French appeals court shortens Le Pen's ban, allowing presidential run under house arrest

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PARIS — An appeals court on Tuesday cleared a possible path for Marine Le Pen to stand in next year’s presidential election — but under conditions she previously said she would not accept.

The three-judge panel that heard the far-right leader’s appeal upheld her conviction for embezzling European Parliament funds but, crucially, tossed her immediate five-year ban on running for office and replaced it with a shorter one that, technically, allows her to run.

However, Le Pen was sentenced to a year of house arrest, and as recently as last week she said she would not run for president while wearing an ankle bracelet.

The decision was unexpected and appeared to confuse Le Pen and others from her party, the National Rally, who were in court when the ruling was delivered. While Le Pen did not speak after leaving the Palais de Justice in central Paris, her lawyer called the court’s decision “a good start.”

Officials from Le Pen’s party had told POLITICO that she would head to National Rally headquarters after court adjourned to meet with Jordan Bardella, her protégé and potential replacement as presidential candidate.

Her first public remarks are expected to come during a primetime interview at 8 p.m.

Should Le Pen choose to stand down in favor of Bardella, it would be a massive personal blow. She has already run for president three times, but polls show the National Rally has never had a better chance of winning the presidency than it does next year.

Opinion polls indicate that Bardella is slightly more popular than Le Pen, but his age and limited experience have sparked concerns among party insiders about whether he can withstand the rigors of a presidential campaign or is ready to take the reins of one of the most powerful offices in the world.

The French presidency concentrates sweeping executive authority in the hands of a leader who oversees the globe’s seventh-largest economy, commands a nuclear-armed state and holds a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council.

This story has been updated.

Clea Caulcutt and Marion Solletty contributed to this report.