A group of ten found guilty of cyber-bullying directed at Brigitte Macron

A Paris court has convicted ten people for carrying out the online harassment of Brigitte Macron, the spouse of France's leader, Emmanuel Macron.

The defendants faced allegations of circulating false claims regarding her gender and sexual orientation, in addition to making malicious remarks about the pair's significant age difference.

The court issued suspended prison sentences of up to eight months to the perpetrators. The complete verdict has yet to be released.

A persistent unfounded claim suggesting that Brigitte Macron is a person assigned male at birth has existed since her husband's initial election in 2017.

This Monday's court decision in France comes as the Macrons pursuing a legal action for defamation in the United States against right-wing influencer Candace Owens, who has repeatedly shared comparable unfounded claims about the French president's wife's identity.

Their complaint alleges that Owens brushed aside all credible evidence contradicting her allegations opting to give a platform to established defamers.

Owens has regularly repeated these claims on her podcast and social media channels, and in March 2024 stated that she would stake her entire professional reputation on her insistence that Mrs. Macron is biologically male.

Brigitte Macron initially encountered her current spouse when she taught at his lycée.

The two married in 2007, when the future French president was 29 and she was approximately 54 years old.