Marine Tondelier at the Ecologists’ Summer Days in Poitiers, on August 19, 2021. Wearing a headset microphone, she speaks during her party’s rally. Credit: Greenbox / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Marine Tondelier, national secretary of the Ecologists and a candidate in the 2027 presidential election, wants to punish factual, deliberate lies by political officials. In France, the penalties would go as far as ineligibility for office. Presented on September 4, 2026 after a row over acetamiprid, her idea takes its cue from Wales. But no French text yet accompanies the announcement. The decisive questions of definition, proof, judge, and appeal remain unanswered.
An Announcement Born From a Shortcut on Acetamiprid
The proposal appears in a note published on Marine Tondelier’s campaign website, credited to Alexis Lebrun. It calls for a “solid legislative arsenal” against deliberate disinformation in public debate. The candidate refers to graduated sanctions, from public correction to ineligibility, as well as a possible recall of elected officials.
The starting point is a segment of Complément d’enquête, filmed in February and aired on France 2 on September 3. Horizons Senator for Indre-et-Loire Vincent Louault claimed that all flea and tick collars for dogs and cats contained acetamiprid. But the products examined by the program contained other pesticides, not this substance. France 2 says it received written confirmation from the National Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health & Safety. Acetamiprid had never been authorized for veterinary use.
Confronted with this contradiction, the senator explained that he had taken a shortcut based on the neonicotinoid family to get a simple message across. He admitted to having “oversimplified,” then said: “Yes, I’m spreading fake news. […] I apologize. But I stand by it.” These words establish acceptance of a factually inaccurate presentation. They are not enough, however, to legally qualify an intentional lie. The proposed offense does not yet exist in this form.
Marine Tondelier, on the other hand, sees this sequence as an example of deliberate deception. This disagreement already shows the main difficulty of the project. A statement can be false without its author’s state of mind and intent being proven.
Three Announced Criteria, But No Bill
The candidate proposes three cumulative conditions. The statement would have to be factually false. Its author would have to know it was false, or reasonably could not ignore that fact. Finally, there would have to be proof of an intent to deceive. She explicitly excludes error, imprecision, and changing one’s mind.
This distinction is essential, but it is not enough to define an offense. A law would have to specify what counts as a verifiable fact. It would have to distinguish that fact from opinion, prediction, or promise. It would also have to separate overstatement, negligence, and willful deception. Being unable to “reasonably ignore” the falsity of a statement does not necessarily amount to an intent to deceive. The first criterion may point to serious carelessness. The second requires proof of a purpose.
As of September 7, the campaign note is accompanied by neither a bill nor a draft law. No parliamentary timetable has been announced. It does not identify the authority that could be referred to or the competent court. The standard of proof, time limits for judgment, and avenues of appeal are also left open. The scope of the people targeted must also be set. Candidates, elected officials, ministers, party leaders, and other campaign participants are not in the same legal situation.
The timing of intervention matters just as much. A correction issued after the vote may come too late. Conversely, a decision handed down in an emergency during a campaign risks immediately affecting it. The rule therefore would need to take effect quickly enough without sacrificing adversarial process. The accuser and the defense must be able to discuss the facts and the evidence.
The Welsh Precedent Is Narrower and Still Incomplete
Wales has indeed opened a path, but not in the finished form presented in the campaign note. The Welsh Parliament passed the Senedd Cymru (Member Accountability and Elections) Act 2026 on March 17. The law received royal assent on April 27, 2026. It requires Welsh ministers to ban certain false or misleading factual statements in the electoral rules. These statements must have been broadcast before or during an election in order to influence the election of a candidate.
The primary law does not, however, create an immediately applicable, fully defined offense. Future texts will have to determine what constitutes a statement of fact. They will specify whether the ban will cover only false statements or also misleading ones, as well as the time period, the authors, and the exceptions. The law also allows knowledge of falsity or conscious risk-taking to be taken into account. According to the timetable announced at the vote, the measure is not to apply before the 2030 elections.
Marine Tondelier’s three-part framework therefore does not exactly match the Welsh text. That text is limited to Senedd elections and to statements intended to influence a candidate’s result. It still leaves part of the framework to be defined, whereas the French proposal already presents it in the form of three criteria.
Recall is, moreover, part of a separate section of the Welsh law. A Senedd member may be subject to a recall vote after a conviction carrying a custodial sentence. The committee in charge of conduct rules may also recommend it, subject to parliamentary approval. The ban on false electoral statements and the recall procedure are included in the same law, but they are not automatically linked.
An Earlier French Proposal That Remained Filed Away
The idea is not new in France. Senator Henri Cabanel introduced a proposal on July 19, 2024, to sanction elected officials who make misleading statements. Its single article provided for one year in prison and a 10,000-euro fine. The penalty would have applied to any elected official who publicly made statements, in connection with their mandate, that “deceive or attempt to deceive.” An additional penalty of ineligibility and publication of the decision could be added.
This text covered elected officials in the exercise of their mandate, not all campaign actors. It did not further detail the boundary between error and deception, nor the elements needed to establish falsity and intent. As of September 7, 2026, the Senate’s legislative record shows no step after its filing at first reading.
French law, however, does not start from zero. Article L. 97 of the Electoral Code already penalizes false news, defamatory rumors, and other fraudulent maneuvers. They must have surprised or diverted votes, or led voters to abstain. The 2018 law against information manipulation also provides for emergency proceedings during certain national campaigns. It can halt the online spread of false information likely to affect the integrity of the vote.
These mechanisms target specific situations and effects; they do not create a general duty of truth for every political official. When reviewing the 2018 law, the Constitutional Council imposed a strict reading. The inaccuracy or misleading nature of the fact must be obvious. So must the risk to the integrity of the vote. This reserve illustrates the balance expected between protecting elections and freedom of expression.
Who Judges, When, And With What Penalty?
The central difficulty is therefore not only naming the prohibited behavior. A procedure must be built that turns neither the government nor a political authority into the arbiter of truth. An independent judge should be able to verify the material fact and hear the person accused. They would then assess the evidence establishing knowledge and intent before issuing a decision that could be appealed.
The burden of proof would be decisive. A statement about a product’s composition can be checked against technical documents. A budget estimate, an economic causal link, or a climate forecast involve more assumptions. The more contested or evolving the subject matter, the more a broad offense risks turning a political or scientific disagreement into a criminal dispute.
The severity of the penalties should also vary according to the seriousness, repetition, reach, and effect of the statement. A public correction does not have the same consequences as ineligibility or removal from office during a term. In a March 28, 2025 decision, the Constitutional Council ruled in a separate case involving a municipal councilor. It recalled that a judge must assess the degree of harm to the ongoing term of office and to voter freedom. That decision does not prejudge a future law, but it sheds light on the minimum safeguards.
Marine Tondelier’s proposal therefore opens up a legislative debate more than it provides a ready-to-pass system. To become enforceable, a law against political lies would have to narrowly define the facts at issue. It would have to reserve punishment for proven deceptions, protect adversarial debate, and tailor penalties to each situation. Without these clarifications, the protection promised to voters would remain exposed to the very risk it seeks to prevent. A debate about the facts could then become a battle over who has the power to define them.