Former president of France’s far-right Front National party (now Rallye National) Jean-Marie Le Pen was hospitalized on Saturday after suffering a “mild heart attack,” we heard from those close to him.
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“Jean-Marie Le Pen was hospitalized in a public facility in the Paris region. His family and loved ones are concerned but calm,” his adviser Lorrain de Saint Affrique said, reporting that Mr Le Pen, a historical figure on the French far right, was “conscious” and surrounded.
Jean-Marie Le Pen founded the National Front (FN) in 1972, which became the National Rally (RN), led by his daughter Marine until November, runner-up in the 2022 presidential election (41.5%) to Emmanuel Macron.
Her 94-year-old father has been hospitalized several times in recent years. In February 2022, he was hospitalized after suffering a minor stroke.
Jean-Marie Le Pen ran for the presidential election five times and managed to reach the second round in 2002, only to be defeated by Jacques Chirac with an overwhelming result.
Born on June 20, 1928 in La Trinité-sur-Mer, western France, he studied law and served as a legionnaire during the wars in Indochina (1953) and Algeria (1957).
Elected to the National Assembly in 1956, he was defeated in the 1962 general election and endured a long journey across the desert.
In 1972 he was appointed to head a new party uniting neo-fascists: the National Front. And develops his favorite theme: “One million unemployed is one million immigrants too many” by accusing them of abusing social welfare at the expense of the French.
In 1984 he was elected Member of the European Parliament, then won a seat in the National Assembly in the 1986 general election.
He was dismissed from the seat of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (south-east) regional council in April 2000 after being sentenced to a year’s ban for violence against a socialist candidate in the 1997 general election, due to his many legal disputes.
In late 1998 his party experienced a split, but the FN managed to establish itself as the main far-right movement.
The “Menhir” has never confessed any regrets for his slip-ups, which have earned him several court convictions: from the gas chambers “single point in history” to “Racial Inequality” (1996), going through the “not particularly inhumane” German Cast (2005).
In the European Parliament in Strasbourg, where he was elected several times, he will try to “defend France against Europe, against the abuses of the European Union”.
The youngest of her three daughters, Marine, inherited the party in 2011. She has long said she “takes over the entire inheritance,” but she is eventually surpassed by this father, who has become embarrassed to “undemonize” the party . Marine Le Pen expelled her father in 2015 after repeated polemic statements about the Holocaust.
After the RN’s historic 89-seat breakthrough in last June’s general election, he deplored “a certain media absence” from the RN MPs led by his daughter and urged them “to respond” by being “aggressive towards power”.