France's Bardella denies alleged antisemitic comments

A French investigative website has alleged that far-right National Rally (RN) leader Jordan Bardella made antisemitic comments in writing in 2013, but the close ally of presidential frontrunner Marine Le Pen dismissed the claims as fake.

According to the report by Mediapart, Mr Bardella wrote, among other comments, in a chat: "The Jew has to dominate other peoples, crush them, and rob them; a Zionist is necessarily a Jew, and fundamentally so."

Mr Bardella, 31, tipped to be prime minister if Ms Le Pen becomes France's president, wrote on X he "formally" rejected the allegations, which he described as "crude forgeries", saying he would take legal action against Mediapart.

Mediapart's investigation is built on comments in private chats allegedly written by Mr Bardella in the summer of 2013 when he was 17 or 18-years-old.

Mediapart maintains it authenticated the comments. It did not specify where the messages had been written nor publish screenshots.

The young activist, who had joined the far-right party then known as the National Front (FN) a year and a half earlier, allegedly also said: "And that is what they want: a New World Order dominated by Israel, with Jerusalem as the capital, of course."

He was also alleged to have written "all the banks are owned by Jews".

Ms Le Pen herself told reporters she believed the purported comments were "fake" and accused Mediapart, which has locked horns with the RN on multiple occasions, of "dirty tricks".

Far right 'breakthrough'

Mr Bardella, a savvy user of social media who projects a clean-cut image, has been a key player in Le Pen's project of "de-demonisation" to make the RN into an electable force.

Both have moved to rid it of the legacy of her father Jean-Marie Le Pen who founded and led the FN and repeatedly made antisemitic remarks.

Mr Bardella in 2025 made an unprecedented visit to Israel, the first by a French far-right leader, in a bid to demonstrate the RN's new credentials.

The allegations emerged as Le Pen's prospects for the 2027 elections appear stronger than at any point in her previous campaigns.

A new poll showed that Ms Le Pen lead the first round of voting to succeed French President Emmanuel Macron, and suggested she could easily defeat potential rivals in the second-round run-off.

She also hailed as "historic" the RN's achievement in the elections for the upper house Senate - which is chosen by local officials - to win enough seats to form a faction in the chamber for the first time.

Le Monde daily described it as a "breakthrough" for the movement and a "warning" for other parties.

Mr Bardella accused what he called an "activist media" of conducting a smear campaign "to destabilise the presidential campaign and attack my honour".

The Toluna-Harris survey for RTL and M6 showed that Ms Le Pen would win around 35-36% in the first round of voting, scheduled for 18 April, if the election were held now.

In the second round, on 2 May, the poll indicated she would emerge victorious against hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) leader Jean-Luc Melenchon or centrist frontrunner Edouard Philippe.