In just over six months, Parisians will head to the polls to choose their next mayor. Among the frontrunners is acting Culture Minister Rachida Dati, a sharp-tongued, high-profile right-wing politician whose political ambitions remain undimmed despite an impending corruption trial linked to the fugitive tycoon Carlos Ghosn.
Recent polls show that despite her legal troubles, Ms Dati would lead the race if elections were held today. A protégé of the former president Nicolas Sarkozy, she rose to national prominence in 2007 when she became the first French politician of North African origin to become Justice Minister.
To this day, Ms Dati regularly references her modest upbringing – her father was a Moroccan bricklayer – as a symbol of her resilience and determination. Though she is now entrenched in the political establishment, few remain indifferent to her fearful reputation – last year, she said to a fellow minister via text message that she would “transform [his] dog into a kebab”.
Now, she hopes to use her mandate as district mayor in the very chic seventh arrondissement as a springboard to the capital's top political job. It's a powerful role in a hyper-centralised country, and one that helped propel Jacques Chirac to the presidency in 1995. A June poll shows that Ms Dati would come first in the first round of elections with 30 to 34 per cent of the votes.
If elected, she would become only the second woman to be elected mayor of Paris, following the Socialist Party's Anne Hidalgo, who has held the post since 2014. It would also reflect the rapid and relatively recent ascent of female politicians in the capital. Before 2014's all-female line-up, women had never had a real shot at being elected.
Rachida Dati
At the time, Ms Dati had thrown her hat into the race but was lagging behind the leading contenders. Yet she was already an easily recognisable figure of the Sarkozy years – part of a deliberate effort by the former president to diversify his cabinet. He also appointed the Senegal-born Rama Yade as Secretary of State for Human Rights.
Speaking in 2014, Mr Sarkozy said that he had appointed Ms Dati Justice Minister because she represented “France in its diversity”, with her “Algerian and Moroccan father and mother”. He used similar rhetoric to justify the appointment of Ms Yade. His remarks were met with backlash in a country that officially eschews ethnic statistics and places a strong cultural emphasis on integration over identity politics.
Conquest of Paris
Today, Ms Dati's origins are rarely discussed publicly. She has become part of the political establishment, and now a frontrunner to lead one of the world's most iconic cities.
“The conquest of Paris has begun,” Ms Dati said on X on August 28, after she was endorsed as the official candidate of her party, Les Republicains. This came after what was widely described as a calculated power play in which she threatened to run against the party's candidate, the former prime minister Michel Barnier, in a by-election this month.
“I was born fighting,” Ms Dati recently told the television network LCI. “I fought when I was forced into a marriage. I never give up,” she added, referring to a marriage to an Algerian architect arranged by her family in 1992 that she had annulled soon after.
Locals in the seventh arrondissement, where she has been in power for 17 years, described her as engaged and accessible. “She may have a lot of baggage, but she's been a good mayor,” said Ronald, a 61-year university professor. The area is among the wealthiest in Paris, and encompasses the Eiffel Tower, the Hotel des Invalides and several prestigious ministerial buildings.
Law and order
Boosting Ms Dati's chances, her longtime rival, Ms Hidalgo, will step down after two mandates. Ms Hidalgo leaves behind her a divided left and growing public frustration over her policies, particularly her aggressive push to reduce car traffic in favour of cycling infrastructure. While few dispute the need to tackle pollution, complaints about congestion are widespread.
Even left-wing Parisians, like Monique, who lives near the busy Republique Square, admit Ms Hidalgo has failed to ensure that blue-collar workers do not feel excluded from the French capital. “Workers have refused refurbishment jobs on my flat because they knew they would not be able to find a parking spot,” she said. Yet Ms Dati offers “no real programme”, Monique said. “She's gone instead for old right-wing tropes – calling for more law and order.”
Just days after announcing her candidacy, Ms Dati publicly took aim at the city's leadership, accusing it of allowing unchecked migration. Her remarks came after an Afghan man was fatally stabbed by another Afghan over a watch in a northern Paris neighbourhood named “Little Kabul” for its high concentration of migrants and crime.
Looming over Ms Dati’s campaign, however, is a legal battle that could derail her ambitions. She stands accused of receiving €900,000 in payments from Renault-Nissan's Dutch subsidiary between 2010 and 2012 while serving as an MEP. Prosecutors allege she acted as an illegal lobbyist on behalf of the carmaker – a charge she vehemently denies. At the time, she had been hired by the company's chief executive Carlos Ghosn, who is now a fugitive in Lebanon.
Legal battle
After five years of investigation, France's national financial prosecutor's office in November 2024 requested a trial for Ms Dati and Mr Ghosn on charges including corruption and influence-peddling. Ms Dati's lawyers have argued that Mr Ghosn had no need to be represented by an MP, since he had direct access to the Elysee Palace.
Ms Dati, a lawyer by training, has insisted she fulfilled her job as a legal consultant defending Renault-Nissan's interests in the Middle East, and has clashed with judges investigating her for allegedly failing to allow her to defend herself properly. A hearing in Paris at the end of the month will determine a date for the trial. The National has reached out to her office to inquire about the trial and her political programme for Paris.
There is reportedly little to show for Ms Dati's work for Mr Ghosn. Even close advisers to Mr Ghosn, such as Mouna Sepehri, have said that they could not remember what she was doing. “Mr Ghosn asked us to think about what we could entrust her with," Ms Sepehri told investigators, according to France Inter radio. "I always told Mr Ghosn the truth, namely that the legal department could not find a line of work for Ms Dati."
French judges have shown they can be tough with politicians. In a separate corruption case, the far-right leader Marine Le Pen was rendered ineligible for five years – effectively barring her from running for president in 2027. Ms Le Pen has appealed, but much to her fury the decision has sparked speculation about her being replaced in the electoral race by her young protégé, Jordan Bardella.
Despite her mounting troubles, Ms Dati remains protected by President Emmanuel Macron, who has described her as “unsinkable”. Few think that a corruption trial will be enough to stop Ms Dati, who has drawn comparisons with US President Donald Trump for her attacks on judges and journalists.
“There are limits not to be crossed,” the Le Monde daily recently warned in an editorial, after Ms Dati clashed with the national financial prosecutor. “There is a hint of Trumpism in the way Rachida Dati is leading her political fight.”
Asked in an interview whether she could imagine going to prison one day, Ms Dati appeared nonplussed. “It hasn't even occurred to me,” she said.
