PARIS — Nearly 70 percent of people that support France’s far-right National Rally say the party’s 30-year-old president, Jordan Bardella, would be a stronger presidential candidate than longtime leader Marine Le Pen, according to a new poll.

The survey from respected pollster Odaxa is yet another data point showing how increasingly difficult it is becoming for Le Pen to mount a bid for the French presidency next year while fighting to overturn the five-year electoral ban that knocked her out of the race. The poll was conducted after Tuesday’s pivotal sentencing recommendations during Le Pen’s appeal, which will wrap up next week.

The National Rally has gone to great lengths to make it clear that Bardella is the party’s Plan B candidate should Le Pen be unable to run. But his growing popularity and the legal hurdles standing in Le Pen’s way have forced the party to confront a tough question: Should Bardella be the Plan A?

Fifty-seven percent of all respondents in the Odaxa poll, which was published Thursday evening in Le Figaro, believed Bardella would be able “exist politically” without Le Pen, seemingly assuaging concerns that he would flounder with his mentor. Forty percent said they are considering voting for Bardella, compared to 38 percent for Le Pen.

Bardella has been at pains in recent days to insist on his full support for Le Pen. On Thursday, he said that Le Pen was “innocent” and hoped that she would be the far right’s “standard bearer” in 2027.

But Le Pen has appeared increasingly pessimistic about her prospects of a successful appeal. She had repeatedly professed her innocence, slamming the charges as politically motivated, but last month said that if a crime was committed, it was not done intentionally. A verdict in the case, which Le Pen has said will determine her political fate, is expected before summer.