Soviet spy’s grandson launches French presidential bid

Raphael Glucksmann, a prominent pro-European figure on France’s Left and the grandson of a Soviet spy, has announced his candidacy for the 2027 presidential election, positioning himself as a potential challenger to hard-Left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon and the far-right National Rally.

Glucksmann, a member of the European Parliament, hopes to emerge as the leading candidate of the moderate Left in the race to succeed President Emmanuel Macron, The Telegraph reports.

Marine Le Pen, leader of the National Rally, has consistently led first-round voting intentions in opinion polls. Potential candidates from the political center and Left face a difficult challenge in defeating her in a runoff.

“Yes, I am a candidate for the presidential election,” Glucksmann told French television channel TF1. “Are we going to hand our country over to the far Right? Faced with such a choice, I could not stand aside.”

Glucksmann led the mainstream Left alliance in the 2024 European Parliament election, securing around 14% of the vote. A wealthy and well-connected figure in France’s political establishment, he studied at Sciences Po in Paris before working as a journalist and documentary filmmaker.

His family history has also attracted attention. His grandfather, Rubin Glucksmann, emigrated to Palestine in the 1920s, later became a communist and was recruited by the Comintern, the Soviet organization established to promote Bolshevism internationally. He subsequently worked as a Soviet spy in France, Germany and Britain, where he operated under the cover of a businessman.

Glucksmann currently trails Mélenchon in opinion polls, with a key question being whether he or another center-left candidate can consolidate moderate left-wing voters behind a single contender.

“The Left can win the presidential election if it stands firm on its principles,” Glucksmann said. “We must stop being afraid of Mélenchon.”

His candidacy comes as France’s political parties return from the summer recess and begin preparing for what is expected to be a highly polarized presidential contest in April and May 2027.

Although Glucksmann has criticized some of Macron’s pro-business policies, he shares the president’s broadly pro-European and pro-Ukraine stance and has positioned himself as a strong defender of liberal democracy.

His growing profile, however, extends beyond politics. His relationship with Léa Salamé, a prominent presenter on France 2’s flagship evening news program, has repeatedly attracted media attention, with French newspapers describing the pair as one of the country’s leading “power couples.”

Photographs of the couple vacationing on a beach in Corsica were published over the summer by Paris Match, a celebrity magazine that has featured numerous French presidential hopefuls over the years.

French media have reported that Salamé is expected to step back from her anchoring duties at the public broadcaster during the presidential campaign to avoid any perception of a conflict of interest.

By Vafa Guliyeva