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‘When the fear of being called racist becomes stronger than the duty to protect women and children, something is deeply broken in our societies,’ migrant assault survivor Thaïs d’Escufon said.
(LifeSiteNews) — Thaïs d’Escufon is a French political activist, commentator, and from 2018 to 2021 was spokesperson for Génération Identitaire, a movement known for its opposition to mass immigration and its defense of French and European identity.
In recent years, she has become one of the most prominent young voices of the French identitarian movement, frequently speaking on issues related to immigration, security, freedom of expression, and women’s safety.
In 2021, d’Escufon revealed that she had been sexually assaulted by a Tunisian man who had entered her home. On December 18, 2023, d’Escufon stated during a television interview for the French channel BFMTV that immigration represents one of the “greatest threats to the safety of French women.”
For this reason, she has been prosecuted for incitement to racial hatred. The case has sparked a heated debate in France about freedom of speech, immigration, public security, and the limits of political expression. On June 18, 2026, the judicial court of Paris handed her to a €1,000 fine ($1,142).
LifeSiteNews interviewed d’Escufon to hear her reflections on the events leading up to the trial, the consequences of the case, and the general situation of France and Europe today.
LifeSiteNews: Could you briefly explain the events that led to your conviction and what exactly you said during the television interview?
Thaïs d’Escufon: The case began after a television appearance on BFMTV in December 2023. I was invited to comment on a case involving a young woman who had been raped by a central-African man under an expulsion order. That case struck me very deeply because the modus operandi echoed my own experience.
In late 2021, a Tunisian man entered my home in Lyon in broad daylight. He took my phone, kept me inside my own apartment for a long time, and the situation gradually turned into an explicit sexual demand. I was terrified. I managed to make him leave and call the police. I later recognized him on surveillance footage, but the case was nevertheless dismissed.
So when I spoke on television, I was not speaking from a cold ideological abstraction, I was speaking from a personal trauma and from anger, because I have the conviction that many women experience similar things but are expected to remain silent when the truth becomes politically inconvenient.
During that interview, I said that, “The main danger for women in France comes from immigrant men, African, black, and Arab men.” It’s just the truth. Those words were later treated as a criminal offense. I was prosecuted, and the prosecutor has sought a four-month unsuspended prison sentence against me. On June 18, after massive pressure on social media, the Paris judicial court sentenced me to a €1,000 fine for public insult on the grounds of origin, ethnicity, nation, or race.