Paris
CNN
—
“It’s my political death they want,” far-right leader Marine Le Pen claimed in November – a prediction that proved prescient, though few took it seriously at the time.
The three-time French presidential candidate saw her path to power cut short on Monday when a court ruling banned her from running for public office for five years, triggering a political earthquake in France and knocking the frontrunner out of the 2027 presidential race.
But far from decapitating the far right, this ruling – that followed a guilty verdict on embezzlement charges – could actually strengthen it by fueling populist grievances and accelerating the rebranding of Le…