FRENCH police raided the headquarters of far-right party National Rally today, seizing documents and accounting records, the party’s leader said, as part of a campaign finance inquiry.

Prosecutors are investigating allegations of illegal financing of Marine Le Pen’s 2022 presidential bid, and European Parliament and French parliamentary campaigns.

Jordan Bardella, who took over the presidency of the popular party in 2022, said that police seized “all files relating to the party’s recent regional, presidential, legislative, and European campaigns — in other words, all of its electoral activity.”

Mr Bardella slammed the raid in a message on X. “This spectacular and unprecedented operation is clearly part of a new harassment operation. It is a serious attack on pluralism and democratic change,” he said.

The raid came after Ms Le Pen — the party’s former leader and runner-up to incumbent President Emmanuel Macron in 2022 — was convicted in April, along with 24 colleagues, of having used money intended for European Union parliamentary aides to pay party staff between 2004 and 2016.

But Wednesday’s raid stems from a more recent case.

The Paris prosecutor’s office said that searches were carried out at the National Rally’s headquarters, at the headquarters of unidentified companies and at the homes of people leading those companies.

The searches were prompted by a judicial inquiry opened a year ago into a raft of allegations, including fraud, money laundering and forgery, the prosecutor’s office said.

The inquiry aims to determine whether Ms Le Pen’s 2022 presidential campaign, and the party’s campaigns for European Parliament in 2024 and French parliamentary elections in 2022 were financed by “illegal loans from individuals for the benefit of the party or National Rally candidates,” the statement said.

The inquiry is also investigating allegations that the National Rally overbilled for services and billed for fictitious services.

Former party treasurer Wallerand de Saint-Just told reporters outside the headquarters, “We did nothing wrong.”

The prosecutor’s office says no one has yet been charged in the case.