Gerard Depardieu is facing a growing number of rape and sexual assault allegations but the French actor appears to have a powerful ally: President Emmanuel Macron. The French president is being strongly criticized for defending Depardieu in an interview with broadcaster France 5 on Wednesday, the Guardian reports. Asked about the accusations against Depardieu and suggestions that the 74-year-old be stripped of the Legion of Honor award he received in 1996, Macron said, "You will never see me participate in a manhunt," adding that he hates "that type of thing." He described himself as a "great admirer" of Depardieu. "I say this as president and as a citizen, he makes France proud," Macron said.
A documentary that aired on the France 2 channel earlier this month shows Depardieu sexually harassing a female translator and making sexual remarks about a 10-year-old girl riding a horse during a 2018 trip to North Korea. On Wednesday, Macron said the Legion of Honor is not a "moral tool" and a person shouldn't be stripped of it based on "a report." Quebec stripped Depardieu of the province's National Order honor last week, the BBC reports. AFP notes that Macron withdrew the Legion of Honor from Harvey Weinstein in 2017, years before he was convicted of rape and sexual assault.
Green Party MP Sandrine Rousseau accused Macron of insulting victims of sexual violence. "Someone who sexualizes a 10-year-old child does not make a country proud," she said. Anne-Cécile Mailfert, president of the country's Women's Foundation, said the president's remarks were "disgraceful, despicable, and of another era." She said Macron is "taking sides" and "judging women who filed a complaint, women who spoke out." According to the France 2 documentary, 16 women have accused Depardieu of sexual misconduct, the AP reports. Emmanuelle Debever, who said he groped her while they were making a movie in 1982, took her own life last week. (More Gerard Depardieu stories.)
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