After Donald Trump and Matteo Salvini, Marine Le Pen is the next right-wing politician against whom the left is using the judiciary as a weapon. News broke on Wednesday that prosecutors have requested the right-wing National Rally leader be found guilty of embezzlement, sentenced to prison, and barred from running for public office for the next five years. This would prevent her from running for president in 2027.
Prosecutors allege that Le Pen, her party, and 24 other individuals—including current and former French lawmakers—illegally used European Parliament funds to pay parliamentary assistants for work related to party business rather than EU affairs from 2004 to 2016. Le Pen and her co-defendants have denied the charges. Prosecutors have requested that Le Pen receive the harshest punishment of all those involved: five years in prison, three of which would be suspended, a €300,000 fine, and a five-year ban from running for public office.
More interestingly, the prosecutors have requested that the court impose the sentence immediately, even if the defendants choose to appeal. ‘It’s clear that the only thing the public prosecutors want is Marine Le Pen’s exclusion from political life,’ Le Pen told reporters, according to POLITICO.
Following Trump and Salvini
Le Pen and her party, National Rally, are long-time allies of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Fidesz. The two parties have been members of a political group in the European Parliament since this summer, Patriots for Europe (PfE), chaired by Le Pen’s ‘padawan’ Jordan Bardella. Orbán reacted to the news in a post on X, stating: ‘Marine, please remember we are with you in this battle!’ The Hungarian PM added: ‘Don’t forget: being harassed by the judiciary was a crucial step towards victory for President @realDonaldTrump.’
Indeed, the use of the judiciary as a political weapon by the Democratic administration played a significant role in President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign. Trump was found guilty on 34 counts by a Manhattan jury in May, becoming the first former president in American history to be convicted by a criminal court. Since then, he has achieved another first: becoming the first convicted felon elected to be the President of the United States. The Democrats’ strategy backfired: they failed to convince the American people that Trump was as diabolically bad as they portrayed him to be. As reported by Hungarian Conservative, not only did Trump’s support surge after the court ruling, but so did the amount of donations to his campaign.
In September, prosecutors requested a six-year prison sentence for the leader of the Italian League Party, another key member of Patriots for Europe (PfE). Matteo Salvini’s ‘crime’ was simply attempting to protect Italy’s borders from a flood of illegal immigrants. The former Interior Minister and current Deputy Prime Minister has been charged with kidnapping for refusing to allow 147 migrants, rescued by the Spanish NGO Open Arms in 2019, to disembark in Lampedusa.
While awaiting the final sentence, both Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani expressed their solidarity with Salvini. At a rally organized by Salvini’s party in early October, Orbán described him as a European patriot, noting that he is celebrated as a hero in Hungary for his efforts to close the borders and defend the homes of Italians and Europeans. ‘He deserves a medal for this, not a criminal prosecution,’ Orbán stated, calling the legal proceedings against Salvini related to illegal migration a disgrace for the left and for Europe as a whole.
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