François Hollande

Born in Rouen and raised in Neuilly-sur-Seine, Hollande began his political career as a special advisor to newly elected President François Mitterrand, before serving as a staffer for Max Gallo, the government's spokesman. He became a member of the National Assembly in 1988 and was elected First Secretary of the PS in 1997. Following the 2004 regional elections won by the PS, Hollande was cited as a potential presidential candidate, but he resigned as First Secretary and was immediately elected to replace Jean-Pierre Dupont as President of the General Council of Corrèze in 2008. In 2011, Hollande announced that he would be a candidate in the primary election to select the PS presidential nominee; he won the nomination against Martine Aubry, before he was elected to the presidency (becoming also, ex officio, Co-Prince of Andorra) on 6 May 2012 in the second round with 51.6% of the vote, defeating incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy.

During his tenure, Hollande legalized same-sex marriage by passing Bill no. 344, reformed labour laws and credit training programmes, signed a law restricting the cumul des mandats, and withdrew French forces in Afghanistan, in addition to concluding an EU directive on the protection of animals in laboratory research through a Franco-German contract. Hollande led the country through the January and November 2015 Paris attacks, as well as the 2016 Nice attack. He was a leading proponent of EU mandatory migrant quotas and NATO's 2011 military intervention in Libya. He also sent troops to Mali and the Central African Republic with the approval of the UN Security Council in order to stabilise those countries, two operations however largely seen as failures. He drew controversy among his left-wing electoral base for supporting the Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen.

Under Hollande’s presidency, Paris hosted the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference and his efforts to bring the 2024 Summer Olympics to the city were successful. However, with domestic troubles – in particular due to Islamic terrorism – over the course of his tenure, and unemployment rising to 10%, he faced spikes and downturns in approval rates, ultimately making him the most unpopular head of state under the Fifth Republic. On 1 December 2016, he announced he would not seek reelection in the 2017 presidential election, for which polls suggested his defeat in the first round. ...

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