National Rally Funding: Marine Le Pen's Appeal Trial to Take Place from January 13 to February 12, 2026

Marine Le Pen's appeal hearing in the European Parliamentary Assistants case would take place between January 13 and February 12, 2026, it was announced on Monday, September 8. This is a crucial legal and political deadline before the 2027 presidential election for the leader of the far-right, who is currently ineligible.

On March 31, 2025, the Paris Criminal Court sentenced the leader of the National Rally (formerly the National Front, FN) deputies to four years in prison, two of which were to be served, a fine of €100,000 and, above all, a five-year ineligibility sentence with immediate execution.

The court found her guilty, along with 24 former MEPs, assistants, an accountant and the far-right party as a legal entity, of having set up a "system" between 2004 and 2016 to pay party employees with European Parliament money for economic damage ultimately estimated at €3.2 million.

Only twelve of the convicted people and the party have appealed - including the mayor of Perpignan Louis Aliot, MP Julien Odoul, MEP Nicolas Bay, Wallerand de Saint-Just and Bruno Gollnisch, two long-standing members of the RN - suggesting a shorter trial than the first, which lasted two months in the autumn of 2024.

Marine Le Pen 's sentence of ineligibility with provisional execution, preventing her from standing in any election, had provoked strong political reactions, both in her camp and among her opponents, with Prime Minister François Bayrou publicly expressing his "disturbance" .