PARIS — Marine Le Pen on Wednesday accused prosecutors of seeking to sentence her to “political death” in a “politicized” embezzlement trial that could jeopardize her chances at running for president.
In an interview with French radio station RTL, the longtime leader of the French far right, said the punishment being sought by prosecutors — which includes an immediate five-year ban on running for office — is tantamount to “a political death sentence because it’s irreparable.”
“There’s real outrage … the public prosecutor’s office has created a disturbance of the peace with its demands,” Le Pen said.
Le Pen, along with her party — the National Rally — and 24 other individuals are on trial for having allegedly embezzled funds from the European Parliament to pay party employees. All those accused have denied the charges.
Prosecutors last week requested that Le Pen be sentenced to five years in prison — three years of which would be suspended — fined €300,000 and barred from running for public office for five years. The last punishment would upend her plans to run for the French presidency a fourth time during the next election, which is scheduled for 2027. Prosecutors urged the presiding judge to enforce the sentence immediately, which would bar Le Pen from running for office during any appeal process.
Under French law, punishments are usually suspended while a case is appealed. However, there have been other cases this year in which bans on political officials running for public office were applied immediately.
Le Pen’s defense in the court of public opinion has echoes of United States President-elect Donald Trump’s strategy of declaring his legal troubles as a politically motivated “witch hunt.” She argued that the prosecutors’ recommendation in her case was a “political act” because prosecutors in France are “not independent.”
Prosecutors are placed under the authority of the justice minister, but the justice minister is, by law, only allowed to give prosecutors broad instructions on criminal justice policy and is not allowed to weigh in on an individual case.
During the interview, she argued that being declared ineligible to run for public office would cause irreversible damage to her reputation, even if she ultimately won an appeal later.
“This is an absolutely outrageous sentence that poses a problem not only for the rule of law, but also for democracy,” Le Pen said.
Budget red lines
During the interview, Le Pen also adopted an increasingly threatening tone against Prime Minister Michel Barnier’s government as it attempts to get its slimmed-down budget over the line before the end of the year.
Barnier’s government needs the tacit support of the National Rally to remain in power, and so far the far-right party has given the longtime conservative grandee a bit of freedom to act.
However, Le Pen made it clear that her party feels unheard and is losing patience. She said Barnier’s budget did not address enough of the concerns raised by the National Rally over immigration and cost-of-living issues. A planned increase on a tax on electricity crossed what Le Pen said was a “red line” for her party and would push her troops to withdraw their support for Barnier’s government.
“Our priorities were not to raise taxes on individuals or entrepreneurs, not to make retirees pay, and to make structural savings on government spending,” Le Pen said, adding that she would be meeting with Barnier next Monday to discuss these budgetary issues.
