US officials tried to lobby against Marine Le Pen election ban, French judge says

Marine Le Pen leaves a hearing during her appeal against her conviction for embezzlement of European parliament funds in Paris on Tuesday. Photograph: Mohammed Badra/EPA

A French magistrate has said two Trump administration emissaries approached her seeking to lobby against an election ban on the French far-right leader Marine Le Pen.

Magali Lafourcade, the secretary general of France’s human rights commission (CNCDH), an independent body that advises the government, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) she had reported the content of the meeting to the French foreign ministry immediately, fearing a potential “manipulation of the public debate in France”.