Jordan Bardella inherits the French far-right spotlight

He wears his suits like armour, smiles like a pop star and boasts more than 1.6 million followers on TikTok. At just 28, Jordan Bardella has become the fresh-faced figurehead of France’s National Rally party and is now poised to inherit one of the most electorally successful far-right machines in Europe.

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Set back behind the rows of youthful front-benchers, a question is increasingly whispered by allies and adversaries alike: Can Bardella, who has no experience in government, really lead?

The presidential ambitions of Bardella’s mentor, too, Marine Le Pen, could be over after a French court convicted her of embezzling European Union funds and barred her from holding office for five years. That means Bardella finds himself the lean man standing after the largest party in the French National Assembly put him in the spotlight. Doesn’t mean he can command the stage.

Critics call him Le Pen’s puppet. Le Pen calls him her asset. On Monday night, she seemed to suggest the moment of reckoning might be approaching sooner than expected. “I hope we won’t have to use that asset sooner than necessary,” she told the TF1 television network.