Ten convicted of online harassment against Brigitte Macron
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A court in Paris has found guilty ten people for carrying out the digital intimidation of Brigitte Macron, the spouse of the President of France, Emmanuel Macron.
The defendants faced charges of circulating false claims regarding her gender identity and sexuality, in addition to making defamatory statements about the couple's age disparity of 24 years.
The court delivered suspended prison sentences of up to eight months to the defendants. The full ruling has yet to be released.
A longstanding unfounded claim alleging that Brigitte Macron is a transgender woman has been in circulation since her husband's initial election in 2017.
This recent ruling in France coincides with the Macrons pursuing a defamation lawsuit in the United States against conservative commentator Candace Owens, who has repeatedly shared analogous false narratives about the French president's wife's identity.
Their complaint states that Owens ignored substantial counter-evidence disproving her claim opting to amplify the voices of notorious conspiracy peddlers.
Owens has regularly repeated these allegations on her show and online platforms, and in March 2024 declared that she would stake her entire professional reputation on her conviction that Mrs. Macron is in fact a man.
Brigitte Macron initially encountered her current spouse when she was a teacher at his secondary school.
The two entered into matrimony in 2007, when the man who would become president was 29 and she was approximately 54 years old.