Antisemitism allegations against running mate cloud Marine Le Pen’s campaign in France

Jordan Bardella, president of France's National Rally party speaks during the Reform UK National Conference, at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham. Picture date: Friday September 4, 2026. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire

French far-right leader Marine Le Pen, her National Rally party and its allies have closed ranks behind her running mate in next year’s presidential election, Jordan Bardella, in the face of media accusations that he made antisemitic remarks as a young party member.

The 31-year-old Mr Bardella, who Ms Le Pen says will be her prime minister if she wins the presidency in May, vigorously denied authorship of the comments about supposed Jewish banking monopolies and other antisemitic conspiracy theories that investigative website Mediapart attributed to him and published on Monday.

It said they were written more than a decade ago. They included years when Mr Bardella, now the National Rally president, was a teenage member of the party’s predecessor, the National Front. It was founded by Ms Le Pen’s father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, who repeatedly denied the Holocaust and was convicted multiple times of hate speech before his death in 2025.

Allegations of antisemitism touch a particular nerve at the National Rally because Ms Le Pen has worked for years to distance herself from her father’s legacy.

To win the presidency, she must overcome obstacles that blocked his presidential ambitions.

His associations with people who collaborated with France’s Nazi occupiers in the Second World War and his multiple convictions for antisemitism, discrimination and inciting racial violence made him anathema to many voters.

Sitting side by side, Marine Le Pen, Mr Bardella and their ally Eric Ciotti on Tuesday used a previously scheduled gathering of their politicians to demonstrate unity.

They described Mediapart’s allegations as the opening salvo of a supposed effort to undermine the National Rally and Ms Le Pen as she campaigns to succeed French President Emmanuel Macron, who is constitutionally barred from seeking a third consecutive term.

It is “the beginnings of an all-out war, of attempts to destabilise the presidential campaign, which — I’m telling you — will target us one after another,” Mr Bardella said.

“We have both put on our Kevlar suits, because this is heavy stuff coming down on us,” Ms Le Pen said.

“This manipulation is about as subtle as a charcuterie convention.” “We are not going to let them do this to us,” she said.

To applause from their politicians, she expressed “absolute confidence” in Mr Bardella, who is particularly popular with young voters and has large followings on social media.

Mediapart said the comments it attributed to Mr Bardella were drawn from private written exchanges but did not specify whether they were emails or another format.

It said it independently authenticated the exchanges but did not detail how or say how it obtained them.

Mr Bardella said he has launched a libel action against Mediapart’s allegations, describing them as “a dirty-tricks operation”.