Gérald Darmanin


Gérald Moussa Darmanin is a French politician serving as Minister of the Interior in the government of Prime Minister Jean Castex since 2020. A former member of The Republicans, he has been a member of La République En Marche! since 2017. Darmanin was Mayor of Tourcoing from 2014 to 2017 and Minister of Public Action and Accounts in the First and Second Philippe government from 2017 until 2020.

Early life and career

Darmanin was born to a working-class family with Algerian and Maltese roots. His father, Gérard Darmanin, managed a bistro and his mother, Annie Ouakid, worked as a cleaner.. His maternal grandfather, Moussa Ouakid, born in 1907 in the douar of Ouled Ghalia in Algeria, was a Chief Warrant Officer in the French Army and decorated with the Médaille militaire. He served in the Algerian tirailleurs and was also a résistant in the FFI during the Second World War.

Political career

In 2014, Darmanin ran for election as mayor of Tourcoing and won, establishing himself on the national political scene.
Former President Nicolas Sarkozy brought Darmanin onboard as director of his primary election campaign in 2016.
In May 2017, Darmanin was appointed by President Emmanuel Macron Minister of Public Action and Accounts in the Philippe Government. In this capacity, he supports Bruno Le Maire, the Minister for Economic Affairs. At the time of his appointment, he was one of the youngest members in Philippe's government.
Soon after taking office, Darmanin announced plans to achieve 4.5 billion euros in savings on the French government's operational budget in 2017. That year, he managed to bring the country's the budget deficit below the EU-mandated limit of 3 percent of GDP, the first time in a decade for France.
In 2018 he was accused of sexual coercion and harassment by two women relating to alleged misconduct in 2009 and between 2014 and 2017, with one of the women alleging that while Mayor of Tourcoing he asked for sexual favours in exchange for providing her with social housing. However prosecutors dropped the case, claiming an inability to determine an "absence of consent", and Darmanin denied both allegations.