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a-u-r-a.com/safety. Check the site for

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details. Walking

1:23

into the criminal courts in Paris

1:25

on Monday, Maureen Le Penne insisted

1:27

she was relaxed about what lay

1:29

ahead. She spent the weekend gardening

1:31

in her garden outside Paris saying

1:33

she felt completely cool and calm

1:35

and collected about this. She took

1:37

her seat on the front row

1:40

and quickly her mood changed. She

1:42

started to become more agitated when

1:44

she could see it was clear

1:46

that the judge was going to

1:48

find her guilty of this massive

1:50

system of embezzlement. The court

1:52

found the pen guilty of embezzling

1:54

millions in European Parliament funds as

1:56

part of a fake job scam

1:58

along with 24 others from her

2:01

National rally party. As the party's

2:03

leader, Le Pen received the harshest

2:05

punishment of the lot, a suspended

2:07

prison sentence, and a five-year ban

2:09

from public office, dashing her hopes

2:11

of a presidential run in 2027.

2:13

As the judge continued with a

2:16

verdict and it became clear that

2:18

she was going to be found

2:20

guilty, she turned to one of

2:22

her neighbours and whispered, Anquyap, incredible.

2:25

She stormed out of court and

2:27

went straight on the offensive. So

2:29

she immediately went on TV, she

2:31

was defiant, she was on the

2:33

attack. She said that she felt

2:35

it was a political decision and

2:38

that she would not submit to

2:40

such a denial of democracy. And

2:42

she said, and she reminded TV

2:44

viewers that millions of people vote

2:46

for her, she said, I didn't

2:48

think the judges would go as

2:50

far as to oppose our democratic

2:53

process and interfere with the choice

2:55

of the French people. Her treatment

2:57

was bad for running for five

2:59

years, and she's the leading candidate

3:01

at the fair, and I'm afraid

3:03

just scobu. Her treatment drew criticism

3:05

from allies around the globe, with

3:08

some leaders seeing themselves in her

3:10

plight. That's a very big deal.

3:12

I know all about it, and

3:14

a lot of people thought she

3:16

wasn't going to be convicted of

3:18

anything, and I don't know if

3:20

it means conviction. But she was

3:23

banned for running for five years,

3:25

and she's the leading candidate. She's

3:27

the leading candidate. Once

3:31

upon a time, really not that

3:33

long ago, being a convicted criminal

3:35

would put an end to any

3:38

political career. But in a world

3:40

where you can become president of

3:42

the USA, despite multiple felonies, maybe

3:44

even because of those felonies, could

3:46

Le Penne's conviction actually help her

3:49

far-right party rise to the very

3:51

top of French politics? From the

3:53

Guardian, I'm Helimpid. Today in focus.

3:55

Will Marine Le Penne's convictions make

3:58

her a martyr. Yeah.

4:02

Angelique Chrysophis, you are the Guardian's

4:04

Paris correspondent, it's been a big

4:06

week for French politics and you've

4:08

been in court following Marie Le

4:11

Pen's case over the past couple

4:13

of months and you've spoken about

4:15

her to us before, she is

4:17

the leader of course of the

4:19

National rally party which used to

4:21

be called the National Front when

4:23

it was run by her father

4:25

Jean-Marie Le Pen and she spent

4:27

years trying to detoxify the farright

4:29

party. next president of France and

4:31

then we come to this below

4:33

this week. Can you just start

4:35

by telling us what exactly have

4:37

Le Pen and her party members

4:39

been found guilty of? Marie Le

4:41

Pen and 24 other party officials

4:43

have been found guilty of a

4:45

massive embezzlement scheme on an unprecedented

4:47

scale and this is the embezzlement

4:49

of European Parliament. taxpayer money to

4:51

pay for parliamentary assistance, but in

4:53

fact those parliamentary assistance were not

4:55

doing their work for the European

4:57

Parliament. They were in fact working

4:59

for the party. So it was

5:01

a way to siphon off European

5:03

taxpayer money into the party coffers

5:05

in Paris. This was a scam

5:07

that was said to have gone

5:09

on for a long time between

5:11

2004 and 2016, and the evidence

5:13

was pretty damning, and much of

5:15

the political class were prepared for

5:17

her to be found guilty, but

5:19

what they weren't prepared for was

5:21

the scale of the sentence. Yeah,

5:23

I can imagine. Can you just

5:25

give us the fine details of

5:27

the sentence? The most dramatic part

5:29

of her sentence was a five-year

5:31

ban on running for public office,

5:34

which almost certainly, because it has

5:36

been delivered with immediate effect, means

5:38

that she can't run for the

5:40

presidency in 2027. She was also

5:42

given four years in prison, but

5:44

she won't go to prison while

5:46

she has appealed at this stage,

5:48

but half of those four years

5:50

are suspended, and the other two

5:52

would be wearing an electronic bracelet.

5:54

and she was also fined 100,000

5:56

euros. And you said that you

5:58

had listened to the evidence against

6:00

her and other party members and

6:02

that it did sound quite damning.

6:04

Were you surprised though just how

6:06

harsh the sentence is for her

6:08

in particular? Well, the sentence has

6:10

to be looked at in context.

6:12

There's been a lot of talk

6:14

in the last decade in France

6:16

of embezzlement fraud, corruption and so

6:18

on among politicians. Marie Le Pen

6:20

was of course the great anti-corruption

6:22

crusader herself calling for there to

6:24

be harsher laws against politicians who

6:26

do anything to do with financial

6:28

impropriety and saying that they should

6:30

be banned from public office for

6:32

life. But about nine years ago,

6:34

the rules were tightened because politicians

6:36

thought, well, judges aren't giving out

6:38

harsh enough. sentences. They're not banning

6:40

people from running for public office.

6:42

So legal observers, a lot of

6:44

lawyers and judges themselves say this

6:46

sentence, ban on running for public

6:48

office and with immediate effect, is

6:50

actually just them observing this tightened

6:52

law. What Le Pen and her

6:54

supporters have a problem with is

6:57

this idea of immediate effect. because

6:59

although she can appeal the verdict

7:01

and the other aspects of it,

7:03

the prison sentence, there's nothing she

7:05

can do about this ban with

7:07

immediate effect, so she feels it's

7:09

undemocratic, the judges say this is

7:11

totally justified, no one can have

7:13

immunity in violation of the law.

7:15

Yeah, and so have the judges

7:17

then effectively just ended Le Penne's

7:19

political career? Not her political career,

7:21

don't forget she's still a member

7:23

of parliament for Nor Padakaléle and

7:25

she can keep that... However, she's

7:27

almost certainly barred from running in

7:29

the 2027 presidential election, which she

7:31

and others say she was a

7:33

favourite for. However, there's a very

7:35

slim chance she could run, and

7:37

it depends on the timing of

7:39

any appeal. An appeal in France

7:41

usually takes 18 months to two

7:43

years. She wants to appeal right

7:45

now. Could that appeal be heard

7:47

before the spring 2027 presidential election?

7:49

Could she be found innocent and

7:51

could this immediate effect ban be

7:53

overturned? All of those factors would

7:55

have to happen for her to

7:57

suddenly sneak in with a last

7:59

minute candidacy for the presidency. So

8:01

she said that she's going to

8:03

appeal, come what May? Yeah, she

8:05

said she's coming out fighting. She

8:07

and the party won't hear of

8:09

any kind of plan B. They're

8:11

currently saying no, I'm going to

8:13

fight this till the end and

8:15

essentially she will be the candidate

8:18

with this hope that an appeal

8:20

could be heard in time. But

8:22

then of course she would have

8:24

to be found innocent of the

8:26

charges she's just been found guilty

8:28

of. Everything would have to be

8:30

overturned on appeal. Let's see what

8:32

happens. And you've heard the evidence,

8:34

do you think that that's likely?

8:36

Well the evidence in court was

8:38

particularly stark. What the judges were

8:40

looking at were were these people

8:42

who had these contracts to be

8:44

parliamentary assistants. Were they actually working

8:46

in the European Parliament? Some of

8:48

them were people that us journalists

8:50

knew, like, a very well-known bodyguard

8:52

from Marine Le Pen and Jean-Marie

8:54

Le Pen, and none of us

8:56

were ever aware that he was

8:58

a European parliamentary assistant. Obviously their

9:00

offices were raided and many email

9:02

communications were taken and some of

9:04

them were quite damning and there

9:06

was one supposed parliamentary assistant who

9:08

were supposed to have been working

9:10

for a member of the European

9:12

Parliament for four months when he

9:14

emailed Marie Lapen herself and said

9:16

I'd really like to see the

9:18

European Parliament and then I could

9:20

meet the member of the European

9:22

Parliament I'm attached to. and he

9:24

was supposed to have been working

9:26

there already. There was somebody else

9:28

who was supposed to have been

9:30

based in Brussels, who really never

9:32

went there. There was somebody else

9:34

who was supposed to be a

9:36

parliamentary assistant and had spoken once

9:38

on the phone to the Member

9:41

of Parliament in question in almost

9:43

a year. So it sounds like

9:45

the evidence against Marie Lappen was

9:47

not simply that she was the

9:49

most senior member of the party

9:51

presided over this corruption, but that

9:53

she was aware of it, given

9:55

that she had received at least

9:57

that email that you just mentioned.

9:59

Yes, the judges found that she

10:01

was at the heart of a

10:03

system of embezzlement and the prosecutor

10:05

said that her party had essentially

10:07

treated the European Parliament like a

10:09

cash cow that had a kind

10:11

of war machine to siphon off

10:13

money from it and certainly there

10:15

were details of meetings and so

10:17

on which showed the judges argued

10:19

that Marie Lapen was at the

10:21

centre of this. And she obviously

10:23

maintains her innocence but she's gone

10:25

further hasn't she in her criticism

10:27

of the judges? Yes, she has.

10:29

I mean, she says that this

10:31

is politically motivated and they were

10:33

deliberately trying to stop her running

10:35

from election and deliberately trying to

10:37

sabotage her career. And her party

10:39

president, Jordan Bardellas, called the judges

10:41

red judges, saying that this wasn't

10:43

a proper legal process and was

10:45

simply a political decision. Neither of

10:47

them talked much about the charges.

10:49

It has to be said. Red

10:51

judges. So Badeo is essentially suggesting

10:53

that the judiciary are a bunch

10:55

of communists that out to get

10:57

La Penn. Right. She has obviously

10:59

said that the sentence is an

11:01

affronts to democracy. Do you think

11:04

there is any truth in these

11:06

kind of assertions that the courts

11:08

that the judges have overstepped the

11:10

mark? Well, the panel of three

11:12

judges listened to this case for

11:14

nine weeks. They then backed up

11:16

their verdicts with 150 pages of

11:18

documentation and said that they simply...

11:20

were following laws voted in by

11:22

the French Parliament on the sentencing

11:24

of politicians who have found guilty

11:26

of embezzlement. And for those of

11:28

us who don't really know the

11:30

French judicial system, is it like

11:32

in America where judges can be

11:34

political appointees or are they completely

11:36

independent from the political system? They're

11:38

not voted in in any way.

11:40

It's a completely independent judicial system.

11:50

Let's talk a bit about the

11:52

reaction to this really dramatic day

11:54

in court. First of all domestically,

11:56

how have her domestic opponents responded?

11:58

celebrating her downfall? Not all her

12:01

opponents. Some of her opponents, for

12:03

example, her long-running opponent on the

12:05

left-wing Jean-Louis Jean-Jean has said, you

12:07

know, this should be decided by

12:09

the people, we shouldn't have this

12:11

kind of decision in court. Other

12:14

people have been harsher. Matthew Lefebb,

12:16

who's an MP for macron centrist,

12:18

said, you know, she's not a

12:20

victim of a political or judiciary

12:22

conspiracy, she's a victim of herself,

12:24

but the traditional right, Lere publicacosa

12:27

Sarko's old party, have been, have

12:29

been... pretty stern about it. Leauvogier, who

12:31

wants to run for head of that party,

12:33

is talking about it being not healthy

12:35

for democracy. Francois Xavier Bellamy, who's a European

12:37

Parliament member, said it was a dark

12:39

day for democracy, which of course echoes the

12:42

way Lippen is talking about it. That

12:44

does surprise me in some ways, because you

12:46

would have thought that they would be

12:48

delighted to see Lippen suffer in this way,

12:50

and also you wouldn't think that you'd

12:52

have sentress attacking the judiciary, would you? Times

12:55

have changed. And if we look beyond

12:57

France, what has the global reaction been? I

12:59

think the reaction beyond France is really

13:01

important politically for the French presidential

13:04

race, because in France, the French

13:06

presidential race, it's very important not

13:08

to be seen to be enthrall

13:10

to any kind of international... powers

13:12

in any international way and what's

13:15

happened is there's been an absolute

13:17

pylon of the kind of global

13:19

populist right in support of Marie

13:21

Lapen which in a way serves

13:23

Emmanuel Macron's charges against her that

13:26

she's part of this kind of

13:28

international reactionary group. So we've had

13:30

the obvious ones in Europe Hungary's

13:32

Victor Orban backing her. Vilders in

13:34

the Netherlands. Orban said, I am

13:36

marine, right? He was the first

13:38

person to come straight in with

13:40

that massive sign of support and

13:42

it goes further afield from Europe.

13:44

Bolsonaro said it was left-wing judicial

13:47

activism. But I think there's two

13:49

points here. The first is one

13:51

of the first people to comment

13:53

was the Kremlin who said, you know,

13:55

more and more European capitals

13:57

were trampling over democratic norms.

13:59

which carries a certain aspect of irony

14:02

in it, but is also not necessarily

14:04

serving Marilla Penn's party that well as

14:06

she's trying to distance herself from the

14:08

cosing up to Vladimir Putin of the

14:10

past. But I think the crucial thing

14:13

has come from the US. If you

14:15

look at the context of this, we've

14:17

had JD Vance's speech in Munich, where

14:19

he's talking about the EU kind of

14:21

rotting from within with an elite that's

14:24

using the judiciary against decent parties, like

14:26

we imagine the AFT in Germany and

14:28

the pens party, it's kind of democracy

14:30

by judges. And so when the verdict

14:33

dropped, Trump himself and Trump's entourage really

14:35

went to town with it. And we

14:37

had a message from Don Junior, Donald

14:39

Trump's son, on social media saying, are

14:41

they trying to show that JD Vance

14:44

was completely right about everything? And then

14:46

we had Elon Musk piling in. Of

14:48

course. Of course. And he said, you

14:50

know, when the radical left, I'm not

14:52

sure who he means by that, French

14:55

judges, I don't know, but when the

14:57

radical left can't win via... Democratic vote.

14:59

They abused the legal system to jail

15:01

their opponents and he said this will

15:03

backfire like the legal attacks on Donald

15:06

Trump. Trump took a while to reply

15:08

actually, but he then did eventually say,

15:10

you know, this sounds very much like

15:12

this country, drawing an absolute parallel with

15:14

his own legal problems, which of course

15:17

didn't stop him being elected or supported.

15:19

And he said, you know, this is

15:21

a very big deal. A lot of

15:23

people thought she wouldn't be convicted of

15:25

anything, which I don't think is actually

15:28

the case in France. I think even

15:30

her own party knew that they were

15:32

looking at convictions. But he said, you

15:34

know, this sounds very much like this

15:37

country like this country, this country, America,

15:39

America, America, America. message from Marie Le

15:41

Pen is that she has to be

15:43

quite cautious and she has been cautious

15:45

about Donald Trump. France is very much

15:48

its own country. It's facing massive tariffs,

15:50

wars with the US. You mustn't look

15:52

like you're selling out your own country's

15:54

interests for the US. And so I'm

15:56

not sure that Trump's comments necessarily serving

15:59

her, but certainly the global outrage she

16:01

has been very pleased to have that

16:03

reflect. back. And if you think about

16:05

Trump becoming the US president for the

16:07

second time in spite of so many

16:10

judgments against him, felonies that he was

16:12

found guilty of, and he still was

16:14

elected to the White House and seems

16:16

more powerful than ever, is there a

16:18

world in which all of this helps?

16:21

Lipen politically and that she can sort

16:23

of paint herself as some sort of

16:25

a scapegoat, you know, that the establishment

16:27

is so frightened of her that they

16:29

are just looking for any excuse to

16:32

bring her down. Well it feeds into

16:34

a victimisation narrative. It feeds into her

16:36

narrative that the system is against her,

16:38

that she and her party are outsiders,

16:40

and that everyone is ganging up against

16:43

her. So yes, and also you have

16:45

to remember that this hasn't damaged her

16:47

yet. So this investigation has been running

16:49

for 10 years, and during those 10

16:52

years, the party has gone from strength

16:54

to strength with her leading it. So

16:56

she's run for president in total three

16:58

times, and twice she's got into the

17:00

final round runoff. And in a last

17:03

runoff, she had a historic score with

17:05

13 million votes. This investigation has never

17:07

put voters off before and her party

17:09

argues very clearly right now that it's

17:11

actually going to bring support to them.

17:14

It may bolster her hardcore group of

17:16

voters but whether it will help her

17:18

reach out to other voters who she

17:20

needs or she or anyone in her

17:22

party needs to win the presidency is

17:25

another issue but certainly it could well

17:27

galvanize support. And

17:34

when I asked you earlier about how

17:36

her domestic opponents have responded, you know

17:38

that quite cautious note that Jean-Luc Melanchion,

17:41

if I've pronounced that correct, on the

17:43

left, you might have thought that he

17:45

would be celebrating her downfall, but him

17:47

saying actually didn't think that it's right

17:50

that these things are decided by the

17:52

courts and that really the voters should

17:54

have a chance to decide. He can

17:57

clearly see that there's a danger that

17:59

Le Penne will use this to her

18:01

advantage, do you think? Yeah, I think

18:04

that's very true. I think that's true

18:06

where we see in relative silence of

18:08

Emmanuel Macron's camp, because of course they

18:10

can't really be seen to making comments

18:13

on the digital system. But one thing

18:15

I would just say, which is perhaps

18:17

a quirk of French politics, is that

18:20

as Marina Pena herself has argued for

18:22

a decade. We're not the only ones

18:24

who did this. And so you can

18:26

sometimes read the reaction through what people

18:29

are facing themselves. So Francois Béru, who's

18:31

the centrist Prime Minister at the moment,

18:33

his party has already faced a trial

18:36

over similar issues on a much smaller

18:38

scale financially, it has to be said,

18:40

because Marine La Pen, we're talking about

18:43

losses to the European Parliament of about

18:45

4.5 million euros. But Bayou was cleared,

18:47

some of his party members were convicted,

18:49

and the state prosecutor has appealed that.

18:52

So he at some point will be

18:54

facing an appeal trial over similar charges,

18:56

and Jolic Meline Jean himself absolutely denies

18:59

any wrongdoing, but has also faced questions

19:01

over parliamentary assistance. Again, he denies any

19:03

wrongdoing, he's not facing a trial, but

19:05

there is a context to some of

19:08

these comments. Yeah, and I guess Lipen

19:10

is far from the only big dog

19:12

in French politics to have found themselves

19:15

on the wrong side of the law.

19:17

Didn't Sarkozy get done for something or

19:19

other? Oh, well, Sarkozy has faced myriad

19:22

court cases, and in fact, he's been

19:24

in the same courtroom that Marie Lipen

19:26

has been in, swapping hearings versus afternoon

19:28

hearings for a trial over presidential campaign

19:31

funding where he's alleged to have taken

19:33

money from Gaddafi in Libya. and the

19:35

state prosecutors asked for him to be

19:38

jailed for seven years. We won't have

19:40

a verdict on that for many months

19:42

to come. It sounds like French politics

19:44

is all a bit mucky doesn't it?

19:47

But back to Le Pen and her

19:49

party. As you said she can carry

19:51

on as an MP for as long

19:54

as this current parliament kind of limps

19:56

on but ultimately if she does have

19:58

to go who will replace her do

20:01

you think at the top of the

20:03

party? I think it's a very good

20:05

question. I don't think we necessarily know

20:07

the answer for sure. The obvious person...

20:10

who she's been training up to be

20:12

her right-hand man for years is Jordan

20:14

Baldella. He's 29. He's extremely young to

20:17

run for president. He's never worked in

20:19

any kind of job outside politics. He

20:21

joined the party's youth group. He's been

20:23

elected to the European Parliament twice and

20:26

he is seen as quite inexperienced. But

20:28

she argues that he could be a

20:30

good candidate. He certainly has the same

20:33

high poll ratings that she has. He's

20:35

very popular, particularly amongst younger people. He's

20:37

just done an autobiography, even though the

20:40

argument was he didn't have much to

20:42

say in it. And it sold 200,000

20:44

copies, and he's constantly signing books all

20:46

across France. It's massive on Tiktok. But

20:49

is that enough for a presidential race.

20:51

We're not sure. He says, look, I'm

20:53

not talking about this now. I backed

20:56

Marie La Penn's niece. She's left the

20:58

party. She's been... in dispute with Maureen

21:00

Le Pen before, she's coming back more

21:02

into the folds. If you think about

21:05

it, I'm not saying she could run,

21:07

but she's one to watch. This party

21:09

is 50 years old, so the national

21:12

rally, formerly the Faun-Nacional, and they've always

21:14

run a La Pen in a presidential

21:16

campaign, whether it's Jean-Marie La Pen, or

21:19

Maureen La Pen. This would be the

21:21

first time they ran without a La

21:23

Pen, if they do. higher wealth photos.

21:25

Because I guess that while he doesn't

21:28

have that instant Le Pen name recognition,

21:30

he also doesn't have all of that

21:32

unwanted baggage that comes along with it.

21:35

Because let's not forget, Marine Le Pen's

21:37

father was an unabashed racist and an

21:39

anti-Semite who called the Holocaust a detail

21:41

of history. Right, he's trying to row

21:44

back on that. Of course that is

21:46

Marine Le Pen's work to change the

21:48

image. of the party, if not the

21:51

content of the anti-immigration policies, has remained

21:53

the same, but this sort of jack-booted

21:55

anti-Semitic image, she's tried to change and

21:58

Jolan Bandela has been key to that.

22:00

He's of course just come back from

22:02

a historic trip to Israel to try

22:04

and caught the Jewish community back home.

22:07

Right. And so it sounds like she's

22:09

got protégé's kind of waiting in the

22:11

wings, but she has been such a

22:14

dominant figure in her own party. Do

22:16

you think that the party can survive

22:18

without her? I don't think there's any

22:20

question of her disappearing in any way,

22:23

because she could still come back after

22:25

the five years if this decision is

22:27

upheld. I don't think she's in any

22:30

way thinking of leaving politics at all.

22:32

Even if Jordan Madela was to win,

22:34

there could be some kind of interesting

22:37

combo where she endeavours to be appointed

22:39

his Prime Minister or a Minister in

22:41

government. You don't have to be elected

22:43

to have that role. Really, even if

22:46

you've got a criminal record, you can

22:48

still become the Prime Minister of France.

22:50

Well, this is the whole debate that's

22:53

currently ongoing about that. Some say yes,

22:55

some say no. I think there's no

22:57

question of her quitting politics. She runs

22:59

that part of this party has always

23:02

been run by one family, one person,

23:04

one Le Pen in a very, very,

23:06

very tight ship. There is no way

23:09

she is letting that go at all.

23:11

Coming up, will this hinder or help

23:13

Marie Le Penne's party in France? And

23:23

where do you think this is going

23:25

to leave the far right in France?

23:27

I think the debate now for the

23:30

next two years is going to be

23:32

a very fraught row over supposed politicisation

23:34

of the justice system, a lot of

23:36

anger, and I think one of Emmanuel

23:38

Macron's potential worries, because it's always the

23:40

way in France. is social unrest, people

23:42

on the streets and so on, how

23:44

unhappy voters might be about this. We

23:47

don't know how it would go. The

23:49

rezamblem and Ashenel are talking about having

23:51

peaceful... demonstrations. They're not a party in

23:53

the last few decades that have gone

23:55

out onto the street. Obviously they were

23:57

in the 70s and was part of

23:59

their problem. But they don't tend to

24:01

do that. She's very much been running

24:04

the parties, keep your head down, wear

24:06

a tie in a suit, and don't

24:08

put your head above the parapet. And

24:10

so it would be interesting to see

24:12

how things develop, but certainly a lot

24:14

of people aren't happy. And when you

24:16

say a lot of people, are you

24:18

talking about ordinary voters? It's going to

24:21

play out. At the beginning, Jordan Bardella

24:23

says, with a kind of leafleting campaign

24:25

and people going door to door to

24:27

explain this grave injustice, it's been done

24:29

to Marie Lapen. Obviously on the left,

24:31

the socialists say, you know, you have

24:33

to respect the judges and what they

24:35

say, but we've already had the government

24:38

says death threats against judges. So whether

24:40

we have the standoff between different parts

24:42

of society, I think is quite worrying

24:44

for Emmanuel Macron. And I appreciate that

24:46

we're only talking 24 hours after the

24:48

judges handed down. this sentence to Le

24:50

Pen, but do you have a sense

24:53

just how divided Francis on the question

24:55

of Le Pen at the moment? Well,

24:57

yeah, there have been a few snap

24:59

polls which found that a small majority

25:01

of French people felt that the justice

25:03

has just been done, that the judges

25:05

were just doing their job. A majority

25:07

of French people think French politicians are

25:10

corrupt. Of course, Le Pen was convicted

25:12

of embezzlement, not necessarily corruption. She wasn't

25:14

lining her own pockets. She was just

25:16

funding her party. But it's going to

25:18

start opening up this idea of conspiracy

25:20

of conspiracy theory of conspiracy theory of

25:22

conspiracy theory. which is already very present,

25:24

I think, in all the European, all

25:27

Western countries probably at the moment, and

25:29

it's not quite clear where that's going

25:31

to lead. And just in terms of

25:33

French politics and the fact that she

25:35

will remain in Parliament for the foreseeable,

25:37

can she cause mischief from the opposition

25:39

benches? I think this is really interesting.

25:41

She can cause mischief. They, of course,

25:44

can vote to bring the government down.

25:46

They have done that before, but they

25:48

need to team up with a left.

25:50

So she can't just bring the government

25:52

down. How's that going to work for

25:54

her? Because she would lose her parliament

25:56

seat. She would lose this massive standing

25:58

she has in parliament and this voice.

26:01

So I'm not quite sure it's in

26:03

their interest, but they like to sort

26:05

of wave that flag at the moment

26:07

to say, listen guys, watch out, we've

26:09

got our eye on you, we've got

26:11

more power than you, because of course,

26:13

you know, they feel that they were

26:15

robbed really of the last snap election,

26:18

which no one was a clear winner

26:20

of, the left alliance did actually take

26:22

the most votes and alliance of left

26:24

parties, but didn't take the Prime Minister's

26:26

position. So there's a lot of mistrust

26:28

on the political system in France at

26:30

the moment. which this could feed into.

26:33

And you've been our Paris correspondent for

26:35

well over a decade now, a keen

26:37

watcher of French politics. How pivotal do

26:39

you see this moment is for the

26:41

future of France? I think this is

26:43

an absolutely historic moment for France. I

26:45

think it could definitely define the next

26:47

presidential election as the left say. Le

26:50

Penne's party is not barred for running

26:52

for the presidency. They're still polling well,

26:54

even if another person would replace her.

26:56

And could this actually serve to propel

26:58

them into power? It sounds like it's

27:00

going to be a very interesting few

27:02

weeks and months in France. Anjalique, thank

27:04

you very much. Thanks, Helen. And

27:10

that was Augely Chrysophis. You can read all

27:12

of her coverage of this case at the

27:14

guardian.com. And if you appreciated this episode, and

27:16

of course, we hope that you did, perhaps

27:19

you'd consider leaving us a review, we always

27:21

really enjoy hearing what you think about the

27:23

show, and it also helps other people to

27:25

find us. And that's all for now. Today's

27:27

show was produced by George McDonough and Alex

27:30

Atak and presented by me, Helen. Sound design

27:32

was by Joel Joel Cox, and the executive

27:34

producer was Hummer Calee Calee Culeleelili. We'll be

27:36

back tomorrow. This

27:42

is the Guardian.