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Jean-Marie Le Pen, whose death on Tuesday was confirmed by the far-right National Rally, spent much of his life fighting – as a soldier in France’s colonial wars, as a fringe politician known for his virulent anti-immigrant rhetoric, or in very public family feuds with his daughter and political heir Marine.
Le Pen’s views sparked massive rejection, even revulsion, among mainstream parties and a majority of French voters, but his electoral success was undeniable – most notably in 2002, the year he burst into France’s presidential runoff in a political earthquake that would forever change the country’s politics.
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The champion of colonial France
Then known as the National Front, the party Le Pen co-founded in 1972 was the latest incarnation of a political current that rejected the French Revolution, despised the Republic, embraced anti-Semitism, sided with the Nazi-allied Vichy Regime, and fought a rearguard battle against decolonisation. A former paratrooper and member of the French Foreign Legion, who fought to maintain French colonial rule in Indochina and Algeria, Le Pen was a fierce critic of decolonisation and would find a first bastion of support among the "pieds noirs" – French settlers who returned to the mainland after Algeria's independence from France.
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The man with the eye patch
During the 1970s, the far-right leader was known as "the man with the eye patch" owing to a pirate’s blindfold he wore over his left eye. Le Pen boasted that he lost the use of his eye during a brawl before changing versions a number of times, eventually blaming a traumatic cataract. He abandoned the blindfold in the early 80s and opted instead for a glass eye, ostensibly to project a less disturbing image.
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The cult of Joan of Arc
As president of the National Front, which he co-founded with former French members of the Waffen SS, Jean-Marie Le Pen began laying wreaths at the foot of a statue of Joan of Arc in Paris each year in May – in what would become a defining ritual of the nationalist far right. After a decade in the doldrums, the fringe party emerged as a political force during the 80s, culminating in the 14% Le Pen won in the first round of the 1988 presidential election.
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A family affair
Le Pen celebrated his 1988 breakthrough with his three daughters at their opulent mansion in the western suburbs of Paris, inherited from his friend Hubert Lambert, who bequeathed him 30 million euros. Aided by her father, Marine, the youngest daughter, would succeed him at the party’s helm more than two decades later, ensuring that the National Front remained a family affair.
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First election wins
The National Front picked up its first election wins in the 1990s, capturing the municipalities of Toulon, Orange and Marignane – located in Le Pen’s southern heartland. The party did well in legislative elections in 1997, though France’s two-round system of voting kept it out of parliament as other parties banded together to defeat the far right.
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The April 2002 ‘thunderclap’
On April 21, 2002, Le Pen stunned the nation by qualifying for France’s presidential runoff, in the biggest shock in French election history. It proved to be a bittersweet win for the far-right firebrand as supporters of the right and left poured into the streets of France in a massive show of solidarity against him. Conservative rival Jacques Chirac went on to win in a landslide victory with a record 82% of the vote.
Read more‘Thunderclap’: The day Jean-Marie Le Pen staged the biggest upset in French election history
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The Holocaust denier
Jean-Marie Le Pen has been convicted on numerous occasions by the French courts, including twice for describing the Nazi gas chambers as "a mere detail in the history of the Second World War". Over the years, the veteran provocateur has been found guilty of public insults, incitement to racial hatred, provocation to hatred and discrimination, and violence against a female candidate. Finally, in 2019, a 90-year-old Le Pen was indicted for embezzlement of public funds by the National Front, renamed the National Rally, though doctors ruled that he was unfit to face trial.
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Family feud
Le Pen’s extremist image and long history of convictions became a burden on his daughter Marine as she took over the party’s leadership in 2011, aiming to "detoxify" the far right. Her efforts to make the National Front more mainstream, and remove the stigma of racism and antisemitism, soon led to very public spats with her father, who was eventually expelled from the party he founded. Since then, Marine Le Pen has transformed the rebranded National Rally into one of France’s most powerful political forces, expunging her father’s virulent rhetoric – while ensuring his core ideas are closer than ever to power.