David Lisnard

David Lisnard (born 2 February 1969) is a French politician of The Republicans (LR). He was elected mayor of Cannes in 2014.

Early and personal life
Lisnard was born in Limoges in Haute-Vienne. His father Denis Lisnard (1944–2024) was a professional footballer born in Cannes, who had started his career at AS Cannes and was playing at Limoges FC at the time of his birth. The Lisnard family had been fishers in Cannes since the 15th century; his great-grandfather Léon Lisnard had a construction company that built Cannes's Forville market in 1934, and his grandfather Raymond Lisnard owned a hotel. Through his mother, he has origins from Bordeaux and Corsica, and developed his Catholic faith.

As of 2014, Lisnard had two daughters and a son. They were born to two mothers, and he was separated from both of them.

Lisnard was made a knight of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in December 2020.

Political career
Lisnard became interested in politics in 1978, when he watched a debate between François Mitterrand and Raymond Barre and began imitating the pair. He campaigned for Jacques Chirac in the 1995 French presidential election, but did not join Chirac's Rally for the Republic until the following year.

After studying at the Institut d'études politiques de Bordeaux and the Paris-Panthéon-Assas University (master's degree in public law), Lisnard became chief of staff to Jacques Pélissard, mayor of Lons-le-Saunier. He returned to Cannes in 1999 and was displeased by mayor Michel Mouillot. His father introduced him to opposition candidate Bernard Brochand, and he worked on his successful mayoral campaign in 2001, becoming his deputy mayor and heir.

Lisnard ran for mayor of Cannes in the 2014 French municipal elections. He was endorsed by the former President of France, Nicolas Sarkozy, who had visited Cannes for a concert by his wife Carla Bruni. In the first round, he took 48.8% of the vote, narrowly missing out on the majority to win outright; the second-place candidate Philippe Tabarot was also from the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP). In the second round, he took 59% of the vote and was elected.

In July 2016, Lisnard was one of several French mayors to ban the burkini. He said that the "ostentatious" religiosity of the swimwear was likely to disrupt public order due to recent terrorist attacks in France. The following month, France's highest court, the Conseil d'État, suspended the burkini bans. The court said that personal freedom could not be restricted unless the risks to public safety were proven. In June 2018, Cannes City Council was ordered by a court to reimburse the €11 fine given to a burkini wearer in August 2016.

In the 2020 French municipal elections, Lisnard was re-elected with 88.1% of the votes in the first round. The result gave his party all 49 seats on the city council.

In June 2021, Lisnard launched on a national scale his party Nouvelle Énergie, which he had set up upon becoming mayor in 2014. That November, he was elected president of the Association des maires de France with 62.34% of the votes.