Far-right leader Marine Le Pen believed that respect for France's venerable institutions would pave her path to the presidency, counting on such an approach to make her once-marginal party more acceptable to traditional voters.
She launched this tactic after her landslide defeat in the 2017 presidential election by Emmanuel Macron, and it worked successfully until yesterday, when a court in Paris convicted her of embezzlement and banned her from running in the 2027 presidential election, which many believed she could win.
Le Pen (56), was found guilty of misusing European Union funds and received a five-year ban from running for public office, effective immediately and valid even during the appeal process.
If she fails to reverse the ruling before the 2027 elections, her National Rally (RN) party will have to find a new candidate, with the most likely choice being 29-year-old party president Jordan Bardella.
“Today, it is not only Marine Le Pen who has been unjustly convicted,” Bardella wrote on the X network. “A death sentence is being carried out on French democracy,” he added, in a tone echoed by her political allies at home and abroad.
Reuters writes that Le Pen's expulsion from the 2027 presidential race is likely to fuel a growing global debate about how unelected judges monitor politicians - especially those on the far right.
The judge who issued the ban said that no politician is above the law, while prosecutors seeking the measure said they were relying solely on tougher anti-corruption laws passed by the French parliament in 2016. Those laws have led to political bans that take immediate effect, like the one Le Pen received, becoming increasingly common in France, according to Reuters.
“At what point did we start to think that the judge would not apply the law?” wrote centrist MP Saša Uli on the X network. “Is society so sick that it is offended by what is nothing other than the rule of law?”
Le Pen and her allies claim that this is a political witch hunt aimed at preventing her and the RN from coming to power, which is reminiscent of claims by Donald Trump, who during his campaign to return to the White House claimed that he was the target of judicial persecution.
However, as Reuters points out, her bid to come to power was significantly less anti-institutional compared to Trump, who, since returning to office two months ago, has been trying to fulfill campaign promises of a fundamental overhaul of domestic and foreign policy.
"This is an event that has an obvious impact at the political, institutional and democratic level," he said. "If there is a certain distrust of politicians in France, there is also a great distrust of the judicial system."
Le Pen, by contrast, has sought to “professionalize” the RN, a party once known solely for racism and anti-Semitism. After her 2017 defeat, she ordered her deputies to wear suits and ties in public appearances while promoting “France First” messages.
She suppressed some of the more radical anti-immigrant messages and then focused on issues of living standards, such as the cost of living, promising to play by the rules of the Fifth Republic.
The effort seemed to be paying off. A growing number of voters began to see Le Pen as a future president - with opinion polls declaring her the frontrunner for the 2027 election - while the RN became the largest single parliamentary party in France.
However, it appears that the RN faces a future without her, as she faces a difficult path towards a fourth attempt at winning the presidency, according to a Reuters analysis.
Brigitte Barège, a former right-wing mayor who, like Le Pen, received an automatic five-year political ban after a corruption conviction in 2021, said that, despite the conviction, Le Pen was right to play the pro-institutional card.
"Unfortunately, there are too many judges who are involved in politics. And that is a serious problem, but it must be solved by republican means - elections, changes in the law," she said. "We will not carry out a coup. We are not despots."
Arnaud Benedetti, a political analyst who has written a book about the rise of the RN, said Le Pen's verdict was likely to further deepen the growing distrust of the judiciary in France.
"This is an event that has obvious implications at the political, institutional and democratic levels," he said. "If there is a certain distrust in politicians in France, there is also a great distrust in the judicial system."
Le Pen's loss is a "big, big, big problem" for the RN, he added, because he doubts Bardella is experienced enough to run a presidential campaign in 2027. Macron is constitutionally barred from a third term. Benedetti believes voters may want a "more experienced profile," like Interior Minister Bruno Retayo.
An incentive for the ultra-right?
The Odoxa-Mascaret poll, released yesterday by Public Senat, suggests that Bardella's rise could actually be good for the RN.
The poll, conducted before yesterday's verdict, showed that 66 percent of French people - and 69 percent of RN voters - believe that banning Le Pen would not harm the party, while about a quarter of respondents think it could be beneficial, as it would allow Bardelli to take the lead.
The Guardian estimates that Le Pen's core voters are now likely to rally around her, and that the verdict and sentence could even boost political support for the far-right.
Le Pen was not accused of personally appropriating the money, but of diverting funds to the party. She has consistently called the case a political attack on her, claiming that the judges want her "political death."
The conviction and harsh sentence contribute to her narrative of victimization: that there is an elite determined to destroy her and her party and to make her political career impossible, the British newspaper points out.
Senior party officials had argued before the verdict that the convictions could actually boost support for the National Rally in France. After all, as the Guardian reports, Trump has shown that political support can survive even with a criminal conviction.
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