BREAKING: Trump says ban of France’s 'leading candidate' Marine Le Pen from office 'sounds very much like this country'

Following the conviction of France’s Marine Le Pen and 20 other National Rally party members, as well as Le Pen’s five-year ban from politics, President Donald Trump said that the banning of the "leading candidate" in France’s 2027 election "sounds very much like this country."

When asked about the conviction and ban, Trump told reporters, "that’s a big deal. That’s a very big deal. I know all about it. A lot of people thought she wasn't going to be convicted of anything." 

"She was banned from running for five years and she was the leading candidate. That sounds like this country. That sounds very much like this country."

Le Pen, a conservative politician, was sentenced to four years in prison, with half being suspended. She is also banned from seeking office for the next five years. A court ruled that Le Pen and other party members misused 4.4 million euros meant to pay assistants to lawmakers in the European Parliament for labor, using it instead to illegally pay staffers in the party who were not involved in parliament work.

“Today it’s not only Marine Le Pen that has been unjustly condemned. It’s French democracy that’s being executed,” the president of the National Rally party, Jordan Bardella, said of the ruling.