Marine Le Pen begins trial for misusing European funds Últimas Noticias

French justice has been trying far-right leader Marine Le Pen since Monday (30.9.2024) for embezzling European public funds when she was a member of the European Parliament, in a case that could cost her her candidacy for the 2027 presidential election in France.

“We have not violated any political norm or any regulatory norm of the European Parliament,” said a “serene” Marine Le Pen before the start of the trial, believing that in this case “parliamentary freedom is at stake,” reported DW.

Marine Le Pen speaks to the press on her arrival at the trial in which she is accused of embezzling European funds when she was a member of the European Parliament/Photo Dimitar Dilkoff/AFP

The Paris criminal court is on trial until the end of November against Le Pen, her party, the National Rally (RN), and 24 others for allegedly paying employees of her party with European Parliament money between 2004 and 2016.

Penalty of disqualification

The majority of those accused – nine former MEPs, 12 former parliamentary assistants and four party collaborators – deny the charges and will seek to transform the process “into a political trial”, according to a Le Pen associate, quoted by the liberal daily The Opinion.

The trial comes at a time when Le Pen has the greatest influence in France. The survival of President Emmanuel Macron’s new right-leaning government depends on her party not supporting the left’s announced vote of no confidence.

The defendants face sentences of up to 10 years in prison and a fine of one million euros. But the biggest risk for Le Pen would be the unlikely imposition of a firm sentence of 10 years of disqualification, which would end her presidential ambitions for 2027.