When convicted for embezzlement, someone should NEVER be allowed to run for government offices ever again
this post was submitted on 31 Mar 2025
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Funnily enough, when the law was introduced a few years ago, her party wanted the penalty to be lifelong ineligibility. They are probably happy it's 5 years, now.
Her party has no principles
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coincidentally, according to conspiracy theorists and paranoid schizophrenics.. Embezzlement is the "fake" charge that The Deep state, The Man, The new world order, the lizard people, etc will always bring against the persecuted patriotic good guy.
in other words. the European and Russian far right will say the charges are fake and that its a political witch hunt.
For 5 years
Good. Still, any real consequences for her? Like prison time? Or will she be granted the usual politician/millionaire+ special treatment and just go on with her merry life minus the extra power?
Reminds me of Portugal's former PM (Mr. Socrates), a few years ago, and 'his' 20M€. Or the convicted felon running the White House currently.
"Le Pen, who left the court before the hearing had finished, was also sentenced to four years in prison with two years suspended and and the other two to be served outside jail with an electronic bracelet."
She can appeal the prison sentence, but the office part has taken effect even if she appeals.
(so she’s on probation for two years in practice, better than nothing I guess.)
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I believe that in French law, for sentence up to two year, you have the right to ask for an alternative to jail. And considering that she isn't homeless and has a steady job, she'll get house-arrest out of business hours. (But it's not just for politicians and billionaire, just that the average convict doesn't have a house and a steady job, so their case is kinda empty at this stage)
But loosing her right to run for election is a pretty big one.
You'd think "not being president" is pretty life changing, but what do I know. In any case, there is a four year prison sentence in there as well. Presumably pending appeal. I have no idea how the French penal system deals with it after that if it holds.
"Not being president" is not a punishment. Just the absence of a reward for her corruption. If the worst she had was "not being rewarded", then what stops every other crook from attempting to seize power?
Absence of a reward is not a consequence for breaking the rules. A consequence for breaking the law is the actual punishment, and that also serves as a warning to any other people wanting to do the same.
That's what's wrong with the system we currently have, and I'm glad at least she got prison out of it. Leniency is what got us here. There's got to be actual hard consequences for mocking the system. Rules are only as good as the willingness to apply consequences for breaking them. It's that simple.
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Enforcing laws on rich/powerful, novel concept in some lands.
What? A right-wing politician actually being held accountable for being awful and a criminal?
Never thought I'd see the day. Good job, France!
This is honestly a fantastic development. Vive la République!
Fuck its only for 5 years.
She was pushing for lifetime bans... When it wasn't her.
They are learning from America and trying a different approach... Jail extremists before extremists jail you.
So presidential! She could be our new president here in the US! Imagine that! First Felon woman president!
Man! We're busting glass ceilings!
A woman? That sounds like DEI, that's not allowed in the US of Trump.
Wow so when a fascist oligarch tries to buy your country you are allowed to say NO?
US right now:
Normally you'd expect this to be pretty definitive, but fascists are real good at playing victims, so I'm not particularly convinced this will move things in the right direction. Electoral losses would have been preferable.
Of course if she did the thing, she did the thing. I'm saying all things being equal I want to see these idiots lose support without having excuses to target democratic institutions in retaliation.
Some "sympathizers" are already crying the justice is interfering with politics. Although the suspension of electoral rights is inscribed in the law, and would you expect anything less of a punishment for someone who corrupted millions of € of public money ?!?
These same "sympathizers" are constantly shouting everywhere that our justice is to soft and that criminals should be punished more harshly.
Yes. They are wrong. Which is why I won't agree with them just because the criminal in question is one of theirs.
And yes, I'm worried that fascists have a history of weaponizing institutions against their enemies when they control them and presenting themselves as victims and eroding those same institutions when democratic processes hold them accountable for criminal behavior.
It's why, while I don't question the criminal outcome, I would have politically preferred for them to lose support electorally before this happened. They are likely to try to capitalize on presenting this as persecution and, looking at historical comparables, they are likely to succeed. It's not like Marine is so charismatic that her absence decapitates the movement by default. She's no Trump.
Still, I'm not objecting to her being inhabilitated or jailed. I just hope the rest of the French political spectrum has a plan to manage the fallout, because so far they haven't even been able to manage the fallout of actually not losing an election, so from the outside looking in my level of trust is low and Europe can't afford to have France spiral down into fascism as well.
Good. In my country, a former PM who embezzled 1.6B is on the verge of being set free, with little in the way of jail time, while a construction worker who stole a loaf of bread got 40 years. Wtf.
Edit: I got the bread story wrong. Not the 1.6B.
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If only America would've done this after Jan 6th
Waiting for the orange fascist to threaten France with tariffs for this.
I wish we could do that in the USA. Must be nice to have a functional government.
Hitler was sentenced for 5 years too lmao
Of course Le Pen's reaction is that this is politically motivated. I'm not familiar with the ins and outs of this case, but am assuming the verdict is sound. Reactions like this are in my mind more serious than the actual offence; they undermine the rule of law. If found guilty in her appeal they should take this reaction into account and ban her from office forever.
Now do Farage.
What AMerica should have done with Trump
Worse than that would be justified.
After the January 6th insurrection he should have been hanged for treason.
Trump should have been banned from running for public office
The French justice system wins and the USA fails.
Elon and Trump will call France out for being anti democracy because of this. Changing the narrative that Europe isn’t a democracy anymore, but the extremely flawed American system is.
For just five years, though. Don't bury the lede.
It's 5 more years than any other recent fascist has gotten
Common French W.