WASHINGTON, DC — Jordan Bardella, the telegenic leader of the National Rally, says he’s been fighting for the “soul” of France since he dropped out of university to work full time for the country’s right wing party.
“I chose to enter the lions’ den,” Bardella told The Post of his role in French politics during an exclusive interview.
“There I had to fight to defend my ideas. Politics is violent. In politics, you are judged, attacked, criticized.”
Bardella, 29, will bring his message to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) Friday —the first French politician to speak at the gathering since 2018.
There, he will emphasize many of the same concerns that define President Trump’s Make America Great Again movement — a battle against mass immigration, censorship, the rising cost of living and against woke ideologies he says have prevented France from moving forward over the last two decades.
“I was impressed by JD Vance’s speech in which he said that European countries were in danger of losing their values, and that their greatest enemies are from within,” said Bardella, referring to the blistering address that the US vice president delivered in Munich last week.
“But I am bringing with me a message from my political movement of hope for France and also for Europe.
“France invented the concept of the ‘nation,’ and we don’t want the French nation to disappear. We want it to inspire the rest of the world, like the victory of Donald Trump and the victory of American patriotism.”
And while he says Trump’s victory “is a great thing for America” it’s also challenging for Europe because “the US president is committed to defending America’s interests, as he should. But most of Europe still believe those are not their interests.”
Bardella, who is also a member of the European Parliament, has long been a rising star of the French right wing.
In 2022, he became the leader of the National Rally, the populist and nationalist party formerly known as the National Front. The far right movement was founded in 1972 by Jean-MArine Le Pen, a polarizing figure in France who was a Holocaust denier convicted of inciting antisemitism and racial violence, but also beloved by his ardent followers. Le Pen died in January. He was 96.
In 2011, the National Front’s leadership shifted to Le Pen’s daughter, Marine Le Pen, who became a mentor to Bardella, who joined the party that same year when he was 16 years old. Still a minor, he needed his mother’s signature on his registration card to join, he said. Later he dropped out of the Sorbonne, one of the most prestigious universities in France, to work in politics.
“Politics chose me,” he said. “Marine Le Pen gave me my chance. She is one of the greatest women of France. I was inspired by her courage and patriotism and her concern for the working class. She gave me a great opportunity.”
In 2018, the party went through a major rebranding and name change as it sought to appeal to younger voters. Four years later, Marine Le Pen, a three-time candidate for president of France, chose Bardella to lead the party.
With his movie star looks, and more than two million Tik Tok followers, Bardella has the allure of a French rock star. It’s largely thanks to his appeal that 25 percent of French voters between the ages of 18 and 25 —many of whom say they are concerned with rising immigration and crime — voted for the National Rally in European parliamentary elections last year, analysts say.
When his memoir was released in November, young fans lined up for hours to get an autographed copy, with women declaring “I Love You, Jordan!” on social media.
He is regularly swarmed at events where fans hold up copies of his book seeking autographs, which he admits is a bit of a jolt for someone who describes himself in his book, “Ce Que Je Cherche” (“What I Am Looking For”), as very discreet and private.
The memoir has become a huge bestseller despite a concerted effort by the country’s railway unions to ban ads for the book on trains and rail stations days before its release in November. The unions said they were against any form of political advertising, and had once banned ads by Greenpeace.
“The hour is grave for freedom of expression,” said Bardella in an X post last year. “At the urging of SNCF [National Company of the French Railways], the ad company has censored the publicity campaign for…my book.”
But in the end the commotion may have increased book sales, he told The Post. “When the unions tried to block ads for my book, it just made it more popular. They were my best-selling agents,” Bardella said, adding that he has sold more than 200,000 copies — exponentially more than Francois Hollande, France’s former president, who released a memoir in 2022.
“Hollande only sold 6,000 copies of his book,” he quipped.
Bardella’s memoir is part political manifesto, part coming of age story that traces his rise from Drancy, Seine-Saint-Denis, an impoverished suburb northeast of Paris, overrun with drug gangs.
The only child of Italian immigrants, he was raised by a single mother, who worked as a kindergarten assistant, after his parents split.
“My upbringing was similar to JD Vance,” Bardella said. “I grew up poor. I did not have the traditional trajectory of French politicians. I did not go to the grand schools, like Sciences Po and the National School of Administration.
“My schooling was among the French movement of patriots. When you vote for RN [National Rally] you are not voting for technocrats, you are voting for a movement that understands and inspires hope.”
The party scored a major upset in the summer when it won 31.4 percent of the vote and a total of 30 seats in European Parliament elections.
An hour after the victory, French President Emmanuel Macron dissolved the French Parliament and declared a snap election, largely to test the strength of the French right wing.
The National Rally won 34 percent of the vote in the first round of voting, and Bardella was poised to become the youngest prime minister in France’s history if the movement scored an absolute majority in the National Assembly. However, the National Rally lost in a stunning reversal in a second round of voting.
“We always make mistakes, I made mistakes, and I take my share of responsibility for the results,” said Bardella on French TV after the defeat.
Marine Le Pen refused to admit defeat, and said that her party’s triumph had not been canceled but merely “postponed” and blamed the loss on an “unnatural alliance” between the country’s leftwing parties and Macron.
Still, the National Rally gained 53 more seats in the National Assembly, bringing its total to 142. The New Popular Front, a leftwing alliance set up to counter the National Rally, is the leading party with 188 seats.
“Politicians are over-exposed on social media, and we can’t afford to make any mistakes. And when you are defending patriotic ideas, you have even less room to make a mistake.”
