If convicted, they face up to two years in prison.
They have been accused of making numerous malicious comments about Brigitte Macron’s gender and sexuality, even equating her age difference with her husband to “paedophilia”, according to prosecutors.
The French first lady filed a complaint in August 2024 that led to an investigation into cyber-harassment and arrests in December 2024 and February 2025.
Brigitte Macron’s lawyer did not respond to AFP queries, and it is not known if she will be present at the hearings.
Among the defendants is Aurelien Poirson-Atlan, 41, a publicist known on social media as “Zoe Sagan” and often linked with conspiracy theory circles.
US lawsuit
The defendants also include a woman already the subject of a libel complaint filed by Brigitte Macron in 2022: Delphine J., 51, a self-proclaimed spiritual medium who goes by the pseudonym Amandine Roy.
In 2021, she posted a four-hour interview with self-described independent journalist Natacha Rey on her YouTube channel, alleging Brigitte Macron, whose maiden name is Trogneux, had once been a man called Jean-Michel Trogneux - the name of her brother.
The two women were ordered to pay damages to Brigitte Macron and her brother in 2024 before the conviction was overturned on appeal. The first lady has since taken the case to the country’s highest appeals court.
Emerging as early as Emmanuel Macron’s election in 2017, the claims have been amplified by far-right and conspiracy theorist circles in France, and in the US, where transgender rights have become a hot-button issue at the heart of American culture wars.
The presidential couple filed a US defamation lawsuit in July against conservative podcaster Candace Owens, who produced a series titled “Becoming Brigitte”, claiming she was born a man.
The couple are planning to offer “scientific” evidence and photos proving that the first lady is not transgender, according to their US lawyer.
Several of those set to be tried in Paris shared posts from the influencer.
In one, a defendant shared claims of “2000 people” ready to go “door-to-door in Amiens (the presidential couple’s hometown) to get to the bottom of the Brigitte affair”.
Other high-profile women in the political sphere, including former US first lady Michelle Obama and former US Vice-President Kamala Harris and former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, have also been the target of disinformation about their gender or sexuality.
-Agence France-Presse
