France: Talent passport withdrawn on weak grounds, Moroccan national has State condemned

The Moroccan national, born in 1994, entered France legally in January 2020 with a long-stay visa. Since May 2023, he had held a multi-year residence permit bearing the designation “talent passport,” valid until 3 May 2027.

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But on 16 July 2025, the prefect of Val-d’Oise withdrew his residence permit, considering that his presence constituted a threat to public order. The administration also ordered him to leave France without delay and imposed a one-year ban on returning.

To justify this decision, the prefecture relied on a record from the judicial antecedents database. It reported acts of violence allegedly committed in Germany in June 2024 against his wife. The prefect stated that the Moroccan national had been arrested and that the incident had required his wife to be hospitalized.

The accusation does not hold up in the case file

Yet these assertions did not correspond to the documents examined by the courts. The police record specified neither the exact circumstances of the case nor the action taken thereafter. Above all, it did not indicate that the Moroccan national had actually been arrested.

The medical report also revealed that his wife’s hospitalization had no connection with any violence. In its decision issued on 2 July, the Council of State therefore held that the alleged facts had not been sufficiently established and that serious doubt existed as to the legality of the withdrawal of the residence permit.

The highest administrative court overturned the initial order of the Cergy-Pontoise Administrative Court, which had refused to suspend the prefectural decision. It then ordered the suspension of the withdrawal of the talent passport and ordered the State to pay 3,000 euros to the Moroccan national.

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This victory nevertheless remains provisional, pending a final judgment on the legality of the decision. The Council of State also specified that its order did not annul the ban on returning to France. The report concerning the Moroccan national in the Schengen Information System has therefore not been removed.