Marine Le Pen’s appeal against embezzlement conviction to begin | Marine Le Pen

French far-right party leader Marine Le Pen faces a new hearing on Tuesday on appeal over misappropriation of European parliament funds in a case that will determine whether she can run in the 2027 presidential election.

Le Pen, 57, who leads the far-right, anti-immigrant National Rally (RN), was considered a candidate for next year’s election until she was banned from running for public office last March after she was found guilty of an extensive and long-running fake jobs scam.

Le Pen appealed along with 10 of the 24 party members convicted last year and now faces a new trial until February 12.

The verdict and sentence, expected before the summer, will determine Le Pen’s political future and whether she can make her fourth presidential bid next year. Otherwise, he would be replaced by the young man and party chairman, 30-year-old Jordan Bardella.

Bardella appears to have benefited from Le Pen’s legal drama. Survey conducted by Verian Le Monde and L’Hémicycle A report published over the weekend revealed that 49 percent of French people thought Bardella had the best chance of winning the election, compared to 18 percent for Marine Le Pen.

An Odoxa poll last fall found Bardella would win the presidency no matter who his runoff opponent was.

Analysts have warned that it is too early to paint a clear picture of how the 2027 election race will shape up, with candidates from across the political spectrum yet to be decided.

Le Pen said she was innocent and still wanted to rule France. He attacked what he called the “tyranny of the judges” who wanted to prevent him from participating in the presidential race, which he said he could otherwise win.

“There was a time when you could take a bullet. Now you can take a judicial bullet. In reality, it means your death,” he told La Tribune Dimanche last month.

But recently he has begun talking about Bardella as a clear alternative if he can no longer run for president, telling the paper: “Jordan Bardella could win instead of me.” He said that no matter the outcome, his party will prevail and “its ideas will survive.”

Judges ruled last year that Le Pen was “at the heart” of a carefully orchestrated system of embezzlement from 2004 to 2016.

Taxpayers’ money allocated to members of the European parliament to pay the salaries of their assistants in Strasbourg or Brussels was siphoned off by the party, then called the Front National, to pay the salaries of its own party staff in France.

The staff in France had no connection with the work carried out in the European Parliament. The loss to European funds is estimated at €4.8 million (£4.2 million).

Le Pen was found guilty last March and was banned from running for five years with immediate effect. He was sentenced to four years in prison; Two years of that sentence were suspended, two of which will be served outside prison with an electronic bracelet. He was also ordered to pay a fine of €100,000.

There is speculation about how long a prison sentence Le Pen could receive if she is found guilty on appeal and whether she could still run for president.

The five-year candidacy ban currently in effect began on March 31, 2025. If an appeals court sentences him to a one- or two-year ban from running, it would end in March 2027, theoretically allowing him to run for president in April 2027, the expected election date.

The choice of RN’s presidential candidate will not be announced until this summer at the earliest, as it will depend on the appeal decision.

Le Pen’s sentence sparked outrage among political figures on the international populist right. Donald Trump called it a “witch hunt” by “European leftists.”

German magazine Der Spiegel reported that Trump officials had internal discussions last year about imposing sanctions on French prosecutors and judges involved in the trial and sentencing of Le Pen. The US state department denied this and said it was a “fake story”.

Peimane Ghaleh-Marzban, president of the Paris judicial court, said last week that any action against a French judge “would constitute an unacceptable and unacceptable interference in the internal affairs of our country.”

French government spokeswoman Maud Bregeon said last week there was no evidence of any international intervention but the government would remain vigilant.