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Far-right politician Jordan Bardella has said he will run to become France’s president in 2027 if Marine Le Pen, his mentor and the de facto leader of their Rassemblement National party, is blocked from running by a court judgment.

Le Pen was found guilty of embezzlement of EU funds last month and banned from standing for election for five years, in a ruling that could prevent her from competing for the presidency for a fourth time.

She is appealing against the ruling and has denied wrongdoing, and the court of appeal is set to hear the case next year.

“Marine Le Pen is my candidate and, if she were to be prevented [from running] tomorrow, I think I can tell you that I will be her candidate. I cannot be clearer than that,” Bardella told Le Parisien newspaper in an interview at the weekend.

However, he said the party would continue to contest Le Pen’s innocence. “Marine is presumed innocent and we will use all the means possible to proclaim our innocence in this affair.”

France is due to hold presidential elections in the spring of 2027, with President Emmanuel Macron ineligible to run for another five-year mandate because of the two-term limit in the constitution.

Le Pen has twice finished second to Macron, in 2017 and 2022, and has steadily improved her performance. In the run-off three years ago, Macron won 58.5 per cent of the vote and Le Pen 41.5 per cent.

She is polling again as a strong candidate to make the run-off in the next election, and remains one of the country’s most popular politicians.

The sentence in the EU embezzlement case includes a two-year prison sentence that would probably be served at home with an electronic bracelet and a further two-year suspended sentence, in addition to the five-year election disqualification that applies even while the case is under appeal.

Le Pen herself has spent years fashioning Bardella into her number two, building up his profile by handing him the presidency of the RN, and saying publicly that he would be her prime minister when she won the Élysée presidential palace. Bardella has long signalled his loyalty by backing her leadership and avoiding any public feuding.

But Le Pen’s legal woes are putting the relationship to the test, as she fights for her political career and Bardella prepares for the possibility that he will be propelled into the role of the RN’s candidate.

Since Le Pen lost the EU funds case, Bardella has said repeatedly that she remained the RN’s uncontested leader, but he has also suggested he would step up if needed. Le Pen has said Bardella is a “formidable asset” for the RN that she says she “hopes they do not have to use too soon”.

“I consider that when Marine is attacked, I am attacked too. We will continue to work together, hand in hand, in the interest of the movement, our ideas, and our political family,” Bardella told Le Parisien.

Bardella, 29, also enjoys high opinion ratings and has helped the far-right movement expand its appeal to young people, including through savvy use of social media.

According to polling by Toluna Harris for CommStrat and L’Opinion earlier this month, Le Pen and Bardella have the most support among French voters of any potential presidential candidates, with 36 per cent of voters saying they could vote for Le Pen in a hypothetical first round, and 37 per cent for Bardella.

This is slightly ahead of Édouard Philippe, the mayor of Le Havre and former prime minister under Macron, who has 35 per cent support in the poll.