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AFP, WASHINGTON
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US Vice President J.D. Vance on Thursday said that French Member of Parliament Marine Le Pen was convicted of a very minor offense and barring her from running for office was “not democracy.”
“They’re trying to throw her in prison and throw her off the ballot,” Vance said in an interview with the Newsmax television channel. “Look, that’s not democracy.”
He said that Le Pen had been “leading in some polls” for France’s 2027 presidential election and had been convicted of an “incredibly minor charge that implicates, by the way, her staff, not even Marine le Pen herself.”
US Vice President J.D. Vance arrives at an event in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington on Wednesday.
Photo: AP
Le Pen, considered a leading candidate in the 2027 election, was found guilty by a French court on Monday of embezzlement of European Parliament expenses and banned from running from public office for five years.
US President Donald Trump weighed in on the sentence late on Thursday, calling it a “Witch Hunt” by “European Leftists using Lawfare to silence Free Speech, and censor their Political Opponent.”
“I don’t know Marine Le Pen, but do appreciate how hard she worked for so many years,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “She suffered losses, but kept on going, and now, just before what would be a Big Victory, they get her on a minor charge that she probably knew nothing about – Sounds like a ‘bookkeeping’ error to me.”
French Member of Parliament Marine Le Pen attends a meeting at the National Assembly in Paris on Tuesday.
Photo: Reuters
“It is all so bad for France, and the Great French People, no matter what side they are on. FREE MARINE LE PEN!” he added.
