French far-right leader Marine Le Pen delivers her speech during the French far-right party national rally near the parliament in Paris, Sunday, April 6, 2025. (AP Photo)
French far-right leader Marine Le Pen’s bid for next year’s presidential election remained uncertain on Tuesday after a Paris appeals court sentenced her to one year under house arrest with an electronic tag and upheld a ban from holding public office linked to a fake jobs scandal at the European Parliament.The appeals court found Le Pen guilty over a fake jobs scam involving the European Parliament but reduced her punishment from an earlier ruling. She was banned from public office for 15 months and sentenced to one year under house arrest to be served with an electronic tag.The ban, which dates back to March 2025, is expected to expire later this year, potentially allowing the 57-year-old National Rally (RN) leader to contest the presidential election scheduled for April and May 2027. However, Le Pen has said she may not run if the sentence prevents her from campaigning effectively.A lower court last year had sentenced Le Pen to a five-year ban from public office and a two-year prison sentence, putting the three-time presidential candidate’s hopes of succeeding outgoing President Emmanuel Macron at risk.Le Pen is expected to announce later on Tuesday whether she will enter the presidential race or hand the National Rally’s candidature to party president Jordan Bardella, 30. “I’m not scared,” Le Pen said last week. “If I can run, I will — as long as I can campaign.”Le Pen finished third in France’s 2012 presidential election before reaching the runoff against Macron in both 2017 and 2022.The case centres on allegations that Le Pen, the National Rally, and several party officials misused European Parliament funds between 2004 and 2016 by employing party staff in France using money intended for parliamentary assistants.The original trial found Le Pen, along with 24 former European lawmakers, assistants, accountants and the party itself, guilty of operating the scheme. Le Pen has maintained that the National Rally was the victim of a “witch hunt”, while judges involved in the case reportedly received death threats.Le Pen, the party and 10 others appealed the verdict. During the appeal, she denied the National Rally had operated a system to embezzle European Parliament funds and said the party acted in “complete good faith”.Prosecutors argued that after taking over the party leadership in 2011, Le Pen “professionalised” a system allegedly introduced under her father, National Rally co-founder Jean-Marie Le Pen. They had sought to retain the five-year ban and requested a four-year prison sentence, with three years suspended.Despite her legal troubles, recent opinion polls have suggested the far right is likely to top the first round of next year’s presidential election. Surveys remain divided on the outcome of the runoff, with some indicating Bardella could perform slightly better than Le Pen, while others see Le Pen as a stronger challenger.”This woman is very intelligent, she’s not here by chance. And if she does also run for a fourth time, she won’t be an opponent we can sneer at,” hard-left leader Jean-Luc Melenchon has said.A Harris Interactive Toluna survey conducted in May projected Le Pen winning a runoff against Melenchon as well as centrist former prime ministers Gabriel Attal and Edouard Philippe if she is allowed to contest the election. Other opinion polls, however, have suggested Philippe could defeat the far-right candidate in a second-round vote.
