Macron, wife file lawsuit against influencer Candace Owens over claim of French first lady being born male

French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte Macron have filed a US defamation suit against rightwing influencer Candace Owens, who has claimed that France's first lady "is actually a man". The 218-page lawsuit, which was filed in Delaware on Wednesday (July 23), alleges Owens had published "outrageous, defamatory and far-fetched fictions", among which was that Brigitte Macron was born male as Jean-Michel Trogneux.

Owens has further claimed that Macron and the French president's wife are blood relatives and Emmanuel Macron is either the product of a CIA human experiment or "a similar government mind control programme", as per the Macrons' court document.

The lawsuit is an unusual instance of a current world leader suing an online influencer personally for content, although it follows days after Donald Trump sued the Wall Street Journal and its holding companies over a report of a letter that the US president allegedly wrote to Jeffrey Epstein.

The Macrons have a steep legal hurdle to overcome, as US defamation law mandates that public figures establish "actual malice", i.e., that the person knew or had a reckless disregard whether the information was true or not. The Macrons are asking for a jury trial and damages punitive.

“The principle here is truth,” the Macrons’ lawyer Thomas Clare, co-founder of defamation specialist firm Clare Locke, was quoted saying to the Financial Times. “They believe it’s important to stand up for themselves . . . Owens has had multiple opportunities to do the right thing and in response she has only mocked them.”

He confirmed that the French president and first lady were prepared to fly to Delaware to appear in court personally. “Because Ms Owens systematically reaffirmed these falsehoods in response to each of our attorneys’ repeated requests for a retraction, we ultimately concluded that referring the matter to a court of law was the only remaining avenue,” the Macrons said in a statement.

Owens' spokesperson said she would be answering on her podcast on Wednesday. The lawsuit says the Macrons have "suffered substantial reputational damage" and have spent “considerable sums of money to correct the public record.”

The defamation case is focused on Becoming Brigitte, an eight-part series Owens published this year, and social media podcasts associated with it. In their complaint, the Macrons allege Owens has "used [a] false statement" regarding Brigitte's sex "to promote her standalone platform, gain fame and generate revenue". They claim she "ignored repeated attempts by the Macrons to communicate".

Becoming Brigitte has over 2.3mn YouTube views.

“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 Macrons said in their filing. “The result is relentless bullying on a worldwide scale.”