Ten convicted of cyber-bullying against Brigitte Macron

A court in Paris has convicted ten people for engaging in the cyber-bullying of Brigitte Macron, the wife of the President of France, Emmanuel Macron.

The accused individuals faced allegations of disseminating untruths regarding her sex and sexuality, in addition to publishing hurtful comments about the husband and wife's significant age difference.

The court issued suspended prison sentences of up to eight months to the defendants. The complete verdict has still to be made public.

A circulating unfounded claim alleging that Brigitte Macron is a person assigned male at birth has spread widely since her husband's rise to the presidency in 2017.

This latest legal outcome in France coincides with the Macrons engaging in a defamation lawsuit in the US against conservative commentator Candace Owens, who has likewise promoted similar conspiracy theories about the French president's wife's identity.

Their legal filing contends that Owens disregarded all credible evidence contradicting her allegations in favour of give a platform to established defamers.

Owens has regularly repeated these assertions on her podcast and social networks, and in March 2024 declared that she would risk all her credibility on her conviction that Mrs. Macron is in fact a man.

Brigitte Macron originally became acquainted with her future husband when she taught at his high school.

The pair entered into matrimony in 2007, when the then-29-year-old Emmanuel Macron was 29 and she was approximately 54 years old.