Former head of the European Union agency responsible for border control, Fabrice Leggeri could be elected MEP in the European elections on June 9 with the National Rally list.
In third position on the RN list for the European elections, Fabrice Leggeri won his place in the hemicycle thanks to the party’s good score on June 9. The RN would be credited with 33% according to the first estimates published at 8 p.m., a result de facto ensuring a seat for Fabrice Leggeri given his advanced position on the National Rally list.
Fabrice Leggeri announced he was joining the National Rally list last February. “Today, I am choosing to put my experience and expertise at the service of the French. Directing Frontex for nearly 7 years and working for the State for around 30 years, particularly in security and immigration, makes this decision coherent,” he declared on X.
He has, in fact, worked for a long time for various departments of the Ministry of the Interior and headed Frontex, the European border and coast guard agency, between 2015 and 2022. A strong profile for the RN which notably rests its speech on the fight against immigration. He declared to the JDD that he was determined to “combat migratory overwhelm, which the European Commission and the Eurocrats do not consider as a problem, but rather as a project”.
The 55-year-old senior civil servant, who studied at the ENA and Normal Sup, has a good chance of joining the European Parliament, given the latest polls released before Friday June 7 which gave Jordan Bardella’s list in the lead. He declared to JDD be determined to “combat migratory overwhelm, which the European Commission and Eurocrats do not consider as a problem, but rather as a project”.
Targeted by procedures for “abuse of power”
A disciplinary investigation by Olaf, the European Anti-Fraud Office, notably forced him to resign from Frontex. A report not made public then accused him of “not having respected procedures and of having demonstrated disloyalty towards the European Union”. After his resignation, Olaf would have investigated “possible faults and/or irregularities in the operation and internal management committed” by the director or “by other members of the company’s staff”. Olaf also asked Frontex to “initiate appropriate disciplinary procedures” because of “behavior and its actions towards three members of the agency, including the former deputy executive director”. Still according to this same report, Fabrice Leggeri would have had, between 2017 and 2021, “a management style based on excessive micro-management and centralization of the decision-making process, as well as on distrust of staff”. It would have had a “negative impact” on the working atmosphere and the “well-being” of the staff.
Defended by Jordan Bardella and Marine Le Pen
But according to Fabrice Leggeri, he would have “suffered pressure” and felt “general abandonment”. “The European Commission, clearly hostile towards me, wanted me to leave,” he explained. A hypothesis supported by Jordan Bardella: “Fabrice Leggeri was pushed to resign by Emmanuel Macron because he was acting against the submersion of Europe”, he tweeted. For the head of the RN list, the senior official was “persecuted for having tried to defend the borders”.
In April 2024, according to The worldthe associations the Human Rights League and the migrant defense association Utopia 56 filed a complaint against Fabrice Leggeri for complicity in a crime against humanity and complicity in the crime of torture, accusing him of having participated, by facilitating or covering them, to the pushback of migrant boats by the Greek authorities towards Turkey but also to the interception of migrants trying to reach Italy by the Libyan coast guard. Marine Le Pen gave his support to Fabrice Leggeri on