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French far-right leader Marine Le Pen has been banned from standing for office for five years with immediate effect and sentenced to jail after being convicted of embezzling EU funds.
Monday’s court ruling, which remakes France’s political landscape, is likely to block Le Pen from running in the 2027 presidential election, for which she was one of the favourites.
Le Pen, who stormed out of the Paris courtroom before her sentence was announced and muttered the word “unbelievable” under her breath, has said she will appeal.
Her party also called for mass protests in response.
With the populist right on the rise in much of Europe and President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist forces deprived of their parliamentary majority in last year’s legislative elections, the three-time presidential candidate had hoped to finally secure power in the 2027 contest.
Although the five-year electoral ban will begin immediately, Le Pen’s four-year jail sentence would only begin once no further legal recourse remains.
Two years of the sentence could be served under surveillance wearing an ankle bracelet, while the two further years are suspended.
Le Pen was also fined €100,000.
“It is necessary to ensure that elected officials do not benefit from preferential treatment,” said chief judge Bénédicte de Perthuis in justifying the imposition of an immediate ban.
Le Pen’s ability to run in 2027 will depend on the duration of the appeal process and its ultimate outcome.
“This marks a major, major turning point in French political life,” said Bruno Cautrès, a political scientist at Sciences Po university in Paris, arguing that Le Pen’s 29-year-old protégé Jordan Bardella would now have to run in her place.
Cautrès added that Le Pen had been one of the two frontrunners for the presidency, along with centrist former prime minister Édouard Philippe, who trailed far behind her in a poll published on Sunday.
“Today, it is not only Marine Le Pen who is being unjustly condemned: it is French democracy that is being executed,” Bardella posted on X, later calling for peaceful mass mobilisation “to show that the will of the people is stronger” than the court.
The verdict was also attacked by figures including Matteo Salvini, Italy’s far-right deputy prime minister, and Elon Musk, a key ally of US President Donald Trump.
“When the radical left can’t win via democratic vote, they abuse the legal system to jail their opponents,” Musk posted on X.
Salvini compared the sentence to the Romanian authorities’ decision to exclude the former frontrunner Călin Georgescu from the country’s presidential race.
“This is a declaration of war by Brussels,” he posted on X. “We will not be intimidated, we will not stop.”
Dmitry Peskov, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesperson, added that “more and more European capitals are going down the path of trampling democratic norms”.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán posted: “Je suis Marine!”
But Prisca Thevenot, a centrist MP from Macron’s party, said Le Pen should not be above the law. “We are in a democracy that is based on the rule of law,” she added. “There is a separation between law and politics.”
The court found that a system of fake contracts and jobs helped Le Pen’s Rassemblement National party siphon off around €4.4mn of EU funds for its operations in France.
Another 24 RN elected officials — including nine former members of the European parliament — were tried for similar offences alongside Le Pen, who was an MEP between 2004 and 2016.
“These were fake contracts,” the chief judge said as she read out the verdict.
She added that while there was “no personal enrichment” for the ex-MEPs involved, they benefited from “a certain financial comfort” as well as financial help to the party.
All nine of the ex-MEPs were also found guilty, while the rulings for other staffers and party officials varied depending on their level of involvement.
In reaching its decisions, the court also took into account the risk of repeat offences and a “major disturbance of public order” if someone who had been sentenced were allowed to run in a presidential election.
Anne-Charlène Bezzina, a constitutional lawyer, said she was concerned about “the broader impact this could have on the perception of democratic institutions — we’re already seeing the Kremlin’s reaction.”
She added that the sentences created “a lot of pressure and distrust towards the judges and the judicial system”.
