France's Marine Le Pen rejects embezzlement claims as presidential bid hangs in the balance

[November 13, 2024]  By SYLVIE CORBET

PARIS (AP) — Marine Le Pen has focused all her energy in recent weeks fighting what she claims are unfair accusations that her National Rally party embezzled European Parliament funds. France’s leading far-right figure is now facing a crucial moment in a high-profile trial where her eligibility to run for president in 2027 is at stake.

Le Pen is anticipating a guilty verdict, as prosecutors wrap up their case Wednesday and lay out their proposed sentence. The trial is scheduled to finish Nov. 27, with a verdict at a later date.

Le Pen is among 25 National Rally officials accused of having used money intended for European Union parliamentary aides to instead pay staff who worked for the party between 2004 and 2016, in violation of the 27-nation bloc’s regulations. The National Rally was called the National Front at the time.

Prosecutor Louise Neyton said the judicial investigation has shown that the alleged fraudulent acts "are unprecedented because of their scope, duration and because of their organized, automatic and systemic nature." She used her introductory remarks to denounce “the serious and lasting damage these facts and this behavior have caused to the democratic game.”

Arriving at court on Wednesday, Le Pen appeared resigned to hear prosecutors' expected request for a guilty verdict.

They “have to justify this procedure, which has appeared more than a little shaky over the last month and a half,” she said. Asked about a possible ineligibility sentence, she replied: “We're not there yet.”

From the outset of the long and complex trial, Le Pen has been a forceful presence, sitting in the front row, staying for long hours into the night and expressing her irritation at allegations she says are wrong.

A lawyer by training, she follows the proceedings with extreme attention, sometimes puffing her cheeks, making her disagreement known with forceful nods of the head and striding over to consult with her lawyers, her heels loudly clicking on the courtroom’s wooden floors.

If convicted, Le Pen and her co-defendants could face up to 10 years in prison and fines of up to 1 million euros ($1.1 million) each. But in recent days, Le Pen's biggest concern has focused on the court's ability to impose a period of ineligibility to run for office. A similar case involving a French centrist party ended up with fines and suspended prison sentences earlier this year.

Le Pen was runner-up to President Emmanuel Macron in the 2017 and 2022 presidential elections, and her party's electoral support has grown in recent years.

Speaking to reporters outside the courtroom, Le Pen appeared to prepare the ground for a possible conviction with comments about a guilty verdict she described as foreseeable – yet she said there was no question of renouncing or lowering her political ambitions.

“I feel we didn’t succeed in convincing you,” Le Pen told the panel of three judges last week, as she detailed her arguments in a 90-minute speech punctuated with political remarks.

She has denied accusations she was at the head of “a system” meant to siphon off EU parliament money to the benefit of her party, which she led from 2011 to 2021. She instead argued the missions of the aides were to be adapted to the MEPs’ various activities, including some highly political missions related to the party.

French far-right leader Marine Le Pen arrives at the courtroom for the trial over the suspected embezzlement of European Parliament funds, Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2024 in Paris. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard, File)

Parliamentary aide “is a status,” she said. “It says nothing about the job, nothing about the work required, from the secretary to the speechwriter, from the lawyer to the graphic designer, from the bodyguard to the MEP's office employee.”

Le Pen’s co-defendants — most of whom owe her their political or professional career — testified under her close watch.

Some of the aides provided embarrassed and confused explanations, faced with the lack of evidence their work was in relation with the EU parliament.

Often, they could hear her bringing precisions or rectifications even when it wasn’t her turn to address the court. Sometimes, she would punctuate a point they made with a loud “voilà” (“that’s it”).

Le Pen insisted the party “never had the slightest remonstrance from the Parliament" until a 2015 alert raised by Martin Schulz, then-president of the European body, to French authorities about possible fraudulent use of EU funds by members of the National Front.

“Let’s go back in time. The rules either didn’t exist or were much more flexible,” she said.

Le Pen feared the court would draw wrong conclusions from the party’s ordinary practices she said were legitimate. “It’s unfair,” she repeated. “When one is convinced that tomato means cocaine, the whole grocery list becomes suspicious!"

The president of the court, Bénédicte de Perthuis, said no matter what political issues may be at stake, the court was to stick to a legal reasoning.

“In the end, the only question that matters ... is to determine, based on the body of evidence, whether parliamentary aides worked for the MEP they were attached to or for the National Rally,” de Perthuis said.

Patrick Maisonneuve, lawyer for the European Parliament, said the cost of the suspected embezzlement is estimated to 4.5 million euros. “In the past few weeks, it has appeared very clearly that the fraud is, I think, largely established,” he told reporters on Tuesday.

Maisonneuve said some of the defendants seemed to have instructions “to give the same collective answers, as good soldiers, for the party and to save the boss.”

As she was heading to the Paris courtroom last week, Le Pen wished Donald Trump “every success” in a message on X. The French far-right leader, who has vowed to run for president for the fourth time in 2027, may keep in mind that Trump’s felony conviction earlier this year didn’t divert his path away from the White House.
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AP journalists John Leicester, Marine Lesprit and Alexander Turnbull contributed to this report.

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