French far-right leader Marine Le Pen said on the opening day of her appeal trial yesterday, which will determine whether she can run in the 2027 presidential election, that she had no sense of having done anything wrong.
Le Pen was in March handed a five-year ban from holding public office, effective immediately, after she and eight other former National Rally (RN) legislators were found guilty of misusing over four million euros ($4.67 million) of EU funds.
Judges said that between 2004 and 2016, Le Pen and others had used funds earmarked for work at the European Parliament to pay staff who were actually working for the party.
The party itself and a dozen parliamentary assistants were found guilty of receiving the money.
In the few words Le Pen said in court, she struck quite a different tone from her first trial, in which she had staunchly denied doing anything wrong and had accused judges of being politically biased.
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