Marine Le Pen is an icon of France’s nationalist right: one of the country’s best-known and most popular political figures – with her France First, anti-woke, anti-migration agenda.
Hard-right leaders, currently growing in support across much of Europe, view her as “one of the gang” – even if they don’t see eye to eye on every issue.
Many of these leaders took to social media on Monday, after Le Pen was banned from running for political office for five years having been found guilty, alongside others, of embezzling €2.9m ($3.4m; £2.5m) of EU funds for use in France by her National Rally party.
For them, this was an opportunity, not simply to show support for Le Pen but to use her case to highlight what they see as their common cause – a struggle against a politically traditional mainstream, that seeks to muzzle or undermine their nationalist agenda.
But for Le Pen, this could be the death knell of her long-cherished ambition to become French president. She’d been riding high in the polls ahead of the next election, scheduled in two years’ time.
She and her political associates insist they’re innocent. They’re appealing against the verdict.
