France's far-right leader Marine Le Pen on Sunday, April 6, vowed not to give up after she was found guilty of embezzlement and banned from taking part in elections, slamming her conviction as a "political decision." The bombshell judgement, which could crush Le Pen's dream of winning the French presidency in 2027, has stunned the country's political establishment.
"I won't give up," Le Pen then told flag-waving members of her Rassemblement National (RN) party and supporters, at the Place Vauban in Paris, with the glittering golden dome of the Hotel National des Invalides in the background. She called her conviction a "political decision" and denounced a "witch hunt" against her party as supporters waved French flags and chanted "Marine! Marine!"
Jordan Bardella, Le Pen's top lieutenant president of the RN, told the crowd, "It is not only Marine Le Pen who has been unjustly convicted. It is French democracy that is being executed on the basis of a simple court decision." But, he added, the party did not want to "discredit all judges."
The far right sought to mount a show of force after Le Pen, 56, was found guilty Monday of embezzling European Parliament funds and given a partly suspended jail term and an immediate ban on holding public office. She has appealed. Her supporters branded the ruling politically motivated. The judges who convicted Le Pen have received threats.
Some left-wing forces and the centrist camp staged counter gatherings on Sunday against the far right and in defense of the rule of law, after the judges who convicted Le Pen received threats.
Earlier, Le Pen urged her supporters to take inspiration from one of America's pre-eminent advocates of nonviolence in the fight for equal rights for black Americans. "We will follow the example of Martin Luther King, who defended civil rights," she told members of Italy's hard-right League party, who were meeting in Florence, via video-link.
At a meeting of President Emmanuel Macron's Renaissance party in the northern working-class Paris suburb of Saint-Denis, former prime minister Gabriel Attal accused the far right of "attacking our judges, attacking our institutions."
"We, here, will never disqualify a court decision," said 36-year-old Attal, speaking in the presence of Prime Minister François Bayrou and fellow former premier Edouard Philippe, who also hopes to run in the 2027 presidential elections. "You steal, you pay," Attal said in a later speech.
Bayrou, in a newspaper interview released on Saturday, took aim at the upcoming far-right rally, saying that it was "neither healthy nor desirable" to stage a demonstration against the court ruling.
Some left-wingers including members of the hard-left La France Insoumise (LFI) party staged a counter rally in Place de la Republique, which attracted several hundred people. LFI coordinator Manuel Bompard said the far right had shown its true colours after years of efforts to become mainstream. "The far right is a dangerous party, dangerous for democracy and dangerous for the rule of law," he told reporters. "It is a violent party that even threatens judges when decisions taken by the courts do not suit them."
Le Pen has worked to turn the party into an electable mainstream force and rid it of the legacy of her father, its co-founder Jean-Marie Le Pen, who died in January and was frequently accused of racism. But after the ruling, she reverted to populist rhetoric against the "system," accusing authorities of using a "nuclear bomb" against her.
US President Donald Trump called the sentence a "witch hunt" by "European leftists using lawfare to silence free speech, and censor their political opponent." Bayrou rejected that remark as "interference" in French affairs. He added that it was "neither healthy nor desirable" to stage a demonstration against the court ruling, insisting French institutions allowed for "the separation of powers and the defense of justice."
Besides Martin Luther King, Le Pen has compared herself to Alexei Navalny, Russia's jailed opposition leader who died in an Arctic prison in 2024 after being jailed under President Vladimir Putin.
The RN is the largest single party in the French Assemblée Nationale and can complicate life for Bayrou, who does not have a majority in the lower house. His predecessor Michel Barnier was ejected from office last December in a move backed by Le Pen.
The Paris Court of Appeal said it would examine Le Pen's case within a timeframe that could potentially allow her to contest the polls if her conviction is overturned or her sentence changed.