A Delaware judge has narrowed the Candace Owens Macron lawsuit, removing the podcaster herself from the case while allowing the French president and first lady's defamation claims to continue against two companies linked to her. The ruling, issued on Tuesday, October 27, 2026, and reported on Wednesday, October 28, does not decide whether any of the disputed statements were defamatory. Instead, it turns on a threshold question: whether a Delaware court has power over a defendant who lives in another state.
Superior Court Judge Sheldon Rennie concluded that it does not have personal jurisdiction over Owens, who lives in Tennessee. The same order keeps the case alive, for now, against Candace Owens LLC and GeorgeTom Inc., two businesses registered in Delaware. That split outcome gives both sides something to claim, and leaves the most consequential question in the case still unanswered.
Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, and his wife, Brigitte Macron, sued Owens and the two companies in July 2025 in Delaware Superior Court. Their complaint described what they called a sustained campaign of false and humiliating claims, advanced through Owens's independent podcast platform, and said the material was designed to win attention and income. Among the claims at the centre of the dispute was the assertion that Brigitte Macron was born male, under the name Jean-Michel Trogneux, which is the name of her older brother.
On Tuesday, Rennie agreed with Owens on the jurisdiction point as it applied to her personally. A court can generally only hear a case against an out-of-state individual when that person has enough of a connection to the state where the suit was filed. Owens's Tennessee residence, the judge found, meant Delaware could not exercise that power over her as an individual. The companies, by contrast, were registered in Delaware, and that registration gave the court a basis to keep the claims against them moving forward at this stage.
The judge did not stop there. He also put off a ruling on Owens's broader request to dismiss the Macrons' litigation, asking both sides for further written argument about a difficult cross-border legal issue: how French rules on defamation and on time limits for bringing claims fit alongside American law. According to reporting on the decision, the judge accepted Owens's argument that French law should determine which limitation period applies, because the Macrons say the greatest reputational harm occurred in France. The court is now seeking further argument on whether the relevant French deadline is three months or a special one-year extension.
That distinction matters enormously. If the shorter three-month period governs, reporting on the ruling says the whole lawsuit could fall. If the longer period applies, the case against the companies would clear that hurdle and move toward the merits: whether the statements were false, whether they were made with the knowledge or reckless disregard required in a public-figure defamation case, and what damages, if any, might follow.
The dispute began long before the Delaware filing. Owens promoted claims about Brigitte Macron's identity in 2024 and then released an eight-part podcast series, Becoming Brigitte, in January 2025, after the Macrons' lawyers had already sent a retraction demand in December 2024. The Macrons say they gave Owens three opportunities to withdraw the claims and shared documents intended to disprove them. Their complaint, running to more than 200 pages with 22 counts, accused Owens of dissecting the couple's appearance, marriage, friendships, family and personal history into what it called a grotesque narrative designed to inflame and degrade.
The Macrons have also pursued related legal action in France, and their American lawyer has said the Delaware case was a last resort after repeated attempts to obtain a retraction. The couple sought a jury trial and have said they are willing to travel to Delaware for it. Owens, for her part, has consistently rejected the Macrons' account. A spokesperson for Owens described the original lawsuit in July 2025 as an attempt by a foreign government to attack the First Amendment rights of an American independent journalist, after Brigitte Macron declined Owens's repeated requests for an interview.
Brigitte Macron was 72 when the suit was filed. The Macrons' complaint pointed to birth announcements, childhood photographs, records showing she gave birth to three children during her first marriage, and photographs of her appearing alongside her brother, Jean-Michel Trogneux, at public events, as evidence that the two are separate people. Owens has disputed the scope of the case in her own public statements, a point addressed in the reactions below.
Personal jurisdiction is one of the least dramatic, and most decisive, ideas in American civil litigation. It asks a simple question with complicated answers: is it fair, and lawful, for this particular court to summon this particular defendant? For a company, registering in a state is often enough to answer yes. For an individual, courts look at where the person lives and what connections they have to the state. That is why Tuesday's order could split the defendants down the middle, even though the underlying allegations concern the same podcast and the same statements.
The split also explains why neither side can credibly call the ruling a final victory. Owens is out of the case in her personal capacity, which removes the prospect of a judgment against her individually in Delaware. But the companies that carry her brand remain defendants, and a judgment against them could still carry serious financial and reputational consequences. For the Macrons, the case survives, but in a narrower form, and it now faces a limitation-period argument that could end it entirely before any jury hears evidence about truth or falsity.
There is a further wrinkle. Defamation cases involving public figures in the United States carry a high bar: a claimant who is a public figure generally must show that a false statement was made knowing it was false, or with reckless disregard for whether it was true. That standard is part of why the Macrons' lawyers have emphasised the retraction demands and the documents they say they shared. It is also why the next phase, if the case survives, would likely focus heavily on what Owens knew, what she was shown, and what she did next.
Owens welcomed the ruling on X on October 27, 2026, thanking the Delaware courts and the presiding judge for examining the case objectively. She described the lawsuit as "one of the grossest, legal overreaches by a foreign government leader in human history — a sitting President's attempt to personally bankrupt a single podcaster from outside the nation in which he governs."
In the same post, Owens sought to reframe what the case was about. She wrote: "And to formally reiterate since many reporters willfully lied about this most important detail: I was NEVER being sued for stating that Brigitte Macron was born a male. I was instead being sued for discussing MK Ultra and for allegedly accusing the 'First Lady' of theft from her sister."
That characterisation should be read carefully. It is Owens's account of the lawsuit, not a finding in Tuesday's order, which addressed jurisdiction and deferred the dismissal question. The Macrons' complaint, as reported when it was filed, centred on the claim that Brigitte Macron was born male, alongside claims that the couple are blood relatives and that Emmanuel Macron was involved in a CIA mind-control experiment. The complaint also described the podcast campaign in broader terms, saying Owens touted false claims and conspiracy theories "to promote her independent platform, gain notoriety, and make money."
When the Macrons filed the case, they said in a joint statement through their lawyers that they had tried repeatedly to resolve the matter without court action. "Ms. Owens's campaign of defamation was plainly designed to harass and cause pain to us and our families and to garner attention and notoriety," they said. "We gave her every opportunity to back away from these claims, but she refused." Their lawyer has since described the lawsuit as a last resort after those efforts failed.
Owens's team took the opposite view from the start. A spokesperson said in July 2025: "This is a foreign government attacking the First Amendment rights of an American independent journalist." That tension — between reputation and free expression, and between a sitting head of state and an independent commentator — is likely to define public debate about the case whatever the courts ultimately decide.
The ruling matters for three reasons. First, it shows how jurisdiction can reshape a high-profile case before any evidence is tested. A lawsuit filed in Delaware because the defendant's companies are registered there does not automatically reach the individual behind those companies, and that distinction can change who bears the risk and who controls the defence.
Second, the limitation-period fight could become the real battleground. Cross-border defamation cases often raise a choice-of-law puzzle: which country's time limits apply when the publication is online, the claimants live abroad, and the harm is said to have occurred in more than one place? If the court applies a short French deadline, the Macrons' case could be dismissed even if a court never reaches the truth of the claims. If it applies a longer period, the case proceeds to the far more public and contentious merits stage.
Third, the case is a test of how far American courts will go when a foreign leader sues a domestic commentator. Sitting heads of state rarely bring defamation cases in the United States, and the Macrons' decision to do so has already drawn attention from free-speech advocates, media lawyers and podcasters who worry about the chilling effect of litigation by powerful figures. At the same time, the Macrons' supporters argue that a public platform does not grant immunity from accountability for repeated false claims, and that retraction requests ignored over many months justify court action.
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The immediate next step is written briefing. Both sides will submit further argument on the French limitation question, and Judge Rennie will then decide the deferred dismissal motion. That decision could end the lawsuit, keep it alive against the companies, or narrow it further. If the case survives, the focus will shift to discovery and to the merits: the truth or falsity of the statements, what Owens knew or disregarded, and whether the Macrons can meet the demanding standard for public-figure defamation.
Owens's personal dismissal in Delaware does not, on its own, prevent the Macrons from pursuing other legal avenues, and it does not resolve the companies' exposure. It also does not settle the public argument. Owens has already used the ruling to renew her claim that the case is an overreach, while the Macrons' team can point out that the case continues and that no court has vindicated the disputed claims. Expect both narratives to harden while the briefing proceeds.
For readers following the case, the key dates to watch are the briefing schedule set by the Delaware court and the eventual ruling on the dismissal motion. Until then, the accurate summary is narrow but important: Owens the individual is out in Delaware, her companies are still in, and the clock — specifically, which country's clock applies — may decide everything.
No. The ruling addressed personal jurisdiction only. It did not decide whether any statement was false or defamatory, and it did not clear Owens or her companies on the merits.
No. Claims against Candace Owens LLC and GeorgeTom Inc. continue for now, because those companies are registered in Delaware. A separate dismissal motion is still pending.
Because registration in Delaware gives the court a basis for jurisdiction over the companies, while Owens's residence in Tennessee meant the court found it lacked personal jurisdiction over her individually.
The judge is seeking further argument on whether France's three-month defamation filing deadline or a special one-year extension applies, given the Macrons' position that the main reputational harm occurred in France. Reporting on the ruling says the shorter deadline could lead to the entire lawsuit being dismissed.
The July 2025 complaint centred on claims in Owens's podcast series Becoming Brigitte, including the assertion that Brigitte Macron was born male as Jean-Michel Trogneux, as well as claims about the couple being blood relatives and about a CIA mind-control experiment. Owens disputes that characterisation of the case's scope in her own public statements.
Sources for this article: Reuters reporting on the October 27, 2026 Delaware order; Forbes reporting on the statute-of-limitations question, as summarised in contemporaneous coverage; NPR reporting from July 2025 on the original filing; and Owens's October 27, 2026 post on X.
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