French far-right leader Marine Le Pen has told a Paris court she hopes will overturn her conviction for embezzling EU funds that she had “no sense of having committed an offence”.
Le Pen, 57, was found guilty last year for hiring assistants who worked on her National Rally party’s affairs rather than for the European Parliament (EP) that paid them.
“The EP did not play its role of raising the alarm as it should have,” she told judges at the start of an appeal trial against a conviction banning her from running for public office for five years.
If the ban is upheld, she will not be able to stand in the 2027 presidential election.
The case at the Paris Court of Appeal will last until 12 February but a ruling is not expected before the summer.
Last year’s case centred on charges that Le Pen, along with more than 20 other senior party figures, used European Parliament funding to pay for National Rally staff in France.
Le Pen was given a four-year prison sentence – with two years suspended and the remaining two to be served with an electronic tag rather than in custody. She was handed a €100,000 (£82,635) fine and banned from seeking public office “with immediate effect”.
More than 20 RN figures were also found guilty in last year’s trial and the party was ordered to pay a €2m fine, with half the amount suspended.
Eleven of Le Pen’s colleagues are taking part in the Paris appeal, but 12 have decided not to challenge the original verdicts, including her sister Yann Le Pen who was given a one-year suspended prison term.
With Le Pen standing, presiding judge Michèle Agi started the hearing by reading the charges and last-year’s verdict.
The RN leader then returned to her seat, in the company of some of the other co-defendants and her lawyers.
Judge Agi then read a report summarising facts of the case, after which Le Pen and her co-defendants took the floor.
“We have never concealed anything, neither in the publication of our organisational charts, nor in the contracts filed, nor in the numerous press articles,” the RN leader said.
Under the French legal system, an appeals court reviews the decision of the lower, first-instance court in its entirety – including facts as well as points of law.
Le Pen will be hoping the Paris appeals court overturns last year’s verdict and clears her name and path to run for the highest office in France for the fourth time.
A second possible outcome would be for the appeals panel to affirm the guilty verdict but remove the “immediate effect” clause. This would enable her to run even if she decided to appeal to the country’s highest court – the Court of Cassation – to overturn the guilty verdict.
A third outcome could see the appeals judges curtail the five-year ban sufficiently to enable Le Pen to register by the March 2027 deadline.
And a fourth would be to leave the lower court’s decisions intact. This would make it next to impossible to run – even though she would still be expected to take the case to the Court of Cassation.
The fifth – which would definitely rule Le Pen out of the race – would be for the original conviction to be upheld and the sentence to be stiffened. After all, the offence may be punishable with up to 10 years in jail.
With the presidential election expected to be held around April 2027, much will depend on the substance – as well as the timing – of the judgements.
The far-right leader has twice made it to the run-off stage and many of her supporters think she has a chance of winning if she is cleared to run next year.
On Monday, the president of her National Rally party, Jordan Bardella, said barring her from the election would be “deeply worrying for democracy”.
Bardella said he would not stand for president but would instead seek the lower-ranking post of prime minister.
An opinion poll – published by Le Monde newspaper on the eve of the appeal – suggested Bardella may have a better chance of winning the French presidency – 49% against 18% for Le Pen.
