French Police Search Macron Party Office, Consulting Firm

By Staff, Agencies

French police have searched the HQ of President Emmanuel Macron's Renaissance political party and the offices of US consulting giant McKinsey in Paris.

Tuesday's raids are part of inquiries into the use of consultancies during Macron's winning presidential campaigns in 2017 and 2022, prosecutors said.

Neither President Macron himself nor his campaign teams have been publicly identified as targets by prosecutors.

Both Renaissance and McKinsey said they were co-operating with the inquiries.

"It's normal for the judiciary to investigate freely and independently to shed all the light on this subject," Renaissance spokesman Loic Signor told the AFP news agency.

Meanwhile, McKinsey told Le Figaro newspaper that "the firm is co-operating fully with the authorities, as has always been the case."

France has strict rules regarding the financing of political parties and election campaigns.

Public spending on consultancies spiked during Macron's first term in office, lawmakers concluded in March.

French prosecutors opened two judicial inquiries in October, looking into possible false election campaign accounting and favoritism.

The prosecutors suspect that a number of McKinsey employees worked as unpaid volunteers during Macron's victorious 2017 bid, and one investigation is focusing on whether this constituted a hidden campaign expense.

Another investigation is trying to establish whether the consultancy firm had privileged treatment in winning lucrative government contracts.

In 2021, former President Nicolas Sarkozy was sentenced to a year in prison for illegally funding his unsuccessful 2012 re-election campaign.

He was found guilty of spending tens of millions of euros more on his campaign than was permitted under the law.

Sarkozy - who denied any wrongdoing - was not jailed, however, as he was allowed to serve his sentence at home with an electronic bracelet.