The Worldwide Far Right Fringe Rallies Around Convicted Embezzler Marine La Pen

Marine Le Pen inherited her neo-Nazi political party, the National Rally, from her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, who was a little less neo and a little more Nazi. A long-time crook, she was convicted yesterday of embezzling over $3 million from the European Parliament and using it for domestic French politics. She was sentenced to 4 years in prison, banned from holding public office for 5 years and fined around $100,000. This is significant because she looked like the likely winner of the 2027 French presidential election. She’s 56 and will still be able to run again when the ban expires as a political martyr.

Right-wing figures in France and abroad are attacking the verdict and sentence. Even the left-wing Jacobin published a piece by David Broder calling the ban a bad idea, declaring that it’s probable that the ban, which was legally automatic, will backfire. Broder wrote that “banning candidates from running for office due to financial crimes is highly dubious. The damaging effect on the democratic choice seems out of proportion to the crime in question, and (even coupled with a €2 million fine) is ineffective in punishing the party. As left-wing party France Insoumise pointed out in a statement, the Rassemblement National’s claim to be uniquely ‘clean’ and stand against a corrupt establishment is in tatters. But that is for the electorate to judge. France Insoumise added that it had never sought to ‘use the courts as a means of defeating the Rassemblement National,’ but instead relied on ‘popular mobilization of the French people.’” That hasn’t worked with Le Pen’s party being the biggest in Parliament.

A more typical reaction came from Vikor Orban, Hungary’s fascist leader:

This is true

Nigel Farage, far right parties in Italy and Spain, Dutch neo-fascist Geert Wilders and the Kremlin were also sympathetic to LePen, who was immediately carrying on the way you would expect Trump to have done if the U.S. justice system hadn’t malfunctioned during the Biden presidency. She called it a “political decision” and “a denial of democracy... I am going to appeal because I am innocent. I’m not going to let myself be eliminated like this. I’m going to pursue whatever legal avenues I can.”

Taking a moment away from trying to steal the Wisconsin Supreme Court election, Elon Musk chimed in that “When the radical left can’t win via democratic vote, they abuse the legal system to jail their opponents. This is their standard playbook throughout the world… This will backfire, like the legal attacks against President Trump.”