France’s Marine Le Pen, popular right-wing politician, found guilty of embezzlement, barred from elections

Marine Le Pen, the figurehead of the ascendant far-right political movement in France, was hit with a non-custodial prison sentence and barred from running in elections for five years on Monday as a court found her guilty of embezzling European Union funds to pay members of her National Rally party’s staff.

In handing down the sentence, the judge said the public office ban would take effect immediately and she will not be able to appeal, which means Le Pen will not be able to run for the French presidency in 2027, barring any legal challenges to the ruling.

“The court took into consideration, in addition to the risk of reoffending, the major disturbance of public order if a person already convicted… was a candidate in the presidential election,” judge Benedicte de Perthuis, was quoted as saying by the French news agency AFP.

Recent polling has shown she is likely to have won at least a first round in that national election. 

Le Pen, 56, garnered 41% of the ballots in the last French presidential election in 2022, and has made no secret of her desire to run again for the nation’s highest office.

Sat in the front row of the Paris court, Le Pen whispered “incredible” as the judge detailed his reasoning for the guilty verdict. She walked out of the court before the sentences were even announced.

Le Pen, along with eight current or former party members, had faced up to 10 years in prison on the embezzlement charges. The court said the four-year sentence handed down on Monday would be served with the politician wearing an ankle bracelet to track her movements, not in prison.

She had described the possibility of a ban from running for the presidency in 2027 as a “political death” sentence.