Le Pen’s ‘Plan B’ stood for Bardella – until it became likely

The French language is full of pitfalls. For example, using the present indicative tense instead of the conditional can convey significant implications. That’s why the following message, posted on social media by Jordan Bardella, five hours after Marine Le Pen was convicted and banned from running for office, raised a few eyebrows: “The provisional execution [the immediate effectivess] of Marine Le Pen’s sentence, which prevents her from being a candidate in 2027, is a democratic scandal.”

Bardella, the president of the far-right Rassemblement National (RN), seemed not to take into account the possibility that she could have the ban overturned on appeal. And Le Pen took notice.

It goes to show just how much the prospect of Le Pen’s disqualification from the 2027 presidential election remains a taboo subject within the RN. And how closely Bardella’s statements will be monitored from now until 2027. This supervision will last until all possibilities for the party’s “natural candidate” to run are exhausted.

Within the RN, everyone agreed “Plan B” stood for Bardella – until it became a likely option. Le Pen herself had acknowledged it, when speaking, ahead of the prosecution’s closing statements, at the launch of Bardella’s book: “Even if you manage to get rid of Marine, you won’t be able get rid of Jordan!” she joked with a few journalists, back when she sincerely thought that the possibility was unimaginable. The prospect no longer seems to amuse her.

Since the court decision on Monday, March 31, she has dismissed “Plan B” twice, without taking any time to extoll her apparent successor’s merits. That evening, speaking on TF1 television, she said, “Jordan Bardella is a tremendous asset for defending the movement. I hope we won’t have to use this asset sooner than is necessary.” Then, more extensively, in the newspaper Le Parisien, on Tuesday evening, she attempted to demonstrate, without explicitly saying so, that her candidacy and Bardella’s were not comparable: “The presidential election is an ‘intuitu personae’ election,” she said, meaning that candidates’ personal identities play a key role. “Today, there’s no question of considering a Plan B before going to the end of Plan A. If I may say so.”

Bardella said no different, speaking on the news channel LCI, on Thursday: “There is no Plan B, because Plan A has not yet been brought to completion. I will be by her side to the end to follow this path, narrow as it may be.”