Candace Owens Sued for Defamation by French President and First Lady Over Gender Claims
French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife, Brigitte Macron, have filed a defamation lawsuit against American conservative commentator candace Owens in Delaware Superior Court. Teh suit, filed on Wednesday, alleges that Owens made false claims about Brigitte Macron’s gender to “promote her self-reliant platform, gain notoriety and make money.”
The legal action stems from statements Owens made in March 2024, asserting on her podcast and in a post on X (formerly Twitter) that she would “stake my entire professional reputation on the fact that Ms. Macron is, in fact, a man.” Owens further characterized any journalist or publication dismissing this claim as “establishment” and expressed that the implications where “terrifying.”
The lawsuit, reportedly spanning 200 pages, outlines 22 counts of defamation and related claims. The macrons are seeking unspecified actual and punitive damages, as well as legal costs. According to the filing, Owens “disregarded all credible evidence disproving her claim” and used attempts by the Macrons to correct the record as “additional fodder for her frenzied fan base.”
A statement from the Macrons’ representatives indicated that due to Owens’s systematic reaffirmation of the falsehoods despite repeated requests for retraction, legal action became the “only remaining avenue for remedy.”
Mitchell Jackson, a representative for Owens, stated that his client had not yet been served with the lawsuit and learned of it through media reports. Jackson characterized the lawsuit as a “foreign government attacking the First Amendment rights of an American independent journalist” and declared that “Candace Owens is not shutting up.”
In addition to Owens herself, the lawsuit also names her media company and the entity responsible for managing her website.
