France’s new first lady is familiar to many in France, but not because she’s been on the arm of France’s incoming president for 7 years, it’s because she’s been on television at least that long. The New York Times catches up with Valérie Trierweiler, the twice divorced companion of Pres. François Hollande. Trierweiler has worked as a political journalist for Paris Match and, later, on TV on the privately-owned network Direct 8. And she plans to be the first French first lady to keep her day job. Which means covering the Hollande presidency, which seems to be just fine in France.
Ms. Trierweiler stopped covering politics for Paris Match in 2005 but continued her political programs on Direct 8, something that is not widely regarded in France as posing a potential conflict of interest.
“We need rules, they exist, but hypocrisy reigns,” she told Le Journal du Dimanche in 2010. “All journalists have opinions, they all vote, they all have sympathy, friendships. But they’re not asked to justify them. We believe in their integrity, we trust them and we’re right to do so.”
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CNN’s Hala Gorani reported on Trierweiler. Her story after the jump…