
Along with nearly two dozen former far-right employees, he was found guilty of misusing EU funds to pay alleged employees for jobs that did not actually exist.
Prosecutors said she “professionalized” a type of corruption to siphon off EU funds that was first started by her father, the late far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen.
Le Pen, the party and 10 others appealed against their decision, with her fellow RN chief Bardella describing the trials as “politically motivated”. He has consistently denied any wrongdoing.
Edited by: Natalie Muller
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