Lawfare in France? Suddenly the RN chief’s campaign financing is an explosive issue.
An investigation has been launched against Marine Le Pen on suspicion of fraud in the financing of her campaign for the 2022 presidential election. While the commission responsible for examining campaign accounts issues frequent reports, these do not automatically lead to a judicial investigation. This leaves open the possibility that ‘lawfare’ and political targeting has begun, almost as soon as the legislative elections were over.
According to the Journal du Dimanche, Marine Le Pen is not the only candidate to be the subject of an alert. But no other judicial information has been made known to the press, fuelling suspicions of a politically motivated attack on Emmanuel Macron’s political opponent.
Two days after the second round of the legislative elections, in which the Rassemblement National (RN) party came out on top with 37% of the vote, but failed to win a majority—the press revealed on Tuesday, July 9th, that the Paris public prosecutor’s office had opened a judicial investigation into suspicions of illicit financing. Marine Le Pen’s campaign for the 2022 presidential election is under scrutiny.
Numerous charges have been brought, including “misappropriation of property by persons holding a public office,” “fraud committed to the detriment of a public person” and “forgery and use of forgeries.” However, no details of the charges have been released. The opening of the investigation follows a report made in 2023 by the national commission on campaign accountability and political fundings (CNCCFP).
The process, which began many months ago, has come to a head at a time when the RN has made significant progress in French public opinion and is increasing its vote share both in European and legislative elections.
At stake is the reimbursement by the state of part of the campaign expenses incurred for the 2022 presidential election. These are subject to very strict legal controls in France. For each election, candidates must comply with a spending ceiling set by law, and their campaign accounts are examined afterwards by a specialised commission to check that they comply. If the rules are complied with, the state reimburses part of the campaign expenses. If not, the commission can reduce the sums reimbursed and refer the matter to the courts for investigation. Marine Le Pen has spent €11.5 million on her campaign—some of which has already been rejected by the commission.
At the end of September, Marine Le Pen, who has just been triumphantly re-elected as MP for her constituency of Hénin-Beaumont in northern France, is also due to stand trial in another case, this time relating to misappropriation of European funds in connection with the remuneration of MEPs’ assistants between 2004 and 2016. Since the beginning of the case, the party has firmly denied any illegal practice.
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