There should definitely be a trial for Marine Le Pen and 26 other people in the affair of the assistants of European deputies of the National Front, which has since become National Rally (RN). French justice suspects several frontist elected officials of the time of having employed, from 2004 to 2016, party personnel – bodyguards, assistants, etc. – with money from the European Union. The Paris prosecutor’s office requested a trial on Friday September 22.
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There are 27 of them, including Marine Le Pen, three-time candidate in the presidential election, her father Jean-Marie, founder of the party, Louis Aliot, the mayor of Perpignan, or even the former number 2 of the party, Bruno Gollnisch. And they are suspected of having participated in a system of embezzlement of public funds when they were MEPs, explains Pierrick Bonno of the RFI Politics department.
Did they really use part of their parliamentary budget to pay staff who actually worked for the party in Paris? The prosecution believes in any case that there is enough evidence to refer them to the criminal court. A decision that comes just a few days after the launch of the RN campaign for the European electionsscheduled for June 9, 2024.
And this is no coincidence, believes Laurent Jacobelli, spokesperson for the party, contacted by Pierrick Bonno. “ We are now used to seeing the issue of European collaborators resurface six or nine months before an important election. Each time, of course, our deputies prove their good faith. But that doesn’t stop this legal soap opera from releasing a new episode at the start of each campaign. What we hope is that the fundamental debate is not obscured by what could perhaps be maneuvers. »
In this affair, we learned on Thursday that Marine Le Pen had reimbursed nearly 330,000 euros to the European Parliament this summer. But the story will not end there. The National Rally is not the only party concerned by the justice system. The Modem is also in the judges’ sights : eleven people, including François Bayrou, will be on the dock next month in a similar case.
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