Marine Le Pen launches nomination for Presidency despite conviction

A leader of the National Union moved today to the market La Flèche (central France), a city governed since March by the party he heads.

Marine Le Pen, 57, was accompanied by Jordan Bardella, 30, appointed as a substitute if the party leader could not run.

” I am very happy that Marine can carry our flag,” Bardella told reporters, insisting that she did not feel any “deceasement”.

” We are both entering this presidential campaign,” said Marine Le Pen, who is running for the fourth time for elections as head of state of France.

“The Court of Appeal restored my eligibility,” he said, reaffirming “innocence” regarding the charges.

On Tuesday, the Court of Appeal found Marine Le Pen and ten other people guilty of setting up a scheme to employ MEPs’ parliamentary assistants when they actually worked for the party.

For contracts of parliamentary assistants in dispute, the Court of Appeal estimated the total financial loss to the European Parliament at EUR 2.8 million between 2004 and 2016.

Marine Le Pen announced his candidacy for the Elisha Palace just hours after the Paris Court of Appeal confirmed his conviction in the case of European parliamentary assistants.

The reduction of the period of ineligibility to 45 months — 30 of which with suspended sentence — allows you to apply for the post of Head of State.

Le Pen was also sentenced to three years in prison, with a year to be completed under electronic monitoring, but said he will make the election campaign “without the device”.

Dozens of protesters from the French Left met to protest the campaign and the candidacy of Marine Le Pen in La Flèche but there were no clashes with the far-right militants present on the spot.

“I’m not buying time. I am a citizen exercising my rights,” Le Pen told supporters of the presidential candidacy.