French police raid HQ of far-right National Rally party over campaign finance, fraud allegations
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Ms Marine Le Pen aims to get her March conviction overturned so that she can run in the 2027 election.
PHOTO: AFP
PARIS – French police raided Ms Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) headquarters on July 9 over alleged campaign finance violations and fraud, prompting its president Jordan Bardella to decry a “new harassment campaign” against the far-right party.
The raid represents a fresh blow for the RN after Ms Le Pen was convicted in March of embezzling European Union (EU) funds and barred from running in the 2027 election.
The RN has become France’s largest single parliamentary party, but still remains toxic for many due to its history of antisemitism and racism.
Mr Bardella broke the news of July 9’s raid on X. “Since 8.50 this morning, the headquarters of the National Rally, including the offices of its leaders, have been subjected to a raid conducted by approximately 20 police officers... accompanied by two investigating judges,” he wrote.
The Paris prosecutor’s office confirmed the searches, which it said were related to a probe into an unnamed person that opened last week following several reports from institutional sources.
It added that the searches were carried out at the RN’s headquarters, the head offices of several unnamed companies and the homes of these firms’ executives.
The probe involves acts that may constitute fraud against a public figure, loans exceeding campaign-finance regulations, regular loans made to a political party and the party’s acceptance of them, regular loans made to a candidate during a campaign and the candidate’s acceptance of them, aggravated laundering of fraud, forgery and use of forged documents between 2020 and 2024, Paris prosecutors said.
The alleged violations were related to the financing of campaigns during the 2022 presidential, 2022 legislative and 2024 European campaigns, the office said.
No person or legal entity has been charged and the investigation is ongoing, it added.
Though the once-taboo RN has managed to improve its reputation, it has struggled to shrug off accusations of financial impropriety during its rise from a scrappy fringe outsider to one of France’s most powerful parties.
On July 8, in a separate probe, EU financial prosecutors said they had opened an investigation into alleged misuse of €4.3 million (S$6.45 million) by Identity and Democracy, a now-defunct far-right European Parliament bloc that included the RN.
Ms Le Pen aims to get her March conviction overturned so that she can run in the 2027 election, her fourth attempt at top office. Mr Bardella has said he will run if she cannot. REUTERS
