French far right goes on trial for allegedly embezzling European funds for party

France's far-right faces a major trial in Paris on Monday with members of the National Rally (RN) charged with embezzling millions of euros of European funds to pay people working for the national political party.

Twenty-seven members and former members of the RN, formerly called the National Front, are on trial, including former presidential candidate Marine Le Pen and her father and the party's co-founder Jean-Marie Le Pen.

Those charged risk a maximum of 10 years in prison and fines of up to €1 million, as well as having their civic rights removed for five years - a penalty that would make them ineligible to run for elected office.

This could derail a potential fourth presidential run for Marine Le Pen in the 2027 election, even as recent polls place her as the most favourable potential presidential candidate among voters.

The charges range from embezzling public funds, complicity in doing so, or concealment. Those on trial also include MEPs such as Nicolas Bay, long-time politicians such as Perpignan mayor Louis Aliot, and many others who worked for the party.

RN has denied the allegations, which span from 2004 to 2016, to multiple French media, saying they would present their arguments in court. Euronews has reached out to the RN for comment but did not receive an immediate response.

Arriving at the trial on Monday, Le Pen told reporters that the party and its lawyers "have a lot of arguments to develop to defend... the parliamentary freedom that is at stake in this case".

"We have not violated any rule, any political rule or any regulatory rule of the European Parliament," she added.

At issue is whether the party used "European money to finance a job that was not used for European purposes, but only for partisan or national purposes," Christophe Chabrot, a senior lecturer in public law at the Lumière University Lyon 2, told Euronews.

"This is not often for personal [gain]," he added. "They are often embezzlements to finance a political party and as a reminder, in the 2010s, the National Front was in an acute financial crisis."

As of this year, MEPs have access to €29,557 a month for costs related to the recruitment of parliamentary assistants.

Didier Rebut, director of the Paris Institute of Criminology and Criminal Law, told Euronews that embezzlement is "a very serious offence since it is just below what is considered a crime in France".

"The [possible] sentence is 10 years of imprisonment... so it is considered among the most serious offences," he said.

What events led up to the trial?

The investigation dates back to 2015, when the then-president of the European Parliament Martin Schulz alerted French authorities of the possible fraudulent use of funds meant to pay the party's parliamentary assistants.

He also contacted the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF), which was already investigating the work of Marine Le Pen's parliamentary assistants. Corruption investigators in France began looking into the suspicions in 2015 and found inconsistencies in contractual documents.

The Paris prosecutor's office opened a judicial investigation in 2016 for breach of trust and suspicion of organised fraud.

Le Pen was ordered in 2018 to pay the European Parliament some €300,000 over the misuse of funds.

The French trial and indictment against the 27 former and current party members was announced last year.

While OLAF can investigate to support European institutions' requesting repayment of funds, it remains a "European and essentially financial procedure," according to Chabrot, who highlighted that the French trial is a criminal proceeding over embezzling public money.

The European Parliament is a civil party in the case to "obtain compensation for financial and reputational damage," a parliament spokesperson confirmed to Euronews, adding that both EU citizens and French taxpayers were victims in the case.

A previous estimate of the damages, reported in 2018, was that it was nearly €7 million but this estimate has since been updated, according to a spokesperson.

Has this type of embezzlement happened before?

Earlier this year, another French political party faced charges of embezzling public funds. The centrist Democratic Movement (MoDem), which has been in coalition with Emmanuel Macron's Renaissance party, will have to pay €300,000 for using MEP funds to finance the party.

Several former MEPs and members of the party received suspended prison sentences and fines of tens of thousands of euros, but the party leader François Bayrou was acquitted.

Rebut said that while Bayrou's defence was that he was not informed about the misuse of funds, there appears to be more evidence against Le Pen so the defence strategy will likely be much different.

There have also been recent examples of the misuse of EU funds designated for parliamentary assistants.

European prosecutors expanded an investigation last month into a Lithuanian parliamentary assistant to the MEP over fraudulent payments worth more than €500,000 related to "the suspected non-performance or imitation of the actual duties of a parliamentary assistant".

Earlier this year, prosecutors seized €170,000 from Italian MEP Stefania Zambelli and four parliamentary assistants over possible fraud.

"According to the evidence, the four members of staff did not carry out the activities related to the function for which they were hired, or only carried them out partially, falsely documenting their activities to the European Parliament," the European Public Prosecutor's Office said.