(31 Mar 2025)
RESTRICTIONS SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Paris – 31 May 2025
1. Various exteriors of Paris courthouse
2. Various of pedestrians and traffic on streets
3. SOUNDBITE (French) Cristine Blanchet, Paris resident:
”Yes, I think it’s normal, definitely, because people who have problems with the law must not be a senior official in the country. I think it’s quite normal, but I would have gone further, even if it means ineligibility for life.”
4. Various of busy streets
5. SOUNDBITE (French) Emanuelle Fabard, Paris resident:
”If she (Marine Le Pen) broke the law, then she’s punished like any other citizen and it just seems right to me that she should be treated like everyone else, and politicians should set an example.”
6. Various of streets
7. SOUNDBITE (French) Didier Kleber, Paris resident:
”Ah yes, it’s a political earthquake. It’s a bit out of the ordinary, arising from knowing such a thing, but I think it will evolve in the next few months, quickly.”
8. Various of people sitting in outdoor cafe
STORYLINE:
Parisians on Monday reacted to news that a French court has convicted Marine Le Pen of embezzlement and barred her from seeking public office for five years.
"People who have problems with the law must not be a senior official in the country. I think it’s quite normal, but I would have gone further, even if it means ineligibility for life," said Cristine Blanchet.
The verdict is a hammer blow to the far-right leader’s presidential hopes and an earthquake for French politics.
"It’s a political earthquake," said one Paris resident.
Le Pen’s lawyer said she would appeal the verdict – but she will remain ineligible while she does and so could be ruled out of the 2027 presidential race.
She was also sentenced to four years, with two to be served under house arrest and two suspended.
The court ruling was a political as well as a judicial temblor for France, hobbling one of the leading contenders to succeed President Emmanuel Macron at the end of his second and final term.
So broad were the political implications that even some of Le Pen’s opponents reacted by saying that the Paris court had gone too far.
Le Pen herself wasn’t around to hear the chief judge pronounce the sentence that threw her career into a tailspin.
By then, she’d already strode out of the courtroom when the judge first indicated that the 56-year-old would be barred from office, without saying straight away for how long.
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