The conviction of Marine Le Pen, France's leading opposition figure, on charges of misusing European Union funds—and her subsequent five-year ban from seeking elected office—should be a watershed moment for anyone still clinging to the idea that Western democracies are immune from authoritarian tendencies. Her disqualification, just two years before the 2027 French presidential election, is not a triumph of the rule of law. It is the triumph of lawfare: the use of legal tools to crush political dissent under a veneer of legitimacy.
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