Four men are set to appear in court next year in Paris over allegations that they harassed French First Lady Brigitte Macron online, including likening her to a “paedophile”.
It is important to note that disinformation regarding Macron’s gender has circulated on social media for years, with additional attacks related to the 24-year age difference between her and President Emmanuel Macron.
In August, Brigitte Macron filed a complaint, prompting authorities to open an investigation into cyberharassment and incitement to commit an offence, according to the public prosecutor.
A hearing scheduled for July next year will focus on “malicious comments about Brigitte Macron’s gender and sexuality, as well as her age difference with her husband… including comparisons to a paedophile,” prosecutors confirmed.
A trial is set for the end of October.
The relationship between the president, 46, and his wife, 71, who first met when she was a teacher and he was a teenager, has long been a source of media attention both in France and abroad.
Among the accused is Aurelien Poirson-Atlan, born in 1984, a publicist known on social media as “Zoe Sagan”, who is frequently associated with conspiracy theory circles.
Poirson-Atlan’s lawyer, Juan Branco, has condemned the charges, accusing the public prosecutor of pursuing an “obvious political direction”.
Among the disinformation spread on social media is a false claim that Brigitte Macron, formerly Brigitte Trogneux, had never existed and that her brother, Jean-Michel, had changed gender and assumed her identity.
In September, a French court ordered two women to pay 8,000 euros ($8,400) in damages to Macron after they falsely claimed she was transgender, sparking further online rumour-mongering by conspiracy theorists and the far right.
