Jean Louis Marie Le Pen (, born 20 June 1928) is a French
far-right politician who served as President of the
National Front from 1972 to 2011. He also served as Honorary President of the National Front from 2011 to 2015.
Le Pen graduated from the
faculty of law in Paris in 1949. After his time in the military, he studied
political science
Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...
and law at
Panthéon-Assas University.
Le Pen focuses on issues related to
immigration to France
According to the French national institute of statistics INSEE, the 2018 census counted nearly 9 million immigrants (foreign-born people) in France, representing 14.0% of the total population. Eurostat estimated the foreign-born population t ...
, the
European Union
The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been de ...
,
traditional culture and values,
law and order
In modern politics, law and order is the approach focusing on harsher enforcement and penalties as ways to reduce crime. Penalties for perpetrators of disorder may include longer terms of imprisonment, mandatory sentencing, three-strikes laws a ...
, and
France's high rate of unemployment. His progression in the 1980s is known as the "lepénisation of minds" due to its noticeable effect on mainstream political opinion. His controversial speeches and his integration into public life have made him a figure who polarizes opinion, considered the "Devil of the Republic" among his opponents or the "last samurai in politics" among his supporters. He has been convicted for statements downplaying
the Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...
, and fined for incitement to discrimination regarding remarks made about
Muslims in France.
His longevity in politics and his five attempts to become
President of France
The president of France, officially the president of the French Republic (french: Président de la République française), is the executive head of state of France, and the commander-in-chief of the French Armed Forces. As the presidency i ...
have made him a major figure in
French political life. His progress to the second round in the
2002 presidential election left its mark on French public life, and the "21st of April" is now a frequently used expression in France. A former
Member of the European Parliament
A Member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament.
When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the ECSC) first met in 1952, its ...
(MEP), Le Pen served as the Honorary President of the National Front from 2011 to 2015. He was expelled from the party by his daughter
Marine in 2015, after new controversial statements.
Life and career
Early life
Jean Louis Marie Le Pen was the only son of Jean Le Pen (1901–1942). Jean Le Pen was born in
Brittany
Brittany (; french: link=no, Bretagne ; br, Breizh, or ; Gallo: ''Bertaèyn'' ) is a peninsula, historical country and cultural area in the west of modern France, covering the western part of what was known as Armorica during the period ...
, like his ancestors, and had started work at the age of 13 on a transatlantic vessel. He was the president of L'Association des Ancients Combattants and Councilor of La Trinité-sur-Mer. Jean-Marie Le Pen's mother, Anne-Marie Hervé (1904–1965) was a seamstress and also of local ancestry.
Le Pen was born on 20 June 1928 in
La Trinité-sur-Mer
La Trinité-sur-Mer (; br, An Drinded-Karnag) is a commune in the Morbihan department in Brittany, in north-western France. Inhabitants of La Trinité-sur-Mer are called ''Trinitains''.
It is located east of Carnac. The town is primarily a por ...
, a small seaside village in Brittany, the son of Anne Marie Hervé and Jean Le Pen, a fisherman. He was
orphan
An orphan (from the el, ορφανός, orphanós) is a child whose parents have died.
In common usage, only a child who has lost both parents due to death is called an orphan. When referring to animals, only the mother's condition is usuall ...
ed as an adolescent (
Ward of the Nation
Ward of the Nation () is a French civil status with certain attendant rights allocated by the State to those who have a parent who was injured or killed in war, or (since the November 2015 Paris attacks) during a terrorist incident, or while c ...
, brought up by the state), when his father's boat ''La Persévérance'' was blown up by a mine in 1942.
He was raised as a Roman Catholic and studied at the
Jesuit high school François Xavier in
Vannes
Vannes (; br, Gwened) is a commune in the Morbihan department in Brittany in north-western France. It was founded over 2,000 years ago.
History Celtic Era
The name ''Vannes'' comes from the Veneti, a seafaring Celtic people who live ...
, then at the ''
lycée'' of
Lorient
Lorient (; ) is a town ('' commune'') and seaport in the Morbihan department of Brittany in western France.
History
Prehistory and classical antiquity
Beginning around 3000 BC, settlements in the area of Lorient are attested by the presen ...
.
In November 1944, aged 16, he was turned down (because of his age) by Colonel Henri de La Vaissière (then representative of the
Communist Youth) when he attempted to join the
French Forces of the Interior
The French Forces of the Interior (french: Forces françaises de l'Intérieur) were French resistance fighters in the later stages of World War II. Charles de Gaulle used it as a formal name for the resistance fighters. The change in designation ...
(FFI). He then entered the
faculty of law in Paris, and started to sell the monarchist ''
Action Française
Action may refer to:
* Action (narrative), a literary mode
* Action fiction, a type of genre fiction
* Action game, a genre of video game
Film
* Action film, a genre of film
* ''Action'' (1921 film), a film by John Ford
* ''Action'' (1980 fil ...
'' newspaper, ''Aspects de la France'', in the street. He was repeatedly convicted of assault and battery (''coups et blessures'').
Le Pen started his political career as the head of the student union in
Toulouse
Toulouse ( , ; oc, Tolosa ) is the prefecture of the French department of Haute-Garonne and of the larger region of Occitania. The city is on the banks of the River Garonne, from the Mediterranean Sea, from the Atlantic Ocean and from Pa ...
. He became president of the ''Association corporative des étudiants en droit'', an association of law students whose main occupation was to engage in street brawls against the "''Cocos''" (
communists
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...
). He was excluded from this organisation in 1951.
After his time in the military, he studied
political science
Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...
and law at
Panthéon-Assas University. His graduate thesis, submitted in 1971 by him and Jean-Loup Vincent, was titled ''Le courant anarchiste en France depuis 1945'' or ("The
anarchist movement in France since 1945").
Military service
After receiving his law degree, he enlisted in the
Foreign Legion. He arrived in
Indochina
Mainland Southeast Asia, also known as the Indochinese Peninsula or Indochina, is the continental portion of Southeast Asia. It lies east of the Indian subcontinent and south of Mainland China and is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the west an ...
after the 1954
battle of Dien Bien Phu,
which had been lost by France and which prompted
French Prime Minister
The prime minister of France (french: link=no, Premier ministre français), officially the prime minister of the French Republic, is the head of government of the French Republic and the leader of the Council of Ministers.
The prime minister i ...
Pierre Mendès France
Pierre Isaac Isidore Mendès France (; 11 January 190718 October 1982) was a French politician who served as prime minister of France for eight months from 1954 to 1955. As a member of the Radical Party, he headed a government supported by a co ...
to put an end to the
Indochina war
The First Indochina War (generally known as the Indochina War in France, and as the Anti-French Resistance War in Vietnam) began in French Indochina from 19 December 1946 to 20 July 1954 between France and Việt Minh (Democratic Republic of Vi ...
at the
Geneva Conference. Le Pen was then sent to
Suez
Suez ( ar, السويس '; ) is a seaport city (population of about 750,000 ) in north-eastern Egypt, located on the north coast of the Gulf of Suez (a branch of the Red Sea), near the southern terminus of the Suez Canal, having the same bou ...
in 1956, but arrived only after the cease-fire.
In 1953, a year before the beginning of the
Algerian War, he contacted President
Vincent Auriol
Vincent Jules Auriol (; 27 August 1884 – 1 January 1966) was a French politician who served as President of France from 1947 to 1954.
Early life and politics
Auriol was born in Revel, Haute-Garonne, as the only child of Jacques Antoine Aurio ...
, who approved Le Pen's proposed volunteer disaster relief project after a
flood in the Netherlands. Within two days, there were 40 volunteers from his university, a group that would later help victims of an earthquake in Italy. In Paris in 1956, he was elected to the
National Assembly
In politics, a national assembly is either a unicameral legislature, the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or both houses of a bicameral legislature together. In the English language it generally means "an assembly composed of the rep ...
as a member of
Pierre Poujade
Pierre Poujade (; 1 December 1920 – 27 August 2003) was a French populist politician after whom the Poujadist movement was named.
Biography
Pierre Poujade was born in Saint-Céré (Le Lot), France, and studied at Collège Saint-Eugène d'Aur ...
's UDCA populist party. Le Pen has often presented himself as the youngest member of the Assembly, but a young communist, André Chène, 27 years old and half a year younger, was elected in the same year.
In 1957, Le Pen became the General Secretary of the National Front of Combatants, a veterans' organization, as well as the first French politician to nominate a Muslim candidate, Ahmed Djebbour, an Algerian, elected in 1957 as deputy of Paris. The next year, following his break with Poujade, he was reelected to the National Assembly as a member of the
Centre National des Indépendants et Paysans (CNIP) party, led by
Antoine Pinay
Antoine Pinay (; 30 December 1891 – 13 December 1994) was a French conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of France from 1952 to 1953.
Life
Antoine Pinay was born on 30 December 1891 in Saint-Symphorien-sur-Coise. He was a child ...
.
Le Pen claimed that he had lost his left eye when he was savagely beaten during the
1958 election campaign. Testimonies suggest that he was only wounded in the right eye and did not lose it. He lost the sight in his left eye years later, due to an illness. (Popular belief is that he wears a
glass eye
An ocular prosthesis, artificial eye or glass eye is a type of craniofacial prosthesis that replaces an absent natural eye following an enucleation, evisceration, or orbital exenteration. The prosthesis fits over an orbital implant and under ...
.) During the 1950s, Le Pen took a close interest in the
Algerian War (1954–62) and the French defence budget.
Elected deputy of the French Parliament under the
Poujadist
Pierre Poujade (; 1 December 1920 – 27 August 2003) was a French populist
Populism refers to a range of political stances that emphasize the idea of "the people" and often juxtapose this group against " the elite". It is frequently a ...
banner, Le Pen voluntarily reengaged himself for two to three months in the French Foreign Legion. He was then sent to
Algeria
)
, image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg
, map_caption =
, image_map2 =
, capital = Algiers
, coordinates =
, largest_city = capital
, relig ...
(1957) as an
intelligence officer
An intelligence officer is a person employed by an organization to collect, compile or analyze information (known as intelligence) which is of use to that organization. The word of ''officer'' is a working title, not a rank, used in the same way ...
. He has been accused of having engaged in
torture
Torture is the deliberate infliction of severe pain or suffering on a person for reasons such as punishment, extracting a confession, interrogational torture, interrogation for information, or intimidating third parties. definitions of tortur ...
. Le Pen has denied these accusations, although he admitted knowing of its use.
Far-right politics
Le Pen directed the
1965 presidential campaign of far-right candidate
Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour
Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour (12 October 1907 – 29 September 1989) was a French lawyer and far-right politician. Elected to the National Assembly in 1936, he initially collaborated with the Vichy regime before leaving for Tunisia in 1941. After a ...
, who obtained 5.19% of the votes. He insisted on the rehabilitation of the
Collaborationists, declaring that:
In 1962, Le Pen lost his seat in the Assembly. He created the Serp (''Société d'études et de relations publiques'') firm, a company involved in the
music industry, which specialized in historical recordings and sold recordings of the choir of the
CGT trade-union and songs of the
Popular Front
A popular front is "any coalition of working-class and middle-class parties", including liberal and social democratic ones, "united for the defense of democratic forms" against "a presumed Fascist assault".
More generally, it is "a coalition ...
, as well as
Nazi
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...
marches.
National Front
In 1972, Le Pen founded the
Front National
The National Rally (french: Rassemblement National, ; RN), until 2018 known as the National Front (french: link=no, Front National, ; FN), is a far-rightAbridged list of reliable sources that refer to National Rally as far-right:
Academic:
...
(FN) party. He then ran in the
1974 presidential election, obtaining 0.74% of the vote.
In 1976, his Parisian flat was dynamited (he lived at that time in his
mansion of Montretout in Saint-Cloud). The crime was never solved.
Le Pen then failed to obtain the 500 signatures from "grand electors" (''grands électeurs'', mayors, etc.) necessary to present himself in the
1981 presidential election, won by the candidate of the
Socialist Party
Socialist Party is the name of many different political parties around the world. All of these parties claim to uphold some form of socialism, though they may have very different interpretations of what "socialism" means. Statistically, most of t ...
(PS),
François Mitterrand.
Criticizing immigration and taking advantage of the economic crisis striking France and the world since the
1973 oil crisis, Le Pen's party managed to increase its support in the 1980s, starting in the municipal elections of 1983. His popularity has been greatest in the south and east of France. The FN obtained 16 seats in the
1984 European elections. A total of 35 FN deputies entered the Assembly after the
1986 elections
The following elections occurred in the year 1986.
Africa
* 1986 Angolan legislative election
* 1986 Gabonese presidential election
* 1986 Mozambican general election
* 1986 Sierra Leonean parliamentary election
* 1986 Somali presidential elec ...
(the only legislative elections held under proportional representation), which were won by the right wing, bringing
Jacques Chirac to Matignon in the first
cohabitation
Cohabitation is an arrangement where people who are not married, usually couples, live together. They are often involved in a romantic or sexually intimate relationship on a long-term or permanent basis. Such arrangements have become increas ...
government (that is, the combination of a right-wing Prime minister, Chirac, with a socialist President, Mitterrand). In Paris, Jean-Marie Le Pen was elected to the National Assembly.
In 1984, Le Pen won a seat in the
European Parliament
The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...
and has been consistently reelected since then. In 1988 he lost his reelection bid for the
French National Assembly in the
Bouches-du-Rhône
Bouches-du-Rhône ( , , ; oc, Bocas de Ròse ; "Mouths of the Rhône") is a department in Southern France. It borders Vaucluse to the north, Gard to the west and Var to the east. The Mediterranean Sea lies to the south. Its prefecture and ...
's 8th constituency. He was defeated in the second round by
Socialist
Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...
Marius Masse. In 1991 Le Pen's invite to London by Conservative MPs was militantly protested by large numbers coordinated by the Campaign Against Fascism in Europe, CAFE, which led to a surge of anti-fascist groups and activity across Europe. In 1992 and 1998 he was elected to the
regional
In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as zones, lands or territories, are areas that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and the interaction of humanity and t ...
council of
Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur.
Le Pen ran in the French presidential elections in 1974, 1988, 1995, 2002, and 2007. As noted above, he was not able to run for office in 1981, having failed to gather the necessary 500 signatures of elected officials. In the
presidential elections of 2002, Le Pen obtained 16.86% of the votes in the first round of voting. This was enough to qualify him for the second round, as a result of the poor showing by the PS candidate and incumbent prime minister
Lionel Jospin
Lionel Robert Jospin (; born 12 July 1937) is a French politician who served as Prime Minister of France from 1997 to 2002.
Jospin was First Secretary of the Socialist Party from 1995 to 1997 and the party's candidate for President of France in ...
and the scattering of votes among 15 other candidates. This was a major political event, both nationally and internationally, as it was the first time someone with such far right views had qualified for the second round of the French presidential elections. There was a widespread stirring of national public opinion as virtually the entire French political spectrum from the centre-right to the left united in fierce opposition to Le Pen's ideas. More than one million people in France took part in street rallies; slogans such as "A crook is better than a fascist" ("Un escroc mieux qu'un facho") and "Graft rather than hate, Chirac rather than Le Pen" ("L'arnaque plutôt que la haine, Chirac plutôt que Le Pen") were heard in opposition to Le Pen. Le Pen was then defeated by a large margin in the second round, when incumbent president Jacques Chirac obtained 82% of the votes, thus securing the biggest majority in the history of the
Fifth Republic.
In the
2004 regional elections, Le Pen intended to run for office in the
Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur region but was prevented from doing so because he did not meet the conditions for being a voter in that region: he neither lived there nor was registered as a taxpayer there. However, he was planned to be the FN's top candidate in the region for the
2010 regional elections.
Le Pen again ran in the
2007 French presidential election and finished fourth. His 2007 campaign, at the age of 78 years and 9 months, makes him the oldest candidate for presidential office in
French history
The first written records for the history of France appeared in the Iron Age. What is now France made up the bulk of the region known to the Romans as Gaul. The first writings on indigenous populations mainly start in the first century BC. Greek ...
.
Le Pen has been a vocal critic of the European Reform Treaty (formally known as the
Treaty of Lisbon
The Treaty of Lisbon (initially known as the Reform Treaty) is an international agreement that amends the two treaties which form the constitutional basis of the European Union (EU). The Treaty of Lisbon, which was signed by the EU member s ...
) which was signed by EU member states on 13 December 2007, and entered into force on 1 December 2009. In October 2007, Le Pen suggested that he would personally visit Ireland to assist the "No" campaign but finally changed his mind, fearing that his presence would be used against the supporters of the NO vote. Ireland finally refused to ratify the treaty. Ireland is the only EU country which had a citizen referendum. All other EU states, including France, ratified the treaty by parliamentary vote, despite a previous citizen referendum where over 55% of French voters rejected the European Reform Treaty (although that vote was on a different draft of the Treaty in the form of the Constitutional Treaty). After the Irish "No" vote, Le Pen addressed the French President
Nicolas Sarkozy in the
European Parliament
The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...
, accusing him of furthering the agenda of a "cabal of international finance and free market fanatics." Ireland has since accepted the treaty in a second Lisbon referendum.
After Le Pen left office in January 2011, his daughter
Marine Le Pen was elected by the adherents of the party against
Bruno Gollnisch
Bruno Gollnisch (; born 28 January 1950) is a French academic and politician, a member of the National Front (FN) far-right party. He was a member of the European Parliament and was chairman of the European Parliamentary group ' Identity, Tra ...
. He became honorary chairman of the party and won his seat again at the
European elections in 2014.
On 4 May 2015, Le Pen was suspended from the party after refusing to attend his disciplinary hearing for describing the gas chambers, used in concentration camps during the
Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...
, as a "detail" of history. A French court decided in June to cancel this suspension; although the members of the party were to hold a vote to accept or reject a whole series of measures aiming at changing the
National Front's status, including Le Pen's Honorary Presidency. On July 10, another French court ruled to suspend the vote two days beforehand and urged the party to organize an in-person Congress, as Le Pen sued the National Front again. The party decided to appeal against both of these decisions. The FN then decided, on July 29, to count the votes on the suppression of Le Pen's Honorary Presidency, which showed that 94% of the members were in favor of this decision. However, due to the legal challenges to the FN's removal of Le Pen as its honorary president, he continued to officially hold the position.
In August 2015, Le Pen was expelled from the National Front after a special party congress. He has since founded the
Comités Jeanne.
Personal life, wealth and security
Le Pen's marriage to
Pierrette Le Pen
Pierrette Le Pen (née Pierrette Lallane; born September 10, 1935) is the ex-wife of Jean-Marie Le Pen and the mother of Marine Le Pen.
Biography
Pierrette was the daughter of a wine seller from the Landes department in southwestern France. Pi ...
from 29 June 1960 to 18 March 1987 resulted in three daughters, who have given him nine granddaughters. The break-up of the marriage was somewhat dramatic, with his ex-wife posing nude, to ridicule him, in the French edition of ''
Playboy
''Playboy'' is an American men's Lifestyle magazine, lifestyle and entertainment magazine, formerly in print and currently online. It was founded in Chicago in 1953, by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from H ...
'' which printed 100,000 more than the normal production of 150,000 nevertheless needed to print a second printing of 150,000, to satisfy demand.
Marie-Caroline, one of his daughters, broke with Le Pen, following her husband to join
Bruno Mégret
Bruno Mégret (; born 4 April 1949) is a French former nationalist politician. He was the leader of the Mouvement National Républicain political party, but retired in 2008 from all political action.
Youth and studies
Born in Paris, Bruno Mégre ...
, who split from the FN to found the rival
Mouvement National Républicain
The National Republican Movement (''Mouvement national républicain'' or MNR) is a French nationalist political party, created by Bruno Mégret with former Club de l'Horloge members Yvan Blot (also a member of GRECE) and Jean-Yves Le Gallou, as ...
(MNR, National Republican Movement).
The youngest of Le Pen's daughters,
Marine Le Pen, is leader of the
National Rally. On 31 May 1991, Jean-Marie Le Pen married Jeanne-Marie Paschos ("Jany"), of Greek descent. Born in 1933, Paschos was previously married to Belgian businessman Jean Garnier.
In 1977, Le Pen inherited a fortune from Hubert Lambert (1934–1976), son of the cement industrialist Leon Lambert (1877–1952), one of three sons of Lambert Cement founder Hilaire Lambert. Hubert Lambert was a political supporter of Le Pen and a
monarchist
Monarchism is the advocacy of the system of monarchy or monarchical rule. A monarchist is an individual who supports this form of government independently of any specific monarch, whereas one who supports a particular monarch is a royalist. ...
as well.
[ Lambert's will provided 30 million francs (approximately €5 million) to Le Pen, as well as his opulent three-storey 11-room mansion at 8 Parc de Montretout, ]Saint-Cloud
Saint-Cloud () is a commune in the western suburbs of Paris, France, from the centre of Paris. Like other communes of Hauts-de-Seine such as Marnes-la-Coquette, Neuilly-sur-Seine and Vaucresson, Saint-Cloud is one of France's wealthiest tow ...
, in the western suburbs of Paris. The home had been built by Napoleon III
Napoleon III (Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte; 20 April 18089 January 1873) was the first President of France (as Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte) from 1848 to 1852 and the last monarch of France as Emperor of the French from 1852 to 1870. A nephew ...
for his chief of staff Jean-François Mocquard.[Le Pen, son univers impitoyable](_blank)
, ''Radio France Internationale
Radio France Internationale, usually referred to as RFI, is the state-owned international radio broadcaster of France. With 37.2 million listeners in 2014, it is one of the most-listened-to international radio stations in the world, along with ...
'', 1 September 2006 With his wife, he also owns a two-story townhouse on the Rue Hortense in Rueil-Malmaison
Rueil-Malmaison () is a commune in the western suburbs of Paris, in the Hauts-de-Seine department, Île-de-France region. It is located from the centre of Paris. In 2017, it had a population of 78,152. It is one of the wealthiest suburbs of P ...
and another house in his hometown of La Trinité-sur-Mer.
In the early 1980s, Le Pen's personal security was assured by KO International Company, a subsidiary of VHP Security, a private security
A private security company (PSC) is a business entity which provides armed or unarmed security services and expertise to clients in the private or public sectors.
Overview
Private security companies are defined by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Stat ...
firm, and an alleged front organisation for ''SAC'', the ''Service d'Action Civique
The SAC (french: Service d'Action Civique; or ''Civic Action Service''), officially created in January 1960, was a Gaullist militia founded by Jacques Foccart, Charles de Gaulle's chief adviser for African matters, and , a former Resistant and ...
'' (Civic Action Service), a Gaullist organisation. SAC allegedly employed figures with organized crime backgrounds and from the far-right movement.[Le général croate Gotovina arrêté en Espagne](_blank)
RFI, 8 December 2005 [Le chauffeur de l'homme de la Question](_blank)
, ''L'Humanité
''L'Humanité'' (; ), is a French daily newspaper. It was previously an organ of the French Communist Party, and maintains links to the party. Its slogan is "In an ideal world, ''L'Humanité'' would not exist."
History and profile
Pre-World Wa ...
'', 10 December 2005
Electoral record
''National Assembly of France''
*Member of the National Assembly of France for Paris: 1956–1962 / 1986–1988. Elected in 1956, reelected in 1958, 1986.
*President of the National Front political grouping: 1986–1988.
''Municipal Council''
*Municipal councillor for the 20th arrondissement of Paris: 1983–1989.
''European Parliament''
*Member of European Parliament
The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...
: 1984–2003 (Sentenced by the courts in 2003) / Since 2004. Elected in 1984, reelected in 1989, 1994, 1999, 2004, 2009, 2014.
''Regional Council''
*Regional councillor of Île-de-France
The Île-de-France (, ; literally "Isle of France") is the most populous of the eighteen regions of France. Centred on the capital Paris, it is located in the north-central part of the country and often called the ''Région parisienne'' (; en, Pa ...
: 1986–1992.
*Regional councillor of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur
Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur (; or , ; commonly shortened to PACA; en, Provence-Alps-French Riviera, italic=yes; also branded as Région Sud) is one of the eighteen administrative regions of France, the far southeastern on the mainland. Its pref ...
: 1992–2000 (sentenced by the courts in 2000) / Since 2010–2015. Reelected in 1998, 2010.
Issues and policy positions
:''See also National Rally for more information of Le Pen's views.''
Death penalty
Le Pen supports bringing back the death penalty in France.
Controversial statements
Le Pen has been accused and convicted several times["Le Pen convicted of inciting racial hatred for anti-Muslim remarks"]
Associated Press, 2 April 2004. Retrieved 18 October 2008. at home and abroad of xenophobia
Xenophobia () is the fear or dislike of anything which is perceived as being foreign or strange. It is an expression of perceived conflict between an in-group and out-group and may manifest in suspicion by the one of the other's activities, a ...
and antisemitism
Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism.
Antis ...
. A Paris court found in February 2005 that his verbal criticisms, such as remarks disparaging Muslims in a 2003 ''Le Monde
''Le Monde'' (; ) is a French daily afternoon newspaper. It is the main publication of Le Monde Group and reported an average circulation of 323,039 copies per issue in 2009, about 40,000 of which were sold abroad. It has had its own website si ...
'' interview, were "inciting racial hatred", and he was fined €10,000 and ordered to pay an additional €5,000 in damages to the ''Ligue des droits de l'homme
The Human Rights League (french: Ligue des droits de l’homme ''t du citoyen' or LDH) of France is a Human Rights NGO association to observe, defend and promulgation of Rights Man within the French Republic in all spheres of public life. The ...
'' (League for Human Rights). The conviction and fines were upheld by the Court of Cassation
A court of cassation is a high-instance court that exists in some judicial systems. Courts of cassation do not re-examine the facts of a case, they only interpret the relevant law. In this they are appellate courts of the highest instance. In th ...
in 2006.["France's far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen convicted of inciting racial hatred"]
Associated Press, 11 May 2006. Retrieved 18 October 2008.
* In May 1987, he advocated the forced isolation from society of all people infected with HIV, by placing them in a special "sidatorium". "Sidaïque" is Le Pen's pejorative solecism
A solecism is a phrase that transgresses the rules of grammar. The term is often used in the context of linguistic prescription; it also occurs descriptively in the context of a lack of idiomaticness.
Etymology
The word originally was used by ...
for "person infected with AIDS" (the more usual French term is " séropositif" (seropositive))["Le Pen et le sida: les modes de contagion et l'exclusion"]
, ''L'Heure de vérité,'' Antenne 2
France 2 () is a French public national television channel. It is part of the state-owned France Télévisions group, along with France 3, France 4 and France 5. France Télévisions also participates in Arte and Euronews.
Since 3:20 CET on 7 ...
, 6 May 1987 (QuickTime video, French). Retrieved 19 October 2008. The term "sidatorium" was coined by François Bachelot.[Renaud Dely]
François Bachelot. Celui qui a soufflé à Le Pen ses «sidatoriums» poursuit sa carrière de cancérologue.
'' Libération'', 11 August 1999
* On 21 June 1995, he attacked singer Patrick Bruel, who is of Algerian Jewish descent, on his policy of no longer singing in the city of Toulon
Toulon (, , ; oc, label= Provençal, Tolon , , ) is a city on the French Riviera and a large port on the Mediterranean coast, with a major naval base. Located in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region, and the Provence province, Toulon is th ...
because the city had just elected a mayor from the National Front. Le Pen said, "the city of Toulon will then have to get along without the vocalisations of singer Benguigui". Benguigui, an Algerian name, is Bruel's birth name.
* In February 1997, Le Pen accused Chirac of being "on the payroll of Jewish organizations, and particularly of the B'nai B'rith
B'nai B'rith International (, from he, בְּנֵי בְּרִית, translit=b'né brit, lit=Children of the Covenant) is a Jewish service organization. B'nai B'rith states that it is committed to the security and continuity of the Jewish peo ...
"[Nicolas Domenach and Maurice Szafran, ''Le Roman d'un President'', Pion: 1997, ][Douglas Johnson]
"Ancient and Modern"
''The Spectator'', 15 March 1997. Retrieved 19 October 2008.
* Le Pen once made the infamous pun "Durafour-crématoire" ("four crématoire" meaning "crematory oven") about then-minister Michel Durafour, who had said in public a few days before, "One must ''exterminate'' the National Front".
*On many occasions, before and after the FIFA World Cup, he claimed that the French World Cup squad contained too many non-white players, and was not an accurate reflection of French society. He went on to scold players for not singing ''La Marseillaise
"La Marseillaise" is the national anthem of France. The song was written in 1792 by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle in Strasbourg after the declaration of war by France against Austria, and was originally titled "Chant de guerre pour l'Armée du R ...
'', saying they were not "French".
* In the 2007 election campaign, he referred to fellow-candidate Nicolas Sarkozy, who is of partial Greek Jewish and Hungarian descent, as "foreign" or "the foreigner."
*In a 2014 video on the National Front's website, Le Pen reacted to criticism of him by Jewish singer Patrick Bruel with "next time we'll do a whole oven batch!" Le Pen later claimed the comments made no anti-Semitic connotations "except for my political enemies or imbeciles".
Arguing that his party includes people of various ethnic or religious origins like Jean-Pierre Cohen, Farid Smahi or Huguette Fatna, he has attributed some anti-Semitism in France to the effects of Muslim immigration to Europe and suggested that some part of the Jewish community in France might eventually come to appreciate National Front ideology. Le Pen has denied man-made climate change and has linked climate science with communism
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a ...
.
He also infamously compared gays to soup with salt, saying "it's like salt with soup: if there is not enough, it's too bland, and if it's too much, it's undrinkable" and compared pedophilia with "the exaltation of homosexuality".
Prosecution concerning Holocaust denial
Le Pen has made several provocative statements concerning the Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...
which have been interpreted by the legal system as constituting Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial is an antisemitic conspiracy theory that falsely asserts that the Nazi genocide of Jews, known as the Holocaust, is a myth, fabrication, or exaggeration. Holocaust deniers make one or more of the following false statements: ...
. He has been convicted of racism or inciting racial hatred at least six times. Thus, on 13 September 1987, he said, "I ask myself several questions. I'm not saying the gas chambers didn't exist. I haven't seen them myself. I haven't particularly studied the question. But I believe it's just a detail in the history of World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
." For Le Pen, the French deportation of 76,000 Jews from France to Nazi concentration camps
From 1933 to 1945, Nazi Germany operated more than a thousand concentration camps, (officially) or (more commonly). The Nazi concentration camps are distinguished from other types of Nazi camps such as forced-labor camps, as well as con ...
, where they were killed, is a trivial matter, and he denies that 6 million Jews were killed, saying "I don't think there were that many deaths. There weren't 6 million ... There weren't mass murders as it's been said." He was eventually condemned under the Gayssot Act
The Gayssot Act or Gayssot Law (french: Loi Gayssot), enacted on 13 July 1990, makes it an offence in France to question the existence or size of the category of crimes against humanity as defined in the London Charter of 1945, on the basis of wh ...
to pay 1.2 million francs
The franc is any of various units of currency. One franc is typically divided into 100 centimes. The name is said to derive from the Latin inscription ''francorum rex'' (King of the Franks) used on early French coins and until the 18th centu ...
(€183,200).
In 1997, the European Parliament
The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...
, of which Le Pen was then a member, removed his parliamentary immunity so that Le Pen could be tried by a German court in Germany, for comments he made at a December 1996 press conference before the German Republikaner party. Echoing his 1987 remarks in France, Le Pen stated: "If you take a 1,000-page book on World War II, the concentration camps take up only two pages and the gas chambers 10 to 15 lines. This is what one calls a detail." In June 1999, a Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...
court found this statement to be "minimizing the Holocaust, which caused the deaths of six million Jews," and convicted and fined Le Pen for his remarks.["Le Pen Convicted for Racial Hatred"]
Associated Press, 2 June 1999. Retrieved 18 October 2008. Le Pen retorted ironically: "I understand now that it's the Second World War which is a detail of the history of the gas chambers."
Other legal problems and allegations
*Prosecution for assault: In April 2000, Le Pen was suspended from the European Parliament
The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...
following prosecution for the physical assault of Socialist candidate Annette Peulvast-Bergeal during the 1997 general election. This ultimately led to him losing his seat in the European parliament in 2003. The Versailles appeals court banned him from seeking office for one year.[Julian Nundy]
"One-year election ban for Le Pen"
''The Scotsman'', 18 November 1998. Retrieved 18 October 2008.
*Statements about Muslims in France: In 2005 and 2008, Le Pen was fined, in both case €10,000 for "incitement to discrimination, hatred and violence towards a group of people", on account of statements made about Muslims in France. In 2010. The European Court of Human Rights
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR or ECtHR), also known as the Strasbourg Court, is an international court of the Council of Europe which interprets the European Convention on Human Rights. The court hears applications alleging that ...
declared Le Pen's application inadmissible.
*Allegations of war crimes in Algeria: Le Pen allegedly practiced torture
Torture is the deliberate infliction of severe pain or suffering on a person for reasons such as punishment, extracting a confession, interrogational torture, interrogation for information, or intimidating third parties. definitions of tortur ...
during the Algerian War (1954–1962), when he was a lieutenant in the French Army. He denied it and won some trials. But he lost a trial when he attacked ''Le Monde
''Le Monde'' (; ) is a French daily afternoon newspaper. It is the main publication of Le Monde Group and reported an average circulation of 323,039 copies per issue in 2009, about 40,000 of which were sold abroad. It has had its own website si ...
'' newspaper on charges of defamation, following accusations by the newspaper that he had used torture. ''Le Monde'' has produced in May 2003 the dagger
A dagger is a fighting knife with a very sharp point and usually two sharp edges, typically designed or capable of being used as a thrusting or stabbing weapon.State v. Martin, 633 S.W.2d 80 (Mo. 1982): This is the dictionary or popular-use de ...
he allegedly used to commit war crimes as court evidence. Although war crimes committed during the Algerian War are amnestied in France, this was publicised by the newspapers ''Le Canard Enchaîné
(; English: "The Chained Duck" or "The Chained Paper", as is French slang meaning "newspaper") is a satirical weekly newspaper in France. Its headquarters is in Paris.
Founded in 1915 during World War I, it features investigative journalism a ...
'', '' Libération'', and ''Le Monde'', and by Michel Rocard
Michel Rocard (; 23 August 1930 – 2 July 2016) was a French politician and a member of the Socialist Party (PS). He served as Prime Minister under François Mitterrand from 1988 to 1991 during which he created the ''Revenu minimum d'ins ...
(ex-Prime Minister
A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister i ...
) on TV ( TF1 1993). Le Pen sued the papers and Michel Rocard. This affair ended in 2000 when the Cour de cassation
A court of cassation is a high-instance court that exists in some judicial systems. Courts of cassation do not re-examine the facts of a case, they only interpret the relevant law. In this they are appellate courts of the highest instance. In th ...
(French supreme jurisdiction) concluded that it was legitimate to publish these assertions. In 1995, Le Pen unsuccessfully sued Jean Dufour, regional counselor of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur
Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur (; or , ; commonly shortened to PACA; en, Provence-Alps-French Riviera, italic=yes; also branded as Région Sud) is one of the eighteen administrative regions of France, the far southeastern on the mainland. Its pref ...
(French Communist Party
The French Communist Party (french: Parti communiste français, ''PCF'' ; ) is a political party in France which advocates the principles of communism. The PCF is a member of the Party of the European Left, and its MEPs sit in the European Un ...
) for the same reason.
Public image
Public perception
Le Pen is often nicknamed the "Menhir
A menhir (from Brittonic languages: ''maen'' or ''men'', "stone" and ''hir'' or ''hîr'', "long"), standing stone, orthostat, or lith is a large human-made upright stone, typically dating from the European middle Bronze Age. They can be found ...
", due to his "granitic nature" as he is perceived as someone who does not give way to pressure or who cannot be easily knocked down. It also connects him to France's Celtic origins.[José Pedro Zúquete]
Missionary Politics in Contemporary Europe
/ref> Le Pen is often described as one of the most flamboyant and charismatic orators in Europe, whose speech blends folksy humour, crude attacks and rhetorical finesse.
However, Le Pen remains a polarizing figure in France: opinions regarding him tend to be quite strong. A 2002 IPSOS
Ipsos Group S.A. () (an acronym of ) is a multinational market research and consulting firm with headquarters in Paris, France. The company was founded in 1975 by Didier Truchot, Chairman of the company, and has been publicly traded on the P ...
poll showed that while 22% of the electorate have a good or very good opinion of Le Pen, and 13% an unfavorable opinion, 61% have a very unfavorable opinion.
Le Pen and the National Front are described by much of the media and nearly all commentators as far right. Le Pen himself and the rest of his party disagree with this label; earlier in his political career, Le Pen described his position as "neither right, nor left, but French" (''ni droite, ni gauche, français''). He later described his position as right-wing and opposed to the "socialo-communists" and other right-wing parties, which he deems are not real right-wing parties. At other times, for example during the 2002 election campaign, he declared himself "socially left-wing, economically right-wing, nationally French" (''socialement à gauche, économiquement à droite, nationalement français''). He further contends that most of the French political and media class are corrupt and out of touch with the real needs of the common people, and conspire to exclude Le Pen and his party from mainstream politics. Le Pen criticizes the other political parties as the "establishment" and lumped all major parties ( Communist, Socialist
Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...
, Union for French Democracy
The Union for French Democracy (french: Union pour la démocratie française, UDF) was a centre to centre-right political party in France. It was founded in 1978 as an electoral alliance to support President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing in order to ...
(UDF) and Rally for the Republic (RPR)) into the "Gang of Four" (''la bande des quatre'' – an allusion to the Gang of Four during China's Cultural Revolution
The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement in the People's Republic of China (PRC) launched by Mao Zedong in 1966, and lasting until his death in 1976. Its stated goa ...
).
Relations with other groups
Some of Le Pen's statements led other right-wing groups, such as the Austrian Freedom Party
The Freedom Party of Austria (german: Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs, FPÖ) is a right-wing populist and national-conservative political party in Austria. It was led by Norbert Hofer from September 2019 to 1 June 2021.Staff (1 June 2021"Au ...
, and some National Front supporters, to distance themselves from him. Controversial Dutch anti-Islam lawmaker Geert Wilders
Geert Wilders (; born 6 September 1963) is a Dutch politician who has led the Party for Freedom (''Partij voor de Vrijheid'' – PVV) since he founded it in 2006. He is also the party's leader in the House of Representatives (''Tweede Kamer'' ...
, who has often been accused of being far-right, has also criticized Le Pen. Bruno Mégret
Bruno Mégret (; born 4 April 1949) is a French former nationalist politician. He was the leader of the Mouvement National Républicain political party, but retired in 2008 from all political action.
Youth and studies
Born in Paris, Bruno Mégre ...
left the National Front to found his own party (the National Republican Movement
The National Republican Movement (''Mouvement national républicain'' or MNR) is a French nationalist political party, created by Bruno Mégret with former Club de l'Horloge members Yvan Blot (also a member of GRECE) and Jean-Yves Le Gallou, as a ...
, MNR), claiming that Le Pen kept the Front away from the possibility of gaining power. Mégret wanted to emulate Gianfranco Fini's success in Italy by making it possible for right-wing parties to ally themselves with the Front, but claimed that Le Pen's attitude and outrageous speech prevented this. Le Pen's daughter Marine leads an internal movement of the Front that wants to "normalize" the National Front, "de- enclave" it, have a "culture of government" etc.; however, relations with Le Pen and other supporters of the hard line are complex. Le Pen's National Front electoral successes along with the party gaining wider public prominence led to suggestions for the renewal of the pan-European alliance of extreme-right parties with Le Pen as its figurehead, a suggestion that eventually did indeed bring about the establishment of the Europe of Nations and Freedom group in the European Parliament
The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...
, chaired by Le Pen's daughter Marine.
On 22 March 2018, Le Pen joined the Alliance for Peace and Freedom
The Alliance for Peace and Freedom (APF) is a Far-right politics, far-right European political party founded on 4 February 2015. The main member parties had been involved in the now defunct European National Front.
The party wishes to establ ...
. In October 2021, he endorsed Éric Zemmour
Éric Justin Léon Zemmour (; born 31 August 1958) is a French far-right politician, essayist, writer and former political journalist and pundit. He was an editor and panelist on ''Face à l'Info'', a daily show broadcast on CNews, from 2019 to ...
for the 2022 French presidential election over his daughter Marine.
Decorations
* Officer of the French Foreign Legion
* Cross for Military Valour
*Croix du combattant
The Combatant's Cross (french: "Croix du combattant") is a French decoration that recognizes, as its name implies, those who fought in combat for France. The Poilus (French combat soldiers) of World War I worked toward recognition by the govern ...
*Colonial Medal
The Colonial Medal (french: "Médaille Coloniale") was a French decoration created by the "loi de finances" of 26 July 1893 (article 75) to reward "military services in the colonies, resulting from participation in military operations, in a colon ...
*Indochina Campaign commemorative medal
The Indochina Campaign commemorative medal (french: Médaille commémorative de la campagne d'Indochine) was a French military decoration established on 1 August 1953 by decree 53-722 to recognize participation in the Indochina War by the member ...
* North Africa Security and Order Operations Commemorative Medal
* Middle-East operations commemorative medal
Electoral history
Presidential
See also
* Politics of France
The politics of France take place with the framework of a semi-presidential system determined by the French Constitution of the French Fifth Republic. The nation declares itself to be an "indivisible, secular, democratic, and social Republic ...
* History of far-right movements in France
The far-right (french: Extrême droite) tradition in France finds its origins in the Third Republic with Boulangism and the Dreyfus affair. The modern "far right" or radical right grew out of two separate events of 1889: the splitting off in the ...
References
Further reading
* Bar-On, Tamir. ''Rethinking the French New Right: Alternatives to Modernity'' (Routledge, 2013).
* Chombeau, Christiane. ''Le Pen: fille et père'' ''Panama Editions'' 2007
* Fauchoux, Marc and Forcari, Christophe. ''Le Pen, le derniner combat'' Jacob-Duvernet Editions. 2007
* Hainsworth, Paul. "The extreme right in France: the rise and rise of Jean‐Marie Le Pen's front national." ''Representation'' 40.2 (2004): 101–114.
* Le Pen, Jean-Marie. '' Mémoires : fils de la nation'' ''Mueller Editions''
* Marcus, Jonathan. ''The National Front and French Politics: The Resistible Rise of Jean-Marie Le Pen'' (NYU Press, 1995).
* Mayer, Nonna. "From Jean-Marie to Marine Le Pen: electoral change on the far right." ''Parliamentary Affairs'' 66.1 (2013): 160–178.
* Shields, James. ''The extreme right in France: from Pétain to Le Pen'' (Routledge, 2007).
* Singer, Daniel. "The resistible rise of Jean‐Marie Le Pen." ''Ethnic and Racial Studies ''14.3 (1991): 368–381.
* Soffer, Dalya. "The use of collective memory in the populist messaging of Marine Le Pen." ''Journal of European Studies'' 52.1 (2022): 69-78
online
* Stockemer, Daniel, and Abdelkarim Amengay. "The voters of the FN under Jean-Marie Le Pen and Marine Le Pen: Continuity or change&quest." ''French Politics'' 13.4 (2015): 370–390.
* Wilsford, David, ed. ''Political leaders of contemporary Western Europe: a biographical dictionary'' (Greenwood, 1995) pp. 271–74.
External links
News articles and videos
from Haaretz
*
Criticism
''Jean-Marie Le Pen: A Right-Wing Extremist and His Party''
from the Anti-Defamation League
{{DEFAULTSORT:Le Pen, Jean-Marie
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