Jean Messiha

Jean Messiha (; born Hossam Boutros Messiha, , 10 September 1970) is an Egyptian-born French far-right economist, media personality, and formerly a politician and senior civil servant. He was appointed Deputy Undersecretary of Management at the Ministry of Defence in 2014 before he joined the National Front (FN) in 2016, when he became spokesman of Horaces, a group of high-ranking civil servants and business executives who meet once a month to discuss the party platform.

Messiha stood as a candidate in the 2017 legislative election in the 4th constituency of the Aisne department. In 2020, he left the party to assume the presidency of the Apollon Institute, a far-right think tank. In 2022, Messiha joined presidential candidate Éric Zemmour's newly-founded Reconquête party and became its spokesman.

Early life Messiha was born Hossam Boutros Messiha in 1970 in Cairo, Egypt, to a family of Coptic Orthodox Christians; his father was a diplomat. He lived in Bogotá, Colombia from the age of 3 to 7. While the group announces more than 155 members, Messiha is the only one whose name has been publicly known so far.

In November 2020, several news outlets reported that Messiha was going to leave the National Rally. This was later confirmed by Messiha, who announced his departure in an interview published in Valeurs actuelles. In March 2021, Jean Messiha made the headlines in affirming the existence of a "black privilege" during the 46th César Awards.

During the 2022 French presidential election, Messiha supported the candidacy of Éric Zemmour.

According to the news website Mediapart, he continued to receive salaries from the Defence Ministry from 2017 to 2022.

On 8 November 2023 the Regulatory Authority for Audiovisual and Digital Communication (Arcom) announced its intention to classify Messiha under the "Miscellaneous right" etiquette. Speaking time on television is therefore deducted from the etiquette's allocated time.

In the 2024 European Parliament election in France, Messiha was eighth on the Reconquête list led by Marion Maréchal.

Media presence and activism Since the late 2010s, Messiha's fame has grown in France, mainly due to his interventions in the TV shows of C8 and CNews and his activities on social networks.

In 2020, the French website Arrêt sur images indicates Messiha is "the favourite RN's member of Canal+ group". Moreover, his debate with Yassine Belattar has exceed 700 000 views on Youtube. to 110 000 in 2020. In August 2021, his Twitter account was suspended because of his words judged hateful. However, it has been reactivated in January 2023 following the acquisition of Twitter by Elon Musk.

In July 2023, he organised on the GoFundMe website a fundraiser in favour of the family of the policeman charged with killing 17-year-old Nahel Merzouk. It raised more than a million euros in a few days.

Personal life Messiha became a naturalised French citizen at the age of 20, changing his first name to "Jean" in the process. He has described himself as a "naturalized ethnic Frenchman" and "Arab outside, French inside". In February 2017, he was surprised to learn that, in spite of his naturalisation, he was still considered an immigrant by the national statistics bureau of France, Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques (INSEE).