Marine Le Pen's graft conviction upheld on appeal, sentence reduced

The face of France's far-right, Marine Le Pen, was back in court on Tuesday where an appeals judge upheld her 2025 graft conviction, but lessened her sentence.

Le Pen, 57, had been sentenced to a five-year ban from public office last year by a lower court, as well as two years in prison over a fake jobs scam when she was a member of the European Parliament.

The National Rally (RN) leader then immediately launched an appeal.

She told a party rally over the weekend that she was "not afraid" of the coming verdict.

Per Tuesday's ruling, her ban on standing in an election has been shortened to 15 months, and her prison term reduced to three years — two suspended and one with an eletronic ankle tag.

Le Pen had previously said she would not run if sentenced to legal monitoring, and left the courtroom without speaking to journalists.

After coming second in France's 2017 and 2022 elections, Le Pen had been hoping to make another run for the presidency in 2027. It remains to be seen if her protege Jordan Bardella will now take her place as the party's main candidate.

What was Le Pen convicted of?

As a member of what was then called the National Front, Le Pen was a member of the European Parliament from 2004 to 2017.

Alongside some two dozen former far-right employees, she was found guilty of misappropriating EU funds to pay alleged staffers for jobs that did not really exist.

Prosecutors said she "professionalized" a type of graft first introduced by her father, the late far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen, to siphon EU funds.

Le Pen, the party, and 10 others appealed their verdicts, with her fellow RN chief Bardella calling the trials "politically motivated." She has consistently denied any wrongdoing.