Sébastien Lecornu

Political career

Career in local politics

In the 2014 municipal election, Lecornu was elected Mayor of Vernon.

The combination of two executive mandates being incompatible, he abandoned the town hall of Vernon on 4 December 2015.

Following the 2015 departmental elections in which he was elected councillor for the canton of Vernon alongside Catherine Delalande, Lecornu became President of the Departmental Council of Eure.

Lecornu has highlighted his refusal to raise taxes and rigorous management of public money. Mediapart points out that the hunt for RSA fraudsters has been – with great communication support – the flagship policy pursued by the department since the arrival of Lecornu. Another flagship policy was closing two priority education colleges, which was justified by their low occupancy rates.

Secretary of state

In 2017, Lecornu was appointed to be a secretary of state to the minister for the ecological and inclusive transition by President Emmanuel Macron.

Lecornu was then suspended from his duties within The Republicans by the party and disciplinary exclusion proceedings were brought against him. He was excluded from LR on 31 October 2017, with Gérald Darmanin, also a member of the government, and the members of the National Assembly, Franck Riester and Thierry Solère. He then joined La République en marche.

Nicolas Hulot delegated issues related to energy in general to Lecornu. In particular, he was entrusted with several sensitive files such as the closure of the Fessenheim Nuclear Power Plant, the opening of the Flamanville's EPR, or the Cigeo nuclear waste landfill project in Bure.

Minister of local authorities

On 16 October 2018, Lecornu was appointed minister of local authorities to the minister of territorial cohesion and relations with local authorities, Jacqueline Gourault.

On 14 January 2019, Lecornu was appointed with Emmanuelle Wargon to lead the "great national debate", organised in order to get out of the crisis caused by the yellow vests movement.

Minister of the overseas

On 6 July 2020, Lecornu was appointed minister of the overseas in the Castex government. In this capacity, he held crisis talks on the French Caribbean territory of Guadeloupe in late 2021, in an effort to defuse tensions amid unrest stemming from the government's handling of the COVID-19 pandemic there. He also announced that France would be willing to discuss autonomy for Guadeloupe.

Elected senator for Eure in September 2020, he left his seat to Nicole Duranton, as he had announced before his election, after a period of one month after entering the Luxembourg Palace. Affected by the accumulation of mandates, he resigned from his mandate as deputy mayor, which he had held since 2015, and from the municipal council of Vernon, on 3 November 2020; this resignation also led to his departure from the community council of the Seine Normandie Agglomeration.

A candidate for re-election in the canton of Vernon during the 2021 departmental elections, he came out on top in the first round with 58.74% of the votes cast, but the high abstention rate did not allow him to be directly elected. He was re-elected in the second round with 81.11% of the votes. To everyone's surprise, while still minister of overseas territories, he resumed the presidency of the Eure departmental council, obtaining the 39 votes of the majority, contrary to the practice established by Lionel Jospin in 1997 of not combining an executive mandate with a government function; he was authorized to do so "for a time" by Emmanuel Macron and Jean Castex.

Minister of the armed forces

On 20 May 2022, Lecornu was appointed minister of the armed forces in the Borne government.

International crises

Early in his tenure, Lecornu and Minister of Foreign Affairs Catherine Colonna travelled to Niger together to seal a regional redeployment, making the country the hub for French troops in the Sahel region.

After Ukraine was invaded by Russia in 2022 and NATO allies were in the midst of supplying arms to Ukraine, Lecornu stated at the end of December 2022 in an official visit to Kyiv that the two problems of maintenance and training were the reason for which the Leclerc tanks would stay at home. There were other troubling signs that all was not well with the effort to aid Ukraine. For example, although the CAESAR mobile artillery system had proven very useful to the June 2022 bombardment and recapture of Snake Island and dominated the battle elsewhere, the Ukrainians were having difficulty with the maintenance of the 18 systems and the solution was problematic. Ukrainian defence minister Oleksiy Reznikov hoped that French tradesmen could be sent to Ukraine to service the artillery pieces.

Military procurements

In December 2022, Lecornu and Mariusz Błaszczak signed an agreement between France and Poland on the 575 million euros ($611.69 million) sale of two Airbus Defence and Space observation satellites to Poland.

In April 2023, he presented the Military Programming Law (LPM), which is to apply from 2024 to 2030, and provides for 413 billion euros of military spending over the seven years of the fiscal year. The annual budget will thus increase from 32 billion in 2017 to 69 billion euros in 2030, a doubling of funding for the armed forces. This budget must notably cover investments in the French nuclear arsenal, the construction of a new aircraft carrier and the increase in the number of armed forces. The government also plans to raise the age limit for reservists to 70, whereas it is currently between 62 and 65, with the objective of providing the armed forces with 300,000 soldiers, including 100,000 reservists. The intelligence services should also see their budget increase by 60%.

In March 2024, Lecornu announced that Les Forges de Tarbes would henceforth have the capacity to produce 4,000 artillery shells per month. It produced 1,000 per month as of February 2022, the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Also in March 2024, according to Lecornu, the Russian war machine was able to fire between 10,000 and 15,000 shells per day in Ukraine war.

In July 2024, Lecornu and his counterparts from Germany, Italy and Poland signed a letter of intent to develop ground-launched cruise missiles with a range beyond 500 km (310 miles).

Prime minister (2025–present)

Lecornu was appointed prime minister on 9 September 2025 by President Emmanuel Macron. He succeeded François Bayrou, who was forced to resign on the same day following the failure of a vote of confidence in the National Assembly the day before.

Shortly after his appointment, Le Figaro and Paris Match revealed that Lecornu had visited former president Nicolas Sarkozy at his offices in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, who assured him of his friendship and support.

On 13 September 2025, in an interview with the regional daily press, he announced that he would abandon the abolition and reinstating of the two public holidays, an unpopular measure sought by his predecessor François Bayrou. Two days later, he announced the end of "lifetime benefits" for former members of the government as of 1 January 2026.

On 6 October 2025, Lecornu unveiled a cabinet that was similar to previous governments. He resigned hours later amidst threats across the political spectrum to oust him. Macron then tasked Lecornu with 48-hour talks to stabilise the government. Lecornu also assumed the role of the minister of the armed forces on an interim basis after Bruno Le Maire resigned after only a few hours in office. On 10 October 2025, Macron reinstated Lecornu as prime minister, resulting in similar criticism.

On 10 October Lecornu was reappointed by Emmanuel Macron as prime minister, four days after having resigned. He stated that he had accepted "out of a sense of duty" and asserted that he wanted to form a "new government team" which, according to him, would "embody renewal and the diversity of skills".

On 14 October, during his general policy statement amid internal conflicts with left-wing and right-wing politicians, he said he had "accepted the mission because France needs a budget, because there are emergency measures to be taken without delay", promised a "serious and reliable budget for France, useful and good for the French, within three months", and announced that he would propose "to Parliament this autumn that we suspend the 2023 pension reform until the presidential election" and that "no increase in the age will take place from now until January 2028".

In an address before the National Assembly, Lecornu said he supported the suspension of pension reforms until after the 2027 presidential election, which led the Socialists to pledge its support for him against a no-confidence motion. This led to Lecornu surviving two successive no-confidence motions filed by La France Insoumise and the National Rally respectively on 16 October.

His government narrowly passed a budget for social security for 2026 in a 247–234 vote in the National Assembly on 9 December.

Lecornu announced in January 2026 that he would invoke Article 49.3 of the constitution to force through the remaining 2026 budget, despite refusing to do so earlier. He faced confidence votes from La France Insoumise and the National Rally, which were both unsuccessful with 269 and 142 votes in favour respectively, falling short of a majority. Lecornu secured the support of the Socialist Party after making concessions on more social housing and €1 lunches for university students.

Political positions

Lecornu described himself as "rather Gaullist, Séguinist, fundamentally right-wing", as well as "liberal and European", while Le Monde described him in 2022 as "not really liberal or all that souverainist", allowing himself to be "sucked in by the identity temptations of the right, while knowing how to make himself appreciated on his left flank".

Against what he calls l'excuse sociale ('the social excuses'), he threatened in 2016 to not proceed with the increase to the Revenu de solidarité active (RSA) decided by Manuel Valls's team as part of the government's plan to combat poverty, and denounced a "clientelism that reeks of old-fashioned politics".

Sébastien Lecornu opposed same-sex marriage in 2012. Declaring that "gay communitarianism frustrates [him] as much as homophobia", he added that "marriage is the basis for building a family in our societies. And a family is built between a man and a woman". In 2015, he spoke out against surrogacy and medically assisted procreation, before issuing an apparently contradictory opinion in 2019.

Presented as the president's unofficial "Mr. Hunter" at the beginning of Emmanuel Macron's first term, he defended traditional hunting as secretary of state to the minister of the ecological and inclusive transition, and lowered the price of the national hunting permit.

Controversies

Lavrilleux affair

It was during Lecornu's term as minister of the armed forces that, in September 2023, journalist Ariane Lavrilleux was 39 hours in police custody and had her home searched for leaking information to the press about a secret Franco–Egyptian military operation. This is considered by Mediapart to be a "serious breach of the confidentiality of sources". However, Lecornu has never "expressed any regret" over this affair.

French arms exports to Israel

In the context of the Gaza war, Mediapart and Disclose are investigating the €30 million in French arms exports to Israel. Questioned on this subject by the Foreign Affairs Committee, Sébastien Lecornu questioned the rigor of these media outlets and refused to answer the former's questions. Amnesty International France deplored the lack of transparency in arms export controls under his tenure as minister, recalling that he opposed the creation of a new extra-parliamentary commission to evaluate exports of war materials and goods for civilian and military use. According to Mediapart, Sébastien Lecornu never "assumed the need to impose an embargo on French arms sales to Israel, even as accusations of war crimes and then genocide in Gaza were becoming more precise".

Lecornu publicly stated that France does not sell weapons to Israel, but exports components used in the Iron Dome, which protects civilian populations, as well as elements subsequently assembled in Israel and re-exported, notably for use by the French Armed Forces. To support his statements, he declassified a document in June 2025, which he submitted to parliamentarians. Three months later, however, Mediapart published an article reporting on the ministry's latest report on arms exports from France. According to the article, "orders from Israel amounted to €27.1 million in 2024", partially contradicting the minister's statements.

Lunches with Marine Le Pen

In April 2025, Lecornu met Marine Le Pen several times in private meetings, organized at the home of his friend Thierry Solère or in his office at the Ministry of the Armed Forces. His entourage acknowledged that one of these discussions concerned the war in Ukraine, even though, as Mediapart notes, the National Rally was funded by Russia.

Honours

National honours

• Grand Cross of the National Order of Merit (2026)
• Knight of the Order of Agricultural Merit (2012)
• Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters (2017)
• National Defence Medal, bronze with Gendarmerie nationale clasp (2015)
• Medal for Voluntary Military Service, silver (2017)
• Medal of Honor for Overseas Commitment, gold (2022)

Foreign honours

• Medal of the Order of Honour ( Armenia, 2026).
• Commander of the Order of the Star of Mohéli ( Comoros, 2021).
• Commander First Class of the Order of the Dannebrog ( Denmark, 2025).
• Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany ( Germany, 2024).
• Grand Officer of the National Order of the Cedar ( Lebanon, 2021).
• Medal of the Order of Honour ( Moldova, 2021).
• Knight of the Order of Saint Charles ( Monaco, 2023).
• Commander of the National Order of the Lion ( Senegal, 2023).
• Commander First Class of the Royal Order of the Polar Star ( Sweden, 2024).
• First Class of the Order of Merit ( Ukraine, 2025).
• Grand Cordon of the Order of Zayed ( United Arab Emirates, 2022).