Le Pen to appeal ban from running for public office, condemning 'political decision'

Marine Le Pen has criticised a court ruling that bans her from running for public office as a "political decision" and says she will appeal.

The French far-right politician was found guilty on Monday of embezzling EU funds and she was barred from standing in an election for five years, with immediate effect.

The decision means that, unless she can get her sentence overturned before the 2027 presidential election, Le Pen will likely not be able to stand.

"I'm not going to let myself be eliminated like this," Le Pen told French TV station TF1. She said she would appeal against the verdict "as soon as possible" using "whatever legal avenues I can".

• Shock verdict rocks French far right

Le Pen has been given a four-year prison sentence, of which two will be suspended. The other two can be spent with an electronic tag rather than in custody.

She has also been handed a €100,000 (£82,635) fine.

"Millions of French people are outraged," she said, claiming that judges have "implemented measures that are reserved for authoritarian regimes".

Le Pen added that she was "scandalised, indignant, but this indignation, this feeling of injustice, is an additional push to the fight that I fight for them [the voters]".

But the appeal process may take a long time.

The appeals trial would probably not happen for another year, and a verdict would come several months after that.

Preparing a presidential campaign under these circumstances could prove complicated.

The 2027 election would have been her fourth attempt, and the one offering the greatest chance of victory.

Jordan Bardella, the 29-year-old president of the National Rally (RN), said on Monday that Le Pen's sentencing was a "democratic scandal".

Bardella also called for a "popular, peaceful mobilisation".

He then posted a link to an online petition which says a "dictatorship of judges... wished to prevent French people from expressing themselves".

"Let's show those who want to circumvent democracy that the will of the people is stronger!" the petition reads.

At the start of the reading of the verdict, the judge, Bénédicte de Perthuis, said Le Pen had been at the "heart of the system" which saw the embezzlement of €2.9m worth of European funds.

Two dozen RN figures were also found guilty and the party was ordered to pay a €2m fine, with half the amount suspended.

Le Pen was accused, along with more than 20 other senior party figures, of hiring assistants who worked on her RN party affairs rather than for the European Parliament which paid them.

During the trial last year, Le Pen denied she had committed "the slightest irregularity".

Before the sentence was issued on Monday, she stormed out of the court, alongside other defendants and headed to the RN's Paris headquarters, where the party held a "crisis meeting".

At the weekend, Le Pen had told media that while she was "not nervous", the judges had "the power of life or death over the [political] movement".

Shortly before her sentencing, Le Pen received messages of support from the Kremlin, as well as European allies such as Hungary's Viktor Orban and Italy's Matteo Salvini.

But some of Le Pen's opponents have also stated they disapprove of the judge's decision.

Media reported that centrist Prime Minister François Bayrou was "troubled" by the ruling against Marine Le Pen, although he did not intend to make a public statement on the matter.

"The choice to dismiss an elected official should only belong to the people," said Jean-Luc Mélenchon of the far-left France Unbowed (LFI).

And Laurent Wauquiez, of the right-wing Republicans, said that the decision would "weigh very heavily on the functioning of our democracy".

"It's undoubtedly not the route that should have been taken."

The reading of the verdict, which started shortly after 10:00 (09:00 BST), took nearly three hours.