Paris, France – Ten people were convicted for making malicious comments about France’s first lady, Brigitte Macron online in Paris.
The French court found the accused guilty of the cyber-harassment primarily by spreading a narrative that the wife of the president of France, Emmanuel Macron, is a transgender woman.
The remarks bordered on that Brigitte was born male and that her real name was Jean-Michel Trogneux – the name of her actual older brother.
The couple had faced criticism for their 24-year age gap since 2017 when Emmanuel was first elected president. Brigitte has faced some backlash with critics saying she is twice his age and that this was “paedophilia,” but had never had the courts attention before.
Media reports highlight that Brigitte first met her husband when she was a teacher at his secondary school. They married in 2007. Emmanuel was 29 while Brigitte was in her mid-50s.
Nvertheless, the Macrons scored their victory on the Monday’s ruling against eight of those convicted being men while two are women. One of the sentences issued is a six-month jail term without suspension while others received suspended jail terms of up to eight months. There were also court decisions of banning five of them from using the social media platform they had posted on, fines and obligatory cyber harassment awareness courses.
There is also a separate pending United States defamation lawsuit against influencer and podcaster Candace Owens, on the similar matter.
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