The
Italian princess who could be France’s next first lady
Jordan
Bardella’s romance with an aristocratic influencer is complicating his
working-class pitch.
By MARION
SOLLETTY
in PARIS
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July 3,
2026 4:00 am CET
By Marion
Solletty
Aroyal
title. A jet-setting lifestyle. A multimillion-euro offshore fortune.
French
far-right leader Jordan Bardella’s glitzy romance with an Italian princess has
handed his critics an irresistible line of attack: that the National Rally’s
champion of the working class is getting dangerously close to the very elite
his party claims to oppose.
The
relationship between Bardella and Maria Carolina de Bourbon des Deux-Siciles,
an aristocratic socialite and influencer, has become a political liability for
a party that has long cast itself as the voice of ordinary French voters
against the rich and powerful.
More
troubling for Bardella supporters, the relationship has contributed to his
first on-camera stumble in months — a rare misstep for a leader known for his
media discipline and tightly controlled public persona.
The risk
became visible in early June, when Bardella was filmed at the Monaco Grand
Prix, sipping drinks and laughing with VIP guests alongside his girlfriend
while France was reeling from the rape and murder of an 11-year-old girl.
Asked
days later on prime-time television whether the trip was inappropriate given
that it coincided with a silent march for the victim, Bardella bristled.
“Is this
a serious question?” he asked. “There are [silent marches] every day.”
Though he
also pointed to the family’s wish not to have politicians join the
demonstration, Bardella’s reply triggered hostile headlines pillorying the
30-year-old far-right member of the European Parliament for his alleged lack of
empathy.
It also
caused unease inside his own camp.
“These
images are a mistake. It’s a bad sequence,” said one National Rally official,
who, like others quoted in this story, was granted anonymity to speak candidly
about a sensitive matter.
Another
far-right figure, who has since parted ways with the party, said the danger was
the impression Bardella had created. “It is a dangerous thing in politics,” the
person said. “The lack of empathy, the cynicism. I’m not saying that’s the case
for him, but that’s the impression it can make.”
For now,
the episode has done little to dent Bardella’s standing. He remains the
front-runner for the first round of the 2027 presidential election, and polls
suggest he would be competitive against centrist rivals in a runoff.
But the
scrutiny is only beginning. Bardella will learn on July 7 whether he is set to
become the National Rally’s presidential candidate if Marine Le Pen’s five-year
election ban is upheld on appeal. If he does, his private life — and the image
projected by his partner — will become part of the test of whether he can
withstand the pressure of a presidential campaign.
Bardella,
through his communications team, declined to comment for this story.
In an
earlier interview with POLITICO, he knocked a suggestion that she would
accompany him on political trips.
“Listen,
she doesn’t do politics,” he said. “Now, she is by my side, and she is an
extraordinary woman. I am extremely happy and extremely in love.”
‘Fairytale’
Bardella
and Maria Carolina first went public as a couple in April, when they appeared
on the front page of glossy magazine Paris Match. But it was in Monaco weeks
later that the relationship turned from celebrity fodder into a political
problem.
The pair
met in 2025 at an earlier edition of the Formula One event, which put them in
the midst of a media storm. For the Bourbon des Deux-Siciles family, Monaco is
familiar ground. Their apartment there is one of several residences scattered
across France and Italy’s most exclusive destinations. The family owns a castle
in Saint-Tropez, a bucolic house in the heart of Provence, a villa with
spectacular views in Sardinia and a large Parisian flat across the Seine from
the Eiffel Tower, where they can enjoy meals cooked by a Neapolitan chef.
The
23-year-old princess’s upbringing contrasts with that of Bardella, who built
his political identity around his working-class childhood in the Paris suburbs
— a story that has helped him connect with voters from France’s industrial
heartlands and midsize cities, where the National Rally has outperformed
declining centrist parties for years.
After the
Paris Match cover, Bardella lost three points in a popularity poll by French
polling firm Odoxa — though he remained the country’s most popular politician,
with 35 percent positive opinions.
Still,
some in the National Rally dismissed the idea that the relationship would hurt
him with voters. Shortly after news of the relationship broke, another party
official mused it could read as “a fairytale.”
“I don’t
think it has an impact,” said a third official close to Bardella a couple of
days after his Monaco misstep. The official pointed to a newly published poll
by French polling firm Ifop, predicting Bardella would get 36 percent of the
vote in the first round of the presidential election, up 2 points from a month
before.
Love and
money
The
French are famously tolerant when it comes to their leaders’ romantic lives,
which have traditionally been considered off-limits to the press. Nicolas
Sarkozy was going through a high-profile divorce when he was elected president
and swiftly got remarried to model Carla Bruni after a whirlwind romance. His
successor, François Hollande, was caught visiting his mistress, actor Julie
Gayet — now his wife — on the back of one of the presidency’s official
scooters.
There is,
however, one thing that touches a deep nerve in French politics: money.
And
Bardella’s girlfriend has a lot of it.
Maria
Carolina is heir to a family fortune of more than €130 million held in offshore
trusts, according to an analysis of financial records and court documents
obtained by the French newspaper Le Monde. She grew up between Paris, Rome and
Monaco, and was educated by private tutors — as many as 12 — who frequently
traveled with the family, according to the princess and her sister.
Neither
Bardella nor Maria Carolina has been shy about their taste for high-end leisure
destinations, including Monaco — the microstate prized by the world’s
wealthiest for its casinos, scenery and favorable tax rules — and Saint-Tropez,
where both spent vacations before becoming a couple.
On
Instagram, Maria Carolina posts snapshots of her lifestyle and extravagant
dresses. She advertises luxury brands, and occasionally highlights her family’s
favored charities.
Asked
whether she and her younger sister felt “disconnected” while on a television
show about royal figures, Maria Carolina replied: “We don’t live on the moon!
Privileged yes, but that doesn’t prevent us from wanting to work, have our own
projects, craft our own future.”
An
acquaintance who was once invited to the family’s annual party in Saint-Tropez
said Maria Carolina is “a bit in her own world” but “very nice and cool … far
from being dumb.”
She and
her sister “were raised to always be on their best behavior, to never put a
foot wrong,” said the acquaintance.
Maria
Carolina, through her lawyer, didn’t reply to a request for comment for this
story.
‘Bling-bling’
It is the
ostentatious display of wealth that could hurt Bardella, according to the first
National Rally official cited above, who rejected the “fairytale” narrative.
Bardella’s
personal wealth is far smaller, though it has grown thanks to royalties from
his books: more than €700,000 as of last July, according to his financial
disclosure to the European Parliament.
“I can’t
see the upsides, I can see the downsides,” said the first National Rally
official. “We are in a society that doesn’t like bling-bling.”
The
contrast is especially stark when compared to many National Rally voters. The
party massively overperforms among low-income working-class voters, drawing 56
percent of first-round voting intentions in the same Ifop poll — 20 points
higher than its score among the general population.
The
opportunity has not been lost on the party’s left-wing opponents, who are
competing for the same electorate and have gone after Bardella over his royal
connection.
“I’m not
judging the relationship, but I believe Jordan Bardella represents a political
and ideological turning point within the French far right, an ultra-liberal
one,” said Paul Vannier, a member of the French parliament from the
radical-left France Unbowed party.
“The
choices he opted to publicize are not private anymore,” added Vannier. “Dating
a princess, participating in international jet-set events. They are a political
message.”
Marine Le
Pen herself has long taken aim at big money, hammering away at the global
elites that meet in places like Davos, while winning over voters wounded by
plant closures and the ripple effects of globalization in France’s industrial
heartlands.
Last
week, MP Jean-Philippe Tanguy — one of Le Pen’s closest lieutenants — reminded
reporters of one of her longtime mantras during a press conference about the
party’s platform for addressing climate change, which National Rally blames on
the ruling elite.
Le Pen
has described “two types of totalitarianism,” said Tanguy. “Islamist
totalitarianism and the totalitarianism of money as a ruling power, money at
all costs.”
In that
context, the irony of Bardella’s current situation is not lost on Le Pen
loyalists, who fear the political repercussions of his love story, and the way
he is handling it. One recent poll by the research firm Verian offered a
warning sign: Bardella was the politician most closely associated with the
elite, with 17 percent of respondents saying he belonged to it.
While the
result could be read as a sign that National Rally supporters see Bardella as
belonging to an intellectual or business elite, it also points to the ambiguity
of the term among French voters in general, and far-right voters in particular,
according to Verian Director General Laure Salvaing, who oversaw the poll.
“What
National Rally supporters criticize about the elite is not so much power and
privilege but rather a disconnect” from everyday reality, she said. That is
where Bardella is “walking a tightrope.”
Blue
blood
There is
another way Bardella’s romance could work for parts of the far right: as royal
symbolism rather than elite baggage.
Speaking
at a rally of far-right activists close to the Identitarian movement, former
National Rally lawmaker Jean-Yves Le Gallou, who left the party years ago,
welcomed this prospect. “If he is elected, the first lady will be a direct
descendant of [the founder of France’s royal dynasty] Charles Martel. That can
only please me,” he said.
Maria
Carolina’s family tree directly connects her to Louis XIV, France’s
17th-century “Sun King,” though her family’s closer royal claim is to the
former kingdom of the Two Sicilies, which comprised Sicily and the southern
part of the Italian peninsula.
Asked on
French television about the possibility of having a Bourbon as first lady,
Bardella deployed what has become his go-to defense of the relationship: that
it is not about money, power or politics but something far more personal.
“Before a
symbol of the highest order for any lover of French history, she is first and
foremost the person I love,” he said. “I am extremely proud of her, and I hope
that the French people will have the opportunity to discover her and get to
know her.”
Paul de
Villepin and Sarah Paillou contributed reporting.
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