Far-right leader could be barred from standing for presidency if she is convicted over alleged fake jobs scam

The future of the far-right leader Marine Le Pen – and France’s political landscape – will be decided on Monday when a court hands down its verdict on charges she and party officials embezzled money from the European parliament.

If convicted, the three-time presidential candidate of the National Rally (RN) could be barred from standing to succeed Emmanuel Macron in the 2027 presidential election.

Public prosecutors have demanded Le Pen be given a €300,000 (£250,000) fine, a prison sentence and that she be prevented from holding or seeking to hold a political position or five years.

  • GreyAlien@lemm.eeEnglish
    47·
    2 days ago

    Scary time, hopefully France do the right thing or else it might be the end of Europe.

    • Takapapatapaka@lemmy.worldEnglish
      22·
      2 days ago

      Scary times indeed, and sadly even if the right thing is done, those fuckheads have a successor at the ready, with a boosted mediatic presence, so I fear that either way it won’t change much.

      • GreyAlien@lemm.eeEnglish
        11·
        2 days ago

        Yup, especially since his last visit to israel and the European elections.

        It’s certain that they are propping him up, but he needs a lot of work to be credible in a national election. From my understanding and what I’ve seen, he’s charismatic on social media but loses all his appeal during debates because he’s stupid.

        If the European Union wants a future, it must get rid of these fascists and their oligarch handlers."

  • TastyWheat@lemmy.worldEnglish
    22·
    2 days ago

    From an Aussie who’s only just hearing about this now (how the hell did I miss this?), what kind of chances are there of a conviction here? How’s the evidence?

    If she gets convicted but remains eligible, that’s a biiiig problem…

    • BestBouclettes@jlai.luEnglish
      6·
      2 days ago

      The evidence is pretty overwhelming, they recovered fake planners, with all the receipts, texts, emails, and records where they openly admitted the fraud.

      Now when it comes to conviction, it might go sideways because she’s the head and the face of RN which is one of the biggest opposition party and has been for the last 20 or so years.

      Hopefully, she’s not above the law, and this case will set a precedent for decades to come, whichever side it goes.

  • BestBouclettes@jlai.luEnglish
    271·
    2 days ago

    That’s gonna be our 6th of January if she doesn’t become ineligible. She has very high chances of winning in 2027.

  • Valmond@lemmy.worldEnglish
    142·
    2 days ago

    For everyone saying it’ll be the end if she isn’t forbidden to run against macrons successor, it would just be a band aid on the wound to forbid her to run IMO (though I do hope she gets a lenghty prison time, together with Sarkozy because fuck those anti democratic assholes).

    What France really needs is someone to step up to the job when macron leaves, there is no one either to the right nor to the left IMO.