PARIS—The fascist international has lost one of its heavyweights in Europe. A Paris court has ruled far-right National Rally leader Marine Le Pen ineligible to run for public office after she was convicted of embezzling European Union funds to pay salaries for party staff. She was expected to run for president of France in the 2027 elections.
The ruling has angered her peers beyond France’s borders. Most are engaged in standoffs of their own with the judiciary in their countries over efforts aimed at reducing the independence of judges and better undermining the rule of law.
Hungary’s nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán was one of the first to react, posting “I am Marine!” on the social network X, shamelessly misusing the slogan of the Charlie Hebdo terrorist attack of a few years ago.
Also on Elon Musk’s platform, many other foreign far-right accounts deplored “the day democracy died in France,” echoing the rhetoric of Le Pen’s deputy, Jordan Bardella, who denounced the ruling against his boss as an “execution.”
“Tell me who your friends are, I’ll tell you who you are,” French Communist Party Senator Fabien Gay said in response to Orban.
“Her ineligibility will certainly provoke strong protests within her party, but also more broadly allegations that French democracy is being denied,” warned the New York Times when the sentence against Le Pen was announced.
Other figures in the European brown camp are supporting Le Pen, including Geert Wilders, the leader of the Dutch Party for Freedom, who said he is “shocked by the incredibly harsh verdict against Marine Le Pen” though he hopes “that she will win the appeal and become president of France.”
The same tone is heard in Rome, where Giorgia Meloni’s neo-fascist government is also engaged in a hunt for “red judges.” The Italian executive is trying to grant “unlimited powers” to the Ministry of Justice in order to better reduce those of prosecutors.
Italy’s Vice-President of the Council of Ministers, Matteo Salvini, is also crying foul: “Those who fear the judgment of the voters often seek reassurance from that of the courts. (…) What is happening against Marine Le Pen is a declaration of war from Brussels, at a time when the belligerent impulses of von der Leyen and Macron are terrifying.”
The leader of the Lega compares the verdict to the situation in Romania, where the nationalist Calin Georgescu was recently banned from running for president for “threatening the constitutional order, forming a fascist organization and false declarations of election campaign financing.”
“They will not succeed in silencing the voice of the French people,” thundered Santiago Abascal, leader of the Spanish neo-Franco party Vox , who hosted Le Pen, Orbán, Musk and other figures from the fascist international at a summit in Madrid in February.
The Tesla billionaire, who is also U.S. President Donald Trump’s top advisor, is always quick to attack judges in the United States and joined in on the French case. Musk castigated the “radical left,” which he claimed “abuses the legal system to imprison its opponents.”
Trump issued a statement of his own, highlighting what he called “a very important matter.” The White House tenant claimed the Le Pen case “makes us think of our country.” He continued the narrative he developed throughout the 2024 presidential campaign, while he was under investigation for his role in the attempted coup in 2021, as well as for the numerous cases (Stormy Daniels, theft of classified documents, etc.) of which he was the center.
Even if Le Pen, the president of the National Rally group in the National Assembly, must leave the political chessboard, numerous brown pawns remain to carry on her work. And as is apparent, her international allies will also carry on the attacks on democracy and checks and balances on their power.
This is an edited version of an article that appeared in L’Humanité.
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