Presidential candidate doubles down after racial hatred verdict

French presidential candidate Eric Zemmour has refused to take back his comments about unaccompanied underage migrants that got him fined by a court for inciting racial hatred. He insists underage migrants are “not a race.” 

Speaking to BFM TV on Tuesday, the polemicist-cum-politician slammed a court ruling from Monday in which he was fined for inciting racial hatred. 

The court fined the right-wing firebrand €10,000 for comments he made on CNews in 2020. “They have nothing to do here, they are thieves, they are murderers, they are rapists, that's all they are,” Zemmour told his audience, referring to unaccompanied minors entering the country. 

He refused to back down on Tuesday, claiming he did not regret his comments at all. “I would repeat what I said. I was sentenced for inciting racial hatred. But I didn't know that unaccompanied foreign minors were a race. It's not a race,” he said. 

Criticizing the verdict, Zemmour claimed the court was just trying to prohibit him from “linking immigration and delinquency.”

Speaking after the ruling on Monday, the man dubbed “Le Trump” dismissed it as “ideological and stupid.”

“The truth is that these ‘unaccompanied minors’ – who are very often neither minors nor unaccompanied – are characterized by their illegal presence in our country and their strong propensity to delinquency, even criminality,” he added. 

He contended that French citizens should have the right to broach this issue without being troubled by the courts.