As the writer Joan Lluís Lluís has stated on social media, the fact that the Elna Maternity Hospital is under the control of the fascists of Reagrupament Nacional is repugnant. It is also painful, due to its powerful symbolic significance. For those unfamiliar with the case, the Elna Maternity Hospital was a healthcare institution founded in 1939 by the Swiss educator and philanthropist Elisabeth Eidenbenz (also known as the Swiss Maternity Hospital) in the town of Elna, in the Roussillon de Argelès region. Its purpose was to house and assist pregnant women forced into exile by the Spanish Civil War. It operated until 1944, when the Nazis closed it during the occupation of France, and its memory was not recovered until the early 2000s. At that time, the Elna City Council acquired the building to convert it into a memorial. To learn about its history, the books by historian Assumpta Montellà on Eidenbenz and the Elna Maternity Hospital are recommended, as well as the documentary – co-produced by TV3 – The Light of Elna, directed by Silvia Quer.

The far right is not making as much progress as it would like across France, but it is gaining new municipalities and strengthening its position in Northern Catalonia. National Rally (RN), Marine Le Pen's party, already secured the mayorship of Perpignan a week ago with an absolute majority in the first round, and this Sunday it won in the second round of the municipal elections In Ribesaltes and Cañoses, in Roussillon. The far-right politician Steve Fortel also won in Elna, and Gilles Foxonet, another far-right politician, retained his position in Baixàs. "It's a lesson for the future of Catalonia and Spain: simply calling them fascists isn't enough," former mayor of Elna Nicolas Garcia told ARA. "We Catalans can't win," added Forques councilor Jordi Vera, who emphasized that 60% of the population comes from outside Northern Catalonia.

The left—despite party divisions—is holding its ground in major cities, while Marine Le Pen's far right has faltered. The French municipal elections have resulted in a map with more far-right mayoralties than ever before, but the National Rally (RN) has not achieved the electoral success it had hoped for. In many municipalities where the far-right candidate had managed to advance to the second round, it ultimately failed to win. The results—still provisional—show that the far right, with some exceptions, is struggling to surpass the 50% threshold and continues to struggle to gain traction in major cities. This is a setback for Le Pen, who had aimed to win in Marseille. According to the initial results, the RN has not won in either Nîmes or Toulon, two cities that were within its reach and which it had expected to win. In large and medium-sized cities, the far right is securing few victories. He retained the mayoralty in Perpignan (Louis Aliot had already won in the first round) and won in Carcassonne and Nice, although the Nice candidate, Éric Ciotti, is not from Marine Le Pen's party, only an ally.

The first round of municipal elections held this Sunday in France confirms the advance of the far right. Final results will not be known until next Sunday, but Marine Le Pen's party, the National Rally (RN), has managed to advance to the second round in the vast majority of municipalities where it ran and will compete to win in city halls where it has not yet governed, such as Marseille, France's second-largest city, Nice, and Toulon. "It is a huge victory for our movement," Le Pen declared in a message to X.

French far-right leader Marine Le Pen returns to the dock this Tuesday in a trial that will shape her political future. Le Pen was sentenced in March 2025 to four years in prison – only two of which were served –, five years of disqualification and a fine of 100,000 euros for misappropriation of European Parliament funds in the case of fraud in parliamentary assistant contracts. Unlike the prison sentence, the court of first instance ruled for the immediate application of the disqualification, even though the sentence was not yet final. De factoThe leader of the National Rally (RN) was barred from the 2027 presidential race. Le Pen appealed the sentence, and the appeal hearing, which will last a month, begins this Tuesday. It represents her last chance to run for president.

The arrival of the National Regrouping (RN) party to power in the Perpignan city council in 2020 sparked excitement as to how the far-right party would govern a city with more than 100,000 inhabitants and, furthermore, the capital of a department, two characteristics that make Perpignan unique in France. A city test, as some French media defined it, although there was already the example of Besiers –with around 80,000 inhabitants–, where RN came to power in 2014 and continues to do so after also winning the 2020 municipal elections.

The ruling condemning Marine Le Pen to four years in prison and five years of disqualification—which will make it unlikely she will be able to run in the 2027 presidential elections—has changed everything. Since a Paris court On Monday, the far-right leader was sentenced for embezzlement of public funds.Le Pen has abandoned her moderate rhetoric and has dedicated herself to attacking state institutions with unprecedented vehemence and anger. This week, the leader of the National Regrouping (RN) party accused "the system" of using a "nuclear bomb" to prevent her from running for president, and the party called for street mobilizations. "If they're using such a powerful weapon against us, it means we're about to win the election," she asserted, referring to the nuclear bomb.

The global far right now has a new victim of the system. "I am Marine!" declared Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán after learning of the corruption conviction of National Rally leader and far-right muse Marine Le Pen. Elon Musk told X that "when the radical left cannot win through democratic voting, it abuses the legal system to imprison its opponents"; and Matteo Salvini, from Rome, linked the corruption conviction of the French far-right leader with the ban on ultra-nationalist Calin Georgescu running in Romania's upcoming presidential elections. Even Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov condemned the sentence as "a violation of democratic norms."

With the five-year ban on National Rally leader Marine Le Pen, which will rule her out of the 2027 presidential race, all eyes are now on Jordan Bardella. He is Le Pen's designated candidate to take her place. She has been preparing him for this moment for years. The far-right leader was aware that her ban could come, and in the last year she has ceded the spotlight to Bardella, an MEP and current leader of the party in Brussels. He is also the party's president. In France, he is already part of the political and media scene, but outside the country, he is still largely unknown. Who is Le Pen's successor?

The 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.