French justice has disqualified Marine Le Pen from running in the 2027 presidential elections.

ParisThe blow to the far right is brutal. Marine Le Pen, leader of the National Rally (RN), was sentenced this Monday to four years in prison (only two of which were final) and five years of disqualification from public office for embezzling European Parliament funds. The Paris Criminal Court decided to implement the disqualification immediately, a decision that will likely prevent Le Pen from running in the 2027 presidential elections. The sentence could trigger a political earthquake and change the history of France.

"It's a political decision," the RN leader denounced in an interview Monday night on TF1. This sentence "should scandalize all those who respect democracy and the rule of law," she insisted. Le Pen confirmed that she will appeal the sentence and is confident of being acquitted and able to participate in the presidential race. "No judge can interfere in an election as important as the presidential election," she stated during the interview.

Le Pen will not have to go to prison because she has no criminal record (she will likely serve two years with an electronic bracelet), but her political career is seriously damaged. With a serious expression and without making any statements, the French far-right leader left the courtroom before the sentence was read and went to the party headquarters, where she met with the party's leadership to analyze the court's decision.

The sentence is a severe blow to the RN leader, who aspired—now that she is at her most popular—to become president of the French Republic. It was her ultimate political aspiration. It is, in fact, a fatal blow to Le Pen, who has already run for president three times. The court could have decided that the disqualification would not be applied until the sentence was final, but it followed the criteria of the Prosecutor's Office, which had requested that the sentence be carried out immediately. According to the French press, neither Le Pen nor her party expected such a sweeping sentence, although it was assumed the court would consider embezzlement proven.

Does Le Pen have any chance of running in 2027? A priori, it's very difficult. The disqualification would only be overturned if one of the appeals ends in acquittal. Another option is that the ruling on an appeal may include a reduction in the sentence, implying a disqualification of less than two years. In any case, the appeal process could take two years.

Despite the conviction, the RN leader retains her seat in the National Assembly. If President Emmanuel Macron decides to call early legislative elections—he could do so as early as July—Le Pen would be left without a seat because her disqualification would prevent her from running in the elections. However, the convicted woman asserted that she will fight to the bitter end to be able to run in the presidential elections. "I won't let them eliminate me so easily," she warned.

Weakening or strengthening the party?

The question is whether the sentence will weaken or strengthen the far-right party. The party has stated that the trial is political and believes the conviction will not have a negative impact on its voters' voting intentions. "Our voters will follow it closely, and in any case, it will not weaken us, and we will continue in the race to win the elections," RN vice president Louis Aliot said on TF1 this Monday. The party's reaction to the sentence is causing tremors in the government: one of the decisions the far-right party could take is to vote in favor of a motion of no confidence to overthrow it. A new political crisis would erupt.

Faced with the possibility of not being able to run in the 2027 presidential elections, Marine Le Pen has been preparing her deputy, Jordan Bardella, to replace her for some time. Bardella, 29, is formally the party's president, and Le Pen has ceded significant prominence to him in the political and media arena for the past year. Le Pen's right-hand man, who is also the party's leader in the European Parliament, has called for "peaceful popular mobilization" against the ruling. Bardella has called the court's decision an "execution of French democracy."

The court considers it proven that between 2009 and 2017 RN (the former National Front) wasHiring people who actually worked for the party as assistants to MEPs – with salaries paid by the European ParliamentThis is an illegal practice that began when the party was still called the National Front and Jean-Marie Le Pen was its president, but continued when Marine Le Pen took over the reins. During those years, the party was in a difficult financial situation. The daughter of the recently deceased founder of the RN was also a member of the European Parliament for twelve years, between 2004 and 2017.

Le Pen, at the center of the fraud

According to the ruling, National Regrouping's embezzlement of fictitious European Parliament contracts amounts to €4.1 million. The president of the court emphasized that Marine Le Pen "was at the center" of the fraud scheme since 2009, although she clarified that there was no personal enrichment. "This is fraud through a system to alleviate the party's expenses," the president of the court stated. "I am innocent," Le Pen proclaimed.

The party has been sentenced to pay a fine of two million euros, one million euros final, as well as the confiscation of one million euros that had been seized during the proceedings. 23 other defendants have been sentenced to prison terms of between six months and four years (Le Pen's received the highest sentence), fines, and disqualifications. Only one of the defendants has been acquitted.

Among those convicted is Louis Aliot, mayor of Perpignan, who has been sentenced to 18 months in prison and three years of disqualification, although in his case it is not immediate. Therefore, he will be able to continue serving as mayor of the city while the sentence is pending. The court has reasoned that it did not impose an immediate disqualification "to preserve the freedom of the voters who elected it." If the immediate disqualification had been applied, Aliot would have lost the mayoralty. Perpignan is one of the strongholds of RN and the only capital with more than 100,000 inhabitants run by the far-right party.

The Kremlin reacts

Even before the reading of the sentence had finished, the Kremlin reacted to the convictions by deploring "the violation of democratic norms." Her European allies also supported the far-right leader. Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini called the sentence "a declaration of war by Brussels" for "excluding Le Pen from political life." Romanian far-right leader Călin Georgescu also referred to the ban.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán tweeted "Je suis Marine," referring to the slogan that became popular after the jihadist attacks on the weekly magazine. Charlie Hebdo.