2027 Presidential Election: Marine Le Pen "asked" Jordan Bardella "to prepare"

Marine Le Pen "asked" Jordan Bardella "to prepare" for the "possibility" of being a candidate in the 2027 presidential election if she herself were prevented from doing so, a "hypothesis" that the leader of the National Rally said she had "integrated" in an interview published Wednesday in Valeurs Actuelles.

"I have accepted the possibility that I will not be able to run. Jordan (Bardella) has accepted the possibility that he will have to take over. I myself have asked him to think about and prepare for this eventuality," assures the MP for Pas-de-Calais, who was sentenced at the end of March to a five-year ban with immediate effect.

A second trial is due to take place in the coming months before the Paris Court of Appeal, which has indicated that it will deliver its decision "in the summer of 2026."

"Until then, I'll keep fighting. Of course, the situation isn't ideal. But what else do you suggest? That I commit suicide before being assassinated?" asks Ms. Le Pen.

The unsuccessful three-time presidential candidate had until now dismissed a Bardella candidacy for the Élysée in 2027 as a purely theoretical possibility, bordering on incongruity.

"If I were to be run over by a truck tomorrow, well, (Jordan Bardella) would obviously be the person who would replace me," she admitted ironically at the end of April.

A united and complementary “duo”?

A certain amount of uncertainty followed between the two leaders for several weeks.

Marine Le Pen had betrayed her annoyance last month, by saying she was "not sure that Jordan, for once, knows very well the problems of New Caledonia" during a trip to Noumea.

From Paris, the person concerned wanted to play it down, seeing it as a comment that he said was "taken out of context" ... while assuring that he too was "very familiar" with the overseas issue.

A joint meeting at the beginning of June and then a side-by-side visit last week to the Paris Air Show were intended to re-establish the image of a united, complementary, even interchangeable "duo" .

But if she could not compete in 2027, Marine Le Pen argues that the election would then "obviously" appear illegitimate.

"I think our opponents and most observers underestimate the anger that could erupt among a large number of voters if I were to be prevented from doing so by the courts," she said, predicting that "many French people, beyond their political convictions, would then understand that the rules of the game had been manipulated."

In addition to the ineligibility sentence, the Paris Criminal Court sentenced Marine Le Pen to four years in prison, two of which were suspended, after she was found guilty of setting up a "system" of embezzlement of public funds to pay party employees with European Parliament money between 2004 and 2016, amounting to €4.4 million.