Marine Le Pen must wear an electronic bracelet if running for president, French court says

Far-right leader Marine Le Pen walks outside the courtroom during a short break in her appeals trial in Paris, on Jan. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Michel Euler, File)

PARIS -- A Paris appeals court cleared the way Tuesday for popular far-right leader Marine Le Pen to possibly run for the French presidency next year but said she must wear an electronic bracelet after finding her guilty of embezzling public funds.

Le Pen has previously said that campaigning with a bracelet wouldn’t be possible. But she now has the option of changing her mind, in light of the verdict that her lawyer described as a partial victory.

“It’s a good start,” said the lawyer, Rodolphe Bosselut.

The court ruled that Le Pen had led misuse by her National Rally party of European Parliament funds by paying party staff with money intended for EU parliamentary assistants. She denied any criminal wrongdoing but said the party had made a “mistake.”

The appeals court upheld guilty verdicts for all 11 accused, including Marine Le Pen, other party members and the party itself. However, it scaled back the punishments for her and her co-accused handed down by a lower court last year.

Crucially for her presidential ambitions, it reduced her ban on holding elected office. From five years handed down in March 2025, the ban was cut to 45 months, two-thirds of which are suspended. Because Le Pen has already served 15 months of the ban since last year’s first verdict, that potential obstacle to what would be her fourth presidential run is now effectively removed.

The verdict also cut her prison sentence. It was four years, two of which were suspended, last year. Now it’s three years, two of which are suspended.

Still, the remaining year of prison time, to be served at home with an electronic bracelet, remains a potential hurdle and it’s not immediately clear whether Le Pen feels she can campaign with that condition.

Le Pen, 57, left the court room without addressing waiting television cameras. But she’s expected to share her thoughts later Tuesday, in an evening television interview.

Before the verdict, Le Pen had said that if the court imposes constraints that make campaigning difficult, she might decide not to run. That could include electronic monitoring, she had said.

“If I’m allowed to be a candidate but am effectively prevented from campaigning freely, then you understand that wouldn’t be possible,” Le Pen said in an interview last week.

If she decides that she cannot run with a bracelet, her protege Jordan Bardella would replace her. Bardella, 30, is the current president of the anti-immigration National Rally party that Le Pen previously led.

From the courthouse, Le Pen went the National Rally’s headquarters in Paris, where Bardella was seen earlier in the day. The party faces a potentially difficult decision choosing which of the two might be best placed to run in 2027.

Bardella, a European Parliament lawmaker, lacks her experience and it would be his first presidential election campaign. But while Le Pen is a seasoned veteran, the bracelet makes it uncertain how effectively she could campaign. That and her embezzlement conviction would also leave her open to criticism from her potential election opponents.

Chief judge Michele Agi said in her verdict Tuesday that Le Pen’s party embezzled 2.8 million euros (US$3.2 million), by using European Parliament funds to pay its own party employees.

“The facts are serious,” the judge said.

The judge had been expected to spend several hours reading out the full verdict. But instead, the proceedings were over surprisingly quickly, in well under an hour.

The court room, without air conditioning, became uncomfortably hot as the judge spoke, with temperatures in Paris climbing past 30 C. Table fans provided a slight breeze.

Prosecutors had asked the appeals court to sentence Le Pen to four years in prison, including three suspended, in addition to a ban on holding elected office for five years.

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By Sylvie Corbet And John Leicester

Associated Press journalists Nicolas Vaux-Montagny, in Paris, and Samuel Petrequin, in London, contributed to this report.