Anne Hidalgo

Ana María "Anne" Hidalgo Aleu (French: [an idalɡo], Spanish: [iˈðalɣo]; born 19 June 1959) is a Spanish-French politician who has served as Mayor of Paris since 2014, the first woman to hold the office. She is a member of the Socialist Party (PS).

Hidalgo was First Deputy Mayor of Paris under Mayor Bertrand Delanoë (2001–2014), having held the title of Councillor of Paris since 2001. She was elected to the mayorship in 2014 after Delanoë announced he would not seek a third term. During her first term as Mayor of Paris she launched the city-wide Réinventer Paris ("Reinvent Paris") programme, which aimed at refurbishing and allocating obsolescent sites new uses, as well as opened a participatory budgeting platform for projects throughout the city. 2015 was marked by instances of Islamic terrorism: the January Charlie Hebdo shooting and November coordinated attacks, including the Bataclan theatre massacre, the aftermath of which she witnessed first-hand.

Her popularity declined following several instances of alleged mismanagement, to the point that polls showed a majority of voters did not want her to win a second term in 2020. First Deputy Mayor Bruno Julliard resigned in 2018, criticising Hidalgo's style of governance. In 2019 she oversaw the disaster recovery efforts for the Notre-Dame de Paris fire. While the COVID-19 pandemic led to a record low voter turnout, she was reelected with a plurality of the vote. During her second term as Mayor of Paris, Hidalgo oversaw the city's response to the COVID-19 pandemic, implementing measures such as nightly curfews, closure of non-essential shops and the introduction of 50 kilometres (31 mi) of pop-up cycle lanes known as "coronapistes" to ease pressure on public transport. By early 2021, a number of Hidalgo's policies had gained international attention, such as her proposal to remove over half of Paris's car parking spaces and turn the Champs-Élysées into a "fantastic garden". In 2024, Paris hosted the Summer Olympics; the opening ceremony was held outside of a stadium for the first time in modern history, with the athletes paraded by boat along the Seine.

On 12 September 2021, Hidalgo announced her candidacy in the 2022 presidential election, despite her 2020 pledge to serve a full second term as Mayor of Paris. She came tenth out of twelve candidates, with 1.75% of the vote, the lowest result ever for a Socialist candidate in a French presidential election.