Macron Taps Right-Wing Figure Rachida Dati as New Culture Minister

From Dati’s time at the Justice Department, the reform of the judicial map will remain, criticized by the 8,000 French magistrates who still reproach her for her intransigence and lack of dialogue.

Of Moroccan origin, currently mayor of a district of Paris, Rachida Dati will take over the Ministry of Culture. Catherine Vautrin, 63, whose past opposition to gay marriage has hampered her chances of becoming Prime Minister in 2022, will be Minister of Labor and Health.

Rachida Dati was also a member of the right-wing opposition party Les Républicains (LR), which excluded her from its ranks on Thursday. The ministers of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire; of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin; and of Defense, Sébastien Lecornu, who left this party in 2017 to join Macron’s ranks, will remain in office, as will Éric Dupond-Moretti, at the head of the Justice Department.

Macron has maintained the core of his government, which will have a new Minister of Foreign Affairs: the European deputy and leader of the presidential party, Stéphane Sejourné, who will succeed the diplomat Catherine Colonna, announced Alexis Kohler, secretary general of the presidency.

Macron has entrusted them with the mission of stimulating the industrial, economic, European and civic "rearmament", as well as the "regeneration" of the country, after a start of the term without an absolute majority in Parliament and forced to negotiate with the right of LR its key reforms.