French president and wife sue U.S. podcaster for claiming Brigitte Macron was born male
The Macrons said in a lawsuit filed in Delaware Superior Court that Owens has waged a lie-filled "campaign of global humiliation" to promote her podcast and expand her "frenzied" fan base.
The couple said the lies included that Brigitte Macron, 72, was born under the name Jean-Michel Trogneux, the actual name of her older brother.
"Owens has dissected their appearance, their marriage, their friends, their family, and their personal history twisting it all into a grotesque narrative designed to inflame and degrade," the complaint said.
"The result," it added, "is relentless bullying on a worldwide scale."
In a statement, a spokesperson for Owens called the lawsuit itself an effort to bully her, after Brigitte Macron rejected Owens's repeated requests for an interview.
"Candace Owens is not shutting up," the spokesperson said. "This is a foreign government attacking the First Amendment rights of an American independent journalist."
In a joint statement released by their lawyers, the Macrons said they sued after Owens rejected three demands that she retract defamatory statements.
"Ms. Owens's campaign of defamation was plainly designed to harass and cause pain to us and our families and to garner attention and notoriety," the Macrons said. "We gave her every opportunity to back away from these claims, but she refused."
Rare for world leader to sue
Wednesday's lawsuit is a rare case of a world leader suing for defamation.
U.S. President Donald Trump has also turned to the courts, including in a $10-billion US lawsuit accusing the Wall Street Journal of defaming him by claiming he created a lewd birthday greeting for disgraced late financier Jeffrey Epstein in 2003.
The Journal said it would defend itself against that case and had full confidence in its reporting.
In December, meanwhile, Trump reached a $15-million US settlement with Walt Disney-owned ABC over an inaccurate claim that a jury found him liable for rape, rather than sexual assault, in a civil lawsuit.
To prevail in U.S. defamation cases, public figures must show that defendants engaged in "actual malice," a tough legal standard requiring proof the defendants knew what they published was false or had reckless disregard for its truth.
Owens has more than 6.9 million followers on social media platform X and more than 4.5 million YouTube subscribers.
WATCH | The Macrons made headlines in May over airplane interaction:
Macron pushed in the face as he prepares to deplane
2 months ago
French President Emmanuel Macron's office is downplaying a moment on a plane in which a woman, later reported to be his wife, Brigitte, appeared to push away Macron's face as cameras captured the moment from the tarmac.
The Macrons' lawsuit focuses on the eight-part podcast Becoming Brigitte, which has more than 2.3 million views on YouTube, and X posts linked to it.
According to the Macrons, the series spread "verifiably false and devastating lies," including that Brigitte Macron stole another person's identity and transitioned to female, and that the Macrons are blood relatives committing incest.
The complaint discusses circumstances under which the Macrons met, when the now 47-year-old president was a high school student and Brigitte was a teacher. It said their relationship "remained within the bounds of the law."
According to the complaint, baseless speculation about Brigitte Macron's gender began surfacing in 2021, and the topic has been discussed on popular American podcasts hosted by Tucker Carlson and Joe Rogan, who have many conservative followers.
In September, Brigitte Macron won a lawsuit in a French court against two women, including a self-described medium, who contributed to spreading rumours about her gender.
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