Yaël Braun-Pivet

Yaël Braun-Pivet (; born 7 December 1970) is a French lawyer and politician who has been President of the French National Assembly since 28 June 2022. The first woman to hold the position, she was re-elected on 18 July 2024 following the 2024 snap election.

A member of Renaissance (RE), she briefly previously was Minister of the Overseas under Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne from May to June 2022. She has been a member of the National Assembly since 2017, representing the department of Yvelines.

Background Braun-Pivet was born Yaël Braun in Nancy in Eastern France. Her paternal grandparents were Jewish - her grandfather was a Polish tailor while her grandmother was German - and had settled in France in the 1930s in order to escape antisemitism. After World War II, her grandfather received the French Resistance Medal. Braun-Pivet's mother had grown up in care.

Braun-Pivet attended a Jewish school in Strasbourg and went on to study law at Paris Nanterre University. After practising as a criminal lawyer for several years, she followed her husband, an executive with L'Oréal, to Taiwan and Japan, where the two youngest of their five children were born. In 2018, when she was chair of the inquiry into the Benalla Affair, she was criticised for her refusal to summon Alexis Kohler, general secretary of the president's office, to give evidence. In September 2018, after François de Rugy's appointment to the government, Braun-Pivet announced her candidacy for the presidency of the National Assembly; she eventually withdrew and instead endorsed Richard Ferrand. Braun-Pivet was appointed Minister of Overseas Territories in May 2022 but stepped down a month later when she became President of the National Assembly following the legislative election. She was the first woman to hold the position. On 9 June 2024, Macron dissolved the French Parliament and announced a snap election following defeat of his party in the European elections. Braun-Pivet was doubtful about Macron's decision, suggesting that he could have considered forming a coalition instead. She retained her seat in the legislative election, winning 49.1% of the votes in the second round.

Braun-Pivet was re-elected as President of the National Assembly on 18 July 2024 after three rounds of voting by members. In the final round she won 220 votes, ahead of André Chassaigne of the New Popular Front with 207, and Sébastien Chenu of the National Rally with 141. On 31 July 2024, the Constitutional Council rejected an appeal filed by La France Insoumise against Braun-Pivet's re-election; the following day a similar appeal was lodged by Marine Le Pen.

Political positions In July 2019, Braun-Pivet voted in favor of the French ratification of the European Union's Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) with Canada. In 2021, she proposed a new ad-hoc body to better supervise the government's decision-making process on the COVID-19 pandemic in France. Also in 2021, Braun-Pivet voted against the party line and instead supported draft legislation proposed by the Liberties and Territories group aimed at legalising assisted suicide. On 10 October 2023, at the beginning of the Gaza war, she advocated for "unconditional" support for Israel. After criticism from the left-wing opposition for her choice of words, she clarified that the unconditional support referred to Israel's right to exist and not to the Israeli government.