01/07/2025

Jean-Marie Le Pen Dies at 96

He was a French xenophobe known for fiery rhetoric

Jean-Marie Le Pen, the founder of France's far-right National Front who was known for fiery rhetoric against immigration and multiculturalism that earned him both staunch supporters and widespread condemnation, died Tuesday. He was 96.

A polarizing figure in French politics, Le Pen was convicted numerous times of antisemitism, discrimination and inciting racial violence. Despite those convictions and eventually being political ostracized, the nativist ideas that propelled his decades of popularity — encapsulated in xenophobic slogans like "French People First" — are ascendant in today's France, across Europe and beyond.

Le Pen — who reached the second round of the 2002 presidential election that Jacques Chirac went on to win in a landslide victory — was eventually estranged from his daughter Marine Le Pen. She renamed his National Front party, ousted him, and transformed it into one of France's most powerful political forces while distancing herself from her father's extremist image.

Please select this link to read the complete article from The Associated Press.