Back in 2013, when a Socialist minister was accused (and eventually convicted) of tax fraud, the righteous fury of Marine Le Pen knew no bounds. Any politician found guilty of financial misconduct, she fulminated, should be ineligible for office for the rest of their lives. That was very much then. Although a court of appeal on Tuesday upheld her own conviction for embezzling European parliament funds, Ms Le Pen announced the same day that she would be the candidate for her far-right National Rally party (RN) in next year’s presidential race.
Confounding speculation that she was preparing to hand the baton on to Jordan Bardella, her young protege, Ms Le Pen has thereby made the biggest gamble of her political career. The court’s ruling enabled her to make a fourth bid for the Élysée by reducing an eligibility ban to a length of time already served. But it also insisted that she wear an electronic monitoring tag, restricting the hours in which she could campaign. That sanction has been circumvented by her appeal to France’s highest court, the cour de cassation – which may or may not be heard before the presidential election’s first round in April.
Given an inch by the French legal system, Ms Le Pen has thus taken a Trumpian mile. She has, in effect, dared France’s most senior judges to disrupt the final stages of her campaign, at which point she would cry conspiracy. Although previous attempts to depict her conviction as a “political assassination” convinced only core RN supporters, the option of staging an “enemies of the people” moment next spring remains.
Such a strategy may alienate many more voters than it enthralls. And Ms Le Pen’s name still carries a toxic charge that Mr Bardella’s does not. But if any reminder were needed, her dangerous opportunism underlines what is at stake in the most significant election in the history of the Fifth Republic. After polling comfortably ahead of rivals throughout her legal difficulties, Ms Le Pen enters the race as the clear frontrunner in an otherwise confused and inchoate field.
Under her leadership, the far right has profited from a prolonged crisis of trust in mainstream politics, the failures of Emmanuel Macron’s two-term presidency and growing inequality. A formidable blue-collar power base has been built, partly through commitments to social spending and a focus on the cost of living. But aggressive and authoritarian nationalism, and the rejection of France’s modern multicultural reality, remain RN’s raison d’etre.
Given the alarming implications of such an agenda for France, and for Europe, the resurrection of Ms Le Pen’s candidacy must function as a wake-up call across the rest of the political spectrum. Tensions are available to exploit. As the ambitious Mr Bardella has sought to woo big business to the far-right cause, for example, his free-market rhetoric has appeared increasingly at odds with Ms Le Pen’s blue-collar focus.
However, from the centre right to the centre left, parties are still struggling to settle on candidates or even a process through which to select them. Another week of courtroom drama has demonstrated the extent to which Ms Le Pen is prepared to play fast and loose with democratic rules and norms. The threat is clear. The response, for now, is not.
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