Le Pen rejects court ban on running for office
Newshour
BBC
4.4 • 984 Ratings
🗓️ 31 March 2025
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
France's far right leader Marine le Pen has come out fighting after a court blocked her from running for President in two years, following her conviction for embezzlement. We hear reaction from her party, plus analysis of what this means for French politics.
Also in the programme: the UN's humanitarian chief says he wants answers and justice after fifteen Palestinian medics and aid workers are killed by Israeli forces in Gaza; and as news emerges of Sudan's National Museum being ransacked by retreating forces, we hear from a senior curator.
(IMAGE: President of the far-right Rassemblement National (RN) parliamentary group Marine Le Pen poses prior to an interview on the evening news broadcast of French TV channel TF1, in Boulogne-Billancourt, outside Paris, France, 31 March 2025 / CREDIT: THOMAS SAMSON/POOL/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to NewsHour. It's coming to you live from the BBC World Service |
| 0:07.7 | Studios in central London. I'm Tim Franks. We're starting the programme with an extraordinary |
| 0:13.4 | twist in French politics, one which throws up huge questions about the future of the |
| 0:18.9 | hard right, about the tension between the judiciary |
| 0:21.7 | and the political class, and most directly about who will be the next president of France. Because |
| 0:28.1 | this morning, Paris time, Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Rally Party and the |
| 0:33.3 | clear front-runner for the 27 presidential election, was found guilty in court of embezzlement. |
| 0:40.7 | She was fined and sentenced to four years in prison, half suspended, half to be served outside jail, |
| 0:45.9 | but with an electronic tag. |
| 0:47.7 | But far more importantly, she was immediately banned from running for public office for the next five years. |
| 0:53.9 | Her lawyers say she will appeal, but all the signs are that the woman leading the opinion |
| 0:59.0 | polls will not be able to stand for the presidency. |
| 1:02.7 | Marine Le Pen has now been interviewed on French TV's T.F.1 channel in a combative interview. |
| 1:10.2 | Here's some of what she had to say. |
| 1:14.9 | Do you realize what a dark day this is? |
| 1:18.1 | Monday, March the 31st, 2025. |
| 1:21.5 | What a dark day this is for our democracy in our country |
| 1:24.5 | where millions of French people will be deprived |
| 1:27.3 | by a judge in a trial |
| 1:29.3 | without any recourse possible of the candidate who's considered the favourite for the presidential |
| 1:34.2 | election, in truth, that should scandalise anyone who cares about democracy in the rule of law. |
| 1:40.2 | Marine Le Pen, in combative mode, our correspondent Hugh Schofield was also watching that interview. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.