GETTY US President Donald Trump says Marine Le Pen is the strongest character

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The president’s comments come just 24 hours before an anxious nation goes to the polls to finally decide on who is to be the Republic's president. Mrs Le Pen has not yet met Mr Trump and while he stopped short of giving her a full endorsement he said he thought she was the "strongest" candidate. Mr Trump said in an interview with the Associated Press that Mrs Le Pen is “strongest on borders, and she’s the strongest on what’s been going on in France”.

GETTY Mr Trump has said he believes Marine Le Pen is the strongest candidate

It has been the longstanding policy of this and previous governments not to engage with the Front National Theresa May, Downing Street Spokesman

However White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said Mr Trump didn’t have a preference in the election. The comments come just a day after En Marche! candidate Emmanuel Macron filmed himself talking on a speaker phone with former US president Barack Obama and broadcast it on Facebook. Around 50,000 police officers and anti-terror military officers are on the streets of France after the country was hit by dozens of terror attacks in just two years.

GETTY Marine Le Pen is angry at the current establishment

Now amid growing scepticism in the European Union over the breakdown of the relationship between France and Germany, it appears Mr Trump backs the Front National candidate's hardline policies. Mrs Le Pen, a former immigration lawyer, had her office targeted by arsonists and previously survived a bomb attack. She has offered to give the French public a say on their membership of the EU as well as pledging to immediately clamp down on security, a major concern for the public.

Mrs Le Pen has large swathes of support from the security and police services and immediately condemned the shooting to death of a police officer in Paris outside Marks and Spencer this week. She has further stated that she intends to reinstate France's borders against EU policy, a move that could motivate voters. A spokesman for Prime Minister Theresa May, who has just called a General Election, said the Government would not deal with the Front National party.

Things you didn't know about Marine Le Pen Fri, May 5, 2017 Marine Le Pen is a French politician who is the president of the National Front, a national-conservative political party in France and one of its main political forces. Play slideshow AFP/Getty Images 1 of 10 Described as more democratic and republican than her nationalist father, she has led a movement of "de-demonization of the Front National" to detoxify it and soften its image