Candace Owens Defamation Lawsuit: Macron Case in Delaware

The Candace Owens lawsuit currently drawing the most attention is Macron v. Owens, a 22-count defamation case filed by French President Emmanuel Macron and first lady Brigitte Macron in Delaware Superior Court on July 23, 2025. The Macrons allege Owens spent more than a year publishing false claims that Brigitte Macron was born a man, along with a cluster of related conspiracy theories. The case (No. N25C-07-194) is active, and a hearing on Owens’ motion to dismiss is scheduled for June 22, 2026, before Judge Sheldon K. Rennie.¹

What Owens Is Accused of Saying

The 219-page complaint accuses Owens of publishing “verifiably false and devastating lies” across her podcast, YouTube channel, and social media. The central allegation is that Owens repeatedly claimed Brigitte Macron was born a man named Jean-Michel Trogneux, transitioned genders, and stole another person’s identity. Jean-Michel Trogneux is actually Brigitte Macron’s older brother.²

The complaint catalogs additional claims Owens promoted: that the Macrons are blood relatives committing incest, that Emmanuel Macron was installed as president through a CIA-linked mind-control program, that the couple participates in pedophilia and Satanic worship, and that Brigitte Macron’s birth and marriage records are forgeries. A September 2025 amendment added the assertion that Owens claimed Brigitte Macron participated in the Stanford Prison Experiment.²

The 22 counts include defamation, false light, and defamation by implication. Owens is sued personally and alongside two Delaware business entities she controls, Candace Owens LLC and GeorgeTom, Inc. The Macrons seek unspecified punitive damages. Their attorney Tom Clare declined to name a figure but said that if Owens continues to “double-down,” “it’ll be a substantial award.”³

How the Case Got to Court

Owens began pushing the theory in March 2024 while still at The Daily Wire, posting on X that she would “stake my entire professional reputation on the fact that Brigitte Macron… is in fact a man.”⁴ Owens and The Daily Wire parted ways on March 22, 2024.⁵

After launching her independent podcast Candace in June 2024, Owens kept the claims going. The Macrons sent a first retraction demand in December 2024, a second later, and a third on July 1, 2025. Instead of retracting, Owens produced an eight-part podcast series titled Becoming Brigitte, which the complaint alleges she used to solicit subscriptions and contributions.⁴ She also sold related merchandise.³ The Macrons filed suit on July 23, 2025, describing it as a “last resort.”⁶

On the day of the filing, Owens posted on Instagram: “I will be coming for this wig today. Stay tuned.” In a livestream that followed, she called the case “an obvious and desperate public relations strategy” and repeated that Brigitte Macron “is definitely a man.”³⁷ Through a spokesperson, she called the lawsuit “a foreign government attacking the First Amendment rights of an American independent journalist.”⁸

Owens’ Motion to Dismiss

Owens moved to dismiss in September 2025 on several grounds. She argued that the Delaware court lacks personal jurisdiction over her because she lives in Tennessee, does not own property in Delaware, and does not do business there. She called the lawsuit “quintessential libel tourism,” saying neither she, the Macrons, nor the evidence has a meaningful connection to the state.⁹

The Macrons counter that jurisdiction is proper because Candace Owens LLC and GeorgeTom, Inc. are both Delaware entities, and Owens manages and directs their operations, publishing the allegedly defamatory content through them.²

Owens also argued that France’s three-month libel limitation period should apply through Delaware’s borrowing statute, cutting off most of the claims, and that imposing liability would violate constitutional protections.¹⁰ The Macrons filed an amended complaint on September 26, 2025. Owens filed a renewed motion to dismiss on October 30, the Macrons opposed it on December 3, and Owens replied on January 9, 2026.¹

Legal Teams and Case Status

The Macrons are represented in Delaware by Farnan LLP and by Clare Locke LLP, the Virginia defamation firm that represented Dominion Voting Systems in its $787.5 million settlement with Fox News.¹¹ Five Clare Locke attorneys, including founding partners Thomas A. Clare and Elizabeth M. Locke, were admitted to practice in Delaware for the case in April 2026.¹

Owens’ side has seen turnover. Her Delaware counsel, Richards, Layton & Finger PA, remains on the case. Marc Kasowitz, best known for representing Donald Trump, joined her team and then filed a notice of withdrawal on April 21, 2026, with no explanation given. Owens is also represented by Noah Balch Law PC and Horwitz Law PLLC.¹² Owens has publicly estimated her legal costs at $5 million and solicited donations from fans for a legal defense fund.¹¹

The June 22, 2026 hearing on the motion to dismiss is the next major step. If the court denies the motion, the case moves into discovery on the merits. If it grants dismissal on jurisdictional or statute-of-limitations grounds, the case ends in Delaware.

Why the Case Is in Delaware

The Macrons’ theory of jurisdiction rests on Owens’ two Delaware companies. Candace Owens LLC manages her social media and advertising revenue. GeorgeTom, Inc. produces her podcast and operates her website. Her husband, George Farmer, plays a central operational role.¹¹ The complaint frames the alleged defamation as inseparable from that business, alleging Owens used the false claims to “maximize attention and financial gain for herself.”¹³

This is not Owens’ first Delaware defamation case, though the last one had her on the other side. In 2020 she sued USA Today and fact-checking outlet Lead Stories, alleging that their labels calling her COVID-19 posts “FALSE” and a “HOAX” defamed her. Judge Craig A. Karsnitz dismissed all claims in July 2021, holding that the labels were protected opinion or rhetorical hyperbole and finding that Owens’ own posts contained “falsehoods and misinformation.”¹⁴ The Delaware Supreme Court affirmed, and the U.S. Supreme Court denied certiorari on October 3, 2022.¹⁵

The French Cases That Came First

Owens did not invent the claim about Brigitte Macron. In December 2021, a self-styled French journalist, Natacha Rey, and a self-proclaimed spiritual medium, Amandine Roy, posted a four-hour video to Roy’s YouTube channel alleging that Brigitte Macron had been born a man named Jean-Michel Trogneux and that the real Brigitte Trogneux never existed. The theory spread through far-right accounts, anti-vaccine networks, and QAnon followers ahead of the 2022 French presidential election.¹⁶

A French court found Rey and Roy guilty of slander in September 2024 and ordered them to pay €8,000 to Brigitte Macron and €5,000 to her brother. That conviction was later overturned on appeal, and the Macrons have appealed to France’s highest court. In a separate case in January 2026, a Paris court convicted eight men and two women of sexist cyber-harassment of Brigitte Macron for spreading the same theory and related degrading comments online, with sentences ranging from cyberbullying awareness training to eight-month suspended prison terms.¹⁷ Those French proceedings are separate from the Delaware case and do not bind the U.S. court, but they involve the same underlying claim the Macrons are now pursuing against Owens.

1
Delaware Courts. Macron v. Owens Docket Report
2
Clare Locke LLP. Macron v. Owens Amended Complaint
3
CNN. Emmanuel and Brigitte Macron Sue Candace Owens for Defamation
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CBS News. French President Emmanuel Macron and Brigitte Macron Sue Candace Owens
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NBC News. Conservative Pundit Candace Owens and Right-Wing Media Outlet Daily Wire Part Ways
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PBS NewsHour. Conservative Influencer Candace Owens Sued for Defamation
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The 19th. Candace Owens and the Brigitte Macron Lawsuit Conspiracy
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Bloomberg Law. French President Macron Sues Candace Owens in US for Defamation
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ALM Media. Libel Tourism: Conservative Influencer Says Delaware Court Lacks Jurisdiction
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ALM Media. Owens Motion to Dismiss Brief
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Fortune. Candace Owens Brigitte Macron Lawsuit
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Bloomberg Law. Trump Lawyer Kasowitz Leaves Candace Owens Team in Macron Case
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Yahoo Finance. Inside the Economics of Candace Owens’ Media Empire
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Bloomberg Law. Candace Owens Loses Lawsuit Over Facebook Fact-Checking by Media
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U.S. Supreme Court. Owens v. Lead Stories, Docket No. 21-1474
16
BBC News. Two Women Go on Trial for Claiming French First Lady Is Transgender
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BBC News. Ten People Found Guilty of Cyberbullying France’s First Lady Brigitte Macron