"For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths." Northwoods is a ministry dedicated to refreshing Christians and challenging them to search for the truth in Christianity, politics, sociology, and science
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The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has rejected veteran right-wing French politician Marine Le Pen’s request to suspend a five-year ban on her standing in elections, including the 2027 presidential race, which stems from an embezzlement conviction.
“In any event, the existence of an imminent risk of irreparable harm to a right protected by the Convention or its protocols has not been established,” the court wrote in its press release on Wednesday.
In March 2025, a French judge found the former leader of the biggest opposition party, National Rally (RN), guilty of misusing public funds intended for assistants to the RN members of the European Parliament; they were instead used to pay staff in France. Le Pen has denied any wrongdoing and appealed the verdict, which she calls politically motivated.
Le Pen ran for president in 2017 and 2022, losing both times in a runoff to President Emmanuel Macron. The National Rally is currently the third-largest party in the National Assembly.
On Wednesday, police raided RN headquarters in Paris as part of an investigation into alleged campaign finance violations and fraud. RN leader Jordan Bardella denounced the searches as an attempt to “destabilize the party and drive it into financial ruin.”
US President Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance have publicly voiced support for Le Pen, which the French authorities dismissed as meddling in domestic affairs.
French authorities raid National Rally HQ over alleged finance crimes
By Ian Stark
Jordan Bardella, president of the French National Rally Party, said its offices had been raided by French authorities. File Photo by Maya Vidon-White/UPI | License Photo
July 9 (UPI) --French law enforcement conducted a raid Wednesday on the headquarters of the National Rally Party as part of an ongoing investigation into possible financial crimes.
National Rally President Jordan Bardella said on X Wednesday that "about 20 financial brigade police officers, armed and wearing bulletproof vests, accompanied by two investigating judges," arrived at RN HQ at around 2:50 a.m. EDT and ostensibly seized "all emails, documents, and accounting records of the leading opposition party."
2:50 a.m. EDT is 8:50 a.m. European Summer Time
He further claimed his group wasn't informed about what led to the seizure.
"This operation, spectacular and unprecedented, is clearly part of a new harassment campaign," Bardella said. "It is a serious attack on pluralism and democratic alternation."
The Parisian prosecutor's office has explained the investigation is intended to determine if the National Rally in any way financed its campaigns through illegal loans between 2020 and 2024.
So, it's basically a fishing trip by the government. More political games to destroy the opposition.
No one has been charged in connection to the Wednesday raid but does come about three months after former RN leader Marine Le Penwas found guilty of misusing European Parliament monies and sent to prison.
"Suspecting our activists," said Bardella in a follow-up X post Wednesday, "who lend to the RN due to the lack of banks willing to do so, of 'illegally practicing the profession of banker' is a farce."
He went on to allege that the RN headquarters raid was a political stunt.
"Nothing to do with justice, everything to do with politics," he concluded.
That's how it's been from the beginning, Jordan. The corrupt use of the justice system against democracy.
Corruption goes hand-in-hand with politics. Using one's powers to enrich oneself is extremely tempting and, unfortunately, few can resist. While it is likely that almost anyone in political power can be found to have benefitted financially from gifts given them, it seems mostly right-wing politicians are investigated relentlessly. Benjamin Netanyahu has been harassed as such for very minor amounts in question. Marine Le Pen has been accused of corruption several times, almost always just before an election, and now Bolsonero. Argentina's Milei should be extremely careful, deep state will be coming after him.
Bolsonaro embezzled $1.2 million worth of undeclared jewelry, Brazil's police say
Former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro has been accused of embezzling roughly $1.2 million worth of jewelry during his time in office, including a diamond-encrusted Rolex and Patek Phillipe watches.
Brazil’s Federal Police allege former President Jair Bolsonaro embezzled jewelry worth 6.8 million Brazilian reals (about $1.2 million) during his time in office, according to the investigative report unsealed Monday by the Supreme Court.
Bolsonaro was indicted last week charging embezzlement, asset laundering and criminal association in connection with the luxury jewelry from Saudi Arabia. The investigation adds pressure on the far-right leader who governed in 2019-2022 before losing his reelection bid to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. He has already lost his political rights until 2030.
Bolsonaro hasn't commented on the indictment, but has previously denied any wrongdoing involving the jewelry.
The police report alleges there was “a criminal association for the embezzlement of high-value gifts that were received due to the position of former President Jair Bolsonaro.” The jewelry included diamond-encrusted Rolex and Patek Phillipe watches, a necklace, rings and cufflinks, among other items. The report says some of the presents were given to government staffers acting on Bolsonaro’s behalf during international trips.
The Associated Press reported Bolsonaro’s indictment Thursday based on information given by two sources with knowledge of the investigation, but the unsealing of the report by Brazil's Supreme Court provided a complete view of the allegations.
Brazil’s prosecutor-general, Paulo Gonet, will analyze the police report and decide whether to file charges and force the far-right leader to stand trial.
The jewelry would have been tax exempt had it been a gift from Saudi Arabia to the nation of Brazil, but not Bolsonaro’s to keep for himself. Rather, it would have been incorporated into the presidential collection.
The police report said Bolsonaro's family received “revenue obtained through the illegal sale” of the jewelry. The investigation found the funds were incorporated by the former president without the use of Brazil's banking system as a way to hide the origin, the report said.
During his first public speech after the accusations came to light, at a conservative conference in southern Brazil on Saturday, the 69-year-old former army captain did not address the issue. But he and his lawyers have previously denied any wrongdoing in the case as well as in other of his actions that are under investigation.
Argentine President Javier Milei, one of Bolsonaro's allies, accused Brazil of promoting a legal witch hunt against the former president.
Bolsonaro’s indictment in the jewelry case followed another formal accusation in March accusing the former leader of falsifying his COVID-19 vaccination certificate. He is also the target of an investigation into possible involvement in inciting a January 2023 uprising in the capital of Brasilia that sought to oust his successor.
'Target' seems to be an appropriate word here.
The police report unsealed Monday indicts 10 others, including two of Bolsonaro’s lawyers, a retired army general and a former energy minister of his administration.
The document recounts one exchange between Bolsonaro and a former top aide to suggest the Brazilian leader was aware that some of the jewelry in question was about to be auctioned in the U.S. Federal Police said Bolsonaro’s phone included other references to Fortuna Auction, the auctioning company.
Police said a second package of luxury jewelry seized in customs was also addressed to Bolsonaro, whose administration made repeated efforts to secure their release. The then president received the package on Nov. 29, 2022, the report said.
(AP)
France’s Marine Le Pen faces probe for fraud, forgery in 2022 presidential vote
By Staff The Associated Press
Posted July 9, 2024 9:45 am
1 min read
The Paris prosecutor’s office said Tuesday it opened a preliminary investigation last week into suspicions of illicit financing of far-right French leader Marine Le Pen’s campaign during the 2022 presidential election.
The office told The Associated Press that the judicial probe opened July 2 into allegations of accepting a financial loan, misappropriation of property, fraud and forgery. It did not give details.
This was, of course, 5 days before the 2nd phase of the elections. This is normal procedure in France where Le Pen is investigated for something just days before an election. You would think the French would catch on after several such elections. Is it time for a lawsuit against the Paris Prosecutor's office?
Le Pen hasn’t commented.
2:05
France election 2024: Can opposition parties stop far-right National Rally from forming government?
The preliminary investigation was opened after a report from the National Commission for Campaign Accounts and Political Financing dating from 2023. The body is responsible for monitoring candidates’ expenses. In French elections, candidates are barred from exceeding a certain spending limit.
French media reports said Le Pen is not the only candidate in the 2022 presidential election being investigated.
Her far-right National Rally party previously was singled out for exaggerating expenses on campaign items used by candidates in the 2012 legislative elections. The Court of Cassation rejected the party’s appeal, and it was fined.
With a week to go before the 2nd phase of the elections, Marine's firey speech is a bit surprising. Her opponents will use it against her to frighten the masses even though the masses should be more frightened of doing nothing to counter the Muslim invasion.
Marine Le Pen: "Give me ONE reason, only one, to keep on our territory foreigners who collaborate with a totalitarian ideology that wants the death of the French."
1:10 / 2:20
Le Pen’s far-right party wins first round as
Macron’s snap elections gamble backfires
Marine Le Pen’s anti-immigrant National Rally led a first round of voting on Sunday in exceptionally high-stakes elections that could put France’s government in the hands of a far-right party for the first time since World War II. President Emmanuel Macron’s ruling coalition was beaten into third place by a fledgling alliance of the left as the incumbent’s gamble with a snap election backfired spectacularly.
Three weeks after trouncing its rivals in low-turnout European polls, Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) confirmed its status as France’s leading political force in a first round of legislative elections marked by the highest turnout in three decades.
Le Pen’s camp secured a clear victory, albeit not a decisive one, meaning the vote’s ultimate outcome remains uncertain ahead of a second round of voting on July 7. Macron, whose decision to call the snap election had stunned friends and foes alike, has urged voters to rally against the far right next Sunday.
RN and its allies on the right took 33.2% of the first-round vote, ahead of the left-wing New Popular Front (NFP) on 28.1%, according to projections by pollsters Ipsos-Talan. Macron’s Ensemble alliance trailed in third place with 21%, followed by the conservative Les Républicains and their partners on 10%.
Based on those figures, the far-right camp would go on to win between 230 and 280 seats in the National Assembly, the pollsters added, leaving it short of the 289 seats required to win an absolute majority.
Such predictions are extremely difficult, owing to the two rounds of voting and a record number of three-way runoff races. The final result will depend on days of frantic horse-trading as parties work to make alliances in some constituencies or pull out of others.
Addressing jubilant supporters in her northern constituency, where she won an outright victory in the first round, Le Pen called on voters to push her party over the line and give it an “absolute majority” of seats in the National Assembly, France’s lower house of parliament, which wields greater powers than the Senate.
In such a scenario, Macron would be expected to name the party’s 28-year-old poster boy Jordan Bardella as prime minister in an awkward power-sharing system, known as “cohabitation”, that would weaken him both at home and on the world stage.
Victory for RN would lead to France’s first far-right government since the Nazi-allied Vichy Regime – capping an extraordinary turnaround for an extremist party that was co-founded by Le Pen’s father Jean-Marie, a Vichy supporter and convicted anti-Semite.
A more likely outcome would be a hung parliament in which no coalition is able to muster a majority, bringing gridlock to the European Union’s second-largest economy and its leading military power.
Boomerang
Sunday’s vote follows a chaotic and volatile three-week campaign – the shortest in modern French history – that saw Macron warn voters of a threat of “civil war” should they choose either of his main rivals.
Estimated at over 65%, turnout was the highest for a parliamentary vote since former president Jacques Chirac called France’s last snap election in 1997 – and suffered an equally catastrophic backlash.
Macron’s startling move to dissolve the lower house of parliament came on the heels of European parliamentary polls that saw Le Pen’s National Rally trounce the ruling party.
The president took the momentous decision against the advice of senior allies, the heads of France’s two chambers of parliament and his prime minister, who were informed of his decision at the 11th hour and were powerless to change his mind.
The abrupt call presented local officials with a logistical nightmare, coming as school summer holidays begin and with the Paris Olympics just around the corner. Gérard Larcher, the conservative head of the Senate, accused Macron of “beating up" democracy.
Even Le Pen marvelled at the gift from the Élysée Palace, stating, in the wake of the dissolution: “When your opponent is riding a wave of support, the last thing you do is encourage that wave.”
She likened the momentum from her party’s victory in European elections to that enjoyed by a newly elected president, when voters typically hand the incoming head of state a parliamentary majority to govern.
Hubris
Macron had hoped to frame the elections as a final showdown between his “progressive” camp and rival “populist” forces. The strategy had worked before, with voters twice rallying behind him – many reluctantly – to defeat Le Pen in presidential runoffs, in 2017 and 2022.
But instead of playing in his favour, the “clarification” he invoked as he dissolved the National Assembly has resulted in a revival of the left-right divide he thought he had banished years ago.
The sudden prospect of a far-right government succeeded in reuniting France’s bitterly fractured left – with a speed that caught the Élysée Palace off guard.
At the other end of the spectrum, the lightning campaign enabled Le Pen’s party to dramatically accelerate its takeover of France’s right-wing electorate – facilitated by the sudden implosion of rival outfits.
Pulling strings from behind the scenes was arch-conservative billionaire Vincent Bolloré, dubbed the “French Murdoch”, who put his sprawling media empire at the service of France’s nationalist right.
The French president also underestimated the extent to which his own political capital has evaporated after seven years in power and a multitude of crises.
Last year’s bitter battle over pension reform, which saw Macron use special powers to bypass parliament amid fierce opposition across the country, undermined his democratic credentials in the eyes of many voters, while a controversial immigration law passed with support from le Pen's lawmakers further alienated many on the left.
Seen as a gift to the far right, his latest gamble proved to be the final straw for many voters who had reluctantly backed him to keep Le Pen out of power.
Macron’s own allies begged the president to take a backseat during the campaign. Many of his candidates asked not to have the president’s photo on their campaign posters, preferring to be pictured alongside his more popular prime minister.
But Macron ignored their warnings, making repeated campaign appearances and promising – for the umpteenth time – to “change the way we govern” in a letter to French voters.
His depiction of the election as a tussle between his moderate camp and “extremists” on the left and right ultimately failed to sway voters, leaving his bloc as the weakest of three forces now vying to govern France.
‘Not a single vote for RN’
How Macron’s weakened bloc positions itself in the days ahead is likely to determine the outcome of the July 7 vote.
Left-wing leaders including Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who heads the hard-left La France inoumise (LFI), were quick to declare they would withdraw all candidates who came third in their respective constituencies, in order not to split the anti-Le Pen vote.
The move puts pressure on the ruling camp to return the favour – and do for left-wing candidates what left-wing voters have repeatedly done for Macron when facing the far right.
Prime Minister Attal, who looks certain to lose his job, said the ruling Renaissance party would do likewise with its third-placed candidates – but only in constituencies where RN’s remaining opponent “shares our Republican values”. The wording suggested the party will likely refuse to withdraw candidates in favour of Mélenchon’s LFI, which Macron’s camp has labelled “extremist”.
“The priority is to ensure the far right does not win an absolute majority,” Attal added. “Not one single vote must go to the National Rally.”
While Le Pen has made huge strides in her efforts to “normalise” the far right, her anti-immigrant, Kremlin-friendly party is still rejected by swathes of the French electorate.
Bardella, her choice of PM, says he would use the powers of prime minister to stop Macron from continuing to supply long-range weapons to Ukraine for the war with Russia.
The National Rally has also questioned the right to citizenship for people born in France and promised to curtail the rights of French citizens with dual nationality, a move critics blasted as contrary to fundamental human rights and a threat to France’s democratic ideals.
Echoes of Chirac
The left-wing NFP – a broad church stretching from former president François Hollande to a fringe anti-capitalist outfit – has also spooked many voters alarmed by its big-spending economic programme and the radicalism of some candidates.
Édouard Philippe, a former prime minister, explicitly called on candidates from his Macron-allied party not to drop out of three-way races where an LFI candidate represents the left. Aurore Bergé, the minister for family affairs, went a step further, urging voters to “band together” against Mélenchon’s party.
Experts note that many voters no longer heed the advice of party leaders. It is also possible that candidates will refuse to drop out despite guidance from political headquarters in Paris, making the outcome of the second round extraordinarily hard to predict
One thing is certain: Macron’s “clarification” has clarified that French voters no longer want him to govern alone.
Since the president's audacious gamble, a quote by former conservative minister Patrick Devedjian has been doing the rounds on social media. It referred to Chirac’s ill-fated snap election in 1997 but could just as well apply to Macron’s.
“We were holed up in an apartment with a gas leak,” the late Devedjian quipped. "That’s when Chirac lit a match to see what was going on.”
Someone should have kept the matches away from Macron! Is he really that stupid? Is there something else going on behind the scenes?
