A state judge ruled that Candace Owens could not be held personally liable in a defamation lawsuit brought by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and his wife, Brigitte, in 2025. Her two companies are still party to the suit.
The Macrons sued the podcaster and her two companies, Candace Owens L.L.C. and GeorgeTom Inc., in a Delaware court in July 2025 after Ms. Owens falsely claimed that Ms. Macron is a man, saying she had caused “substantial and irreparable damage” to their reputation.
Judge Sheldon K. Rennie of Delaware Superior Court ruled on Tuesday that the court did not have jurisdiction over Ms. Owens, who lives in Tennessee, and dismissed all claims against her.
That ruling means that if the Macrons were to prevail in the case, any judgment could not be assigned to Ms. Owens, and it is likely that her personal assets would be shielded.
Judge Rennie also found that because the Macrons live in France, that country’s statute of limitations, rather than those in the United States, should apply.
France requires that lawsuits be brought within three months of the time supposedly defamatory statements were made, but in cases where they target someone for their race, religion, sex, sexual orientation or disability, that deadline can be extended to one year.
In Tuesday’s ruling, the court asked both sides to submit arguments on which time period would be appropriate and reserved a decision for a later date. If the judge ultimately rules in favor of the three-month rule, that could force dismissal of the entire suit because the Macrons did not initially file within a three-month window.
Ms. Owens celebrated the ruling in a post on X, saying she was “tremendously grateful” to the courts and the judge. A spokesman for Ms. Owens declined to offer further comment.
Clare Locke, the law firm representing the Macrons, applauded the court’s decision to preserve the claims against Ms. Owens’s companies and said it would consider other ways to hold Ms. Owens accountable personally, despite the ruling.
Ms. Owens first began discussing Mrs. Macron’s identity in March 2024 and has since dedicated dozens of episodes of her show, “Candace,” to the conspiracy theory.
Separately, she has twice been sued for defamation in the past seven months over her commentary on the killing of the Turning Point USA co-founder Charlie Kirk. Those cases, filed in federal court in Tennessee and Utah, are both pending.
The post Judge Limits Candace Owens’s Liability in Macron Defamation Case appeared first on New York Times.
