Premiere Dame Worries Sarkozy Constituents

She’s a former model turned pop star and her list of exes includes Mick Jagger, Eric Clapton and Donald Trump. No, she’s not the star of a new reality TV show—although you could be forgiven for thinking so—she is the new First Lady of France.

Born in Turin, Italy, in 1967, Carla Bruni is the daughter of a concert pianist (her mother) and a classical composer. Her grandfather however, was the founder of the tire manufacturing company CEAT, making Bruni herself heiress to a well-established fortune.

Bruni is not exactly what the French had in mind when they contemplated their future First Lady. When Nicolas Sarkozy was elected to office in May of 2007, he was married to someone else. Cecilia Ciganer-Albeniz to be precise, though that marriage had been on the rocks well before Sarkozy began his campaign to be elected president.

Their divorce surprised no one, but the same cannot be said of Sarkozy’s whirlwind romance with Bruni. They married at the Elysee Palace on February 2, having made their first public appearance at Euro Disney during the Christmas holidays. Since then, they have been splashed on every tabloid imaginable, caused considerable havoc with established protocol, and generally turned French political life on its head.

Until the Sarkozy/Bruni soap opera, the French media traditionally left the private lives of their politicians alone. That this pair proved the exception to this rule is in large part their own doing. The innumerable photo ops that show them in informal settings acting like love struck teenagers make them seem more like a celebrity couple than a political power partnership. Brangelina as opposed to Bill and Hillary.

If her presidential husband were anyone other than Sarkozy, a right-wing conservative reputed for his quick decisions and hard-line tendencies, Bruni might find her position slightly less untenable. But France’s first foreign-born First Lady represents a lifestyle and belief system that clashes with those of her husband’s political base. She’s a celebrity in her own right, which doesn’t sit well with the social conservatives among his supporters. They would undoubtedly prefer a more understated woman to occupy the role of Premiere Dame. Furthermore, Bruni has been on the opposite side of the political spectrum, having criticized his proposal to require DNA testing for the families of immigrants wishing to join them in France. She was equally critical of his statements during the 2005 riots in the banlieus, the immigrant working-class suburbs of Paris.

Now that they are married, many of his supporters worry that her left-wing tendencies will impact his political policies. More than that, they worry that his marriage will distract him from politics altogether.

It is a legitimate concern, considering that to date Sarkozy has made little or no progress with the reforms he promised during his campaign. Most of the headlines he has made since being sworn in have been about his personal life.

Bruni faces an uphill battle to swing public opinion in her favor. The French have cast her very much in the role of “The Other Woman” in Sarkozy’s marriage to his office. Despite appearances, France remains at its core a conservative, right wing patriarchy, and Bruni will unavoidably provide a convenient scapegoat for her husband’s political failings.

Bruni gave her first official interview as France’s First Lady to L’ Express two weeks after the wedding. In it, she admitted that she and Sarkozy had made certain mistakes when it came to conducting their relationship in public.

“We gave, and I regret it, the impression of a life that was almost normal, a life of leisure.… People consider, and rightly so, that the work of a president should be done 24/7.”

And here, Bruni has touched on a significant part of the problem. That impression of a jet set celebrity couple is at direct odds with the discretion and decorum that the French expect from the president of the Republic and by extension from the First Lady. Insiders at the Elysee insist that now that the courtship is over, the situation will stabilize and Sarkozy will return his focus to his presidential duties. Bruni, in turn, will focus on her new role, learning and defining it as she goes along.

She promised in her interview to L’Express that she would approach the job “seriously” and that she would do her best. It is hard to know if the French bought into Bruni’s apparent candor and sincerity. The overwhelming media reaction to her interview focused on one statement, in which she compared the website of the Nouvelle Observateur—a respected center left magazine—to Nazi collaborators during the Second World War. She was reacting to a story on the website alleging that Sarkozy had sent a text message to his former wife, Cecilia, eight days before marrying Bruni, swearing to “drop everything” if she came back to him. Sarkozy has since taken legal action against the Nouvelle Observateur.

Bruni’s remarks constituted an enormous faux pas, considering France’s continued inability to digest its role in the Second World War, and while she immediately apologized, the damage was done. She is an independent and strong-minded woman who by her own admission tends to speak and act based on feelings rather than reflection. That is a dangerous tendency to have considering that the press and the public will be waiting to pounce on even her most minor mistakes.

It is entirely possible that the remainder of Sarkozy’s five-year term will be as much, if not more, of a challenge to her than to him.