French appeals court upholds National Front’s decision to expel Jean-Marie Le Pen

A French appeals court upheld the far-right National Front’s decision to expel party founder Jean-Marie Le Pen over anti-Semitic remarks on Friday. The move is seen as a victory for his daughter and rival Marine, who the elder Le Pen anointed to succeed him in 2011. Jean-Marie Le Pen was expelled in 2015 over a series of remarks considered a liability to the party’s image, including repetition of a remark that Nazi gas chambers are a “detail” in World War II history, AP said. In the appeals court ruling on Friday, the judge echoed the lower court’s arguments that the National Front was justified in removing the party founder as a rank-and-file member “because of damage he caused to the party.”