Jean-Noël Barrot

Jean-Noël Barrot (born 13 May 1983) is a French politician of the Democratic Movement (MoDem) who has been serving as the Secretary of State for European Affairs in the government of Prime Minister Gabriel Attal since 2024. He previously was in the government of Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne from 2022 to 2024.

Prior to joining the government, Barrot represented the 2nd constituency of the Yvelines department in the National Assembly from 2017. He was elected to Parliament under the banner of La République En Marche! (LREM), and is the current chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Assembly.

Early life and career
Barrot is the son of politician Jacques Barrot (1937–2014). He graduated from HEC Paris in 2007 (Grande Ecole programme) and 2013 (PhD). He also graduated from Sciences Po and the Paris School of Economics in 2008. His sister Hélène Barrot is Direction of communication for Uber in Europe.

In 2013, Barrot became a research affiliate at the Sloan School of Management at the MIT. In 2017, he became an assistant professor at HEC Paris.

Career in local politics
Barrot served in the Departmental Council of Haute-Loire for the canton of Yssingeaux from 2015 to 2017, a position his father had held until 2004. In the 2021 regional election, he was elected to the Regional Council of Île-de-France on the La République En Marche! list led by Laurent Saint-Martin.

Member of Parliament (2017–2022)
In the 2017 legislative election, Barrot was elected to Parliament. In parliament, he served as a member (and vice president) of the Finance Committee. In this capacity, he co-authored with Bénédicte Peyrol draft legislation in 2018 to combat large-scale tax evasion and avoidance schemes through dividend stripping in the wake of the CumEx Files revelations.

In addition to his committee assignments, Barrot was a member of the French-Uruguayan Parliamentary Friendship Group.

In late 2017, Barrot was appointed by President of the National Assembly François de Rugy to chair a 10-member working group on reforming the National Assembly. The group submitted two reports, in 2017 and 2018, respectively.

From February 2018, Barrot served as spokesman of the Democratic Movement, in tandem with Sarah El Haïry. He eventually succeeded Yann Wehrling as Secretary General of MoDem in December 2018, serving under the leadership of the party's president François Bayrou.

Minister for Digital Transition and Telecommunications (2022-2024)
In July 2022, Barrot became in the government of Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne. In 2023, Barrot criticized ChatGPT and accused the service of not respecting privacy law. However, Barrot stated that he opposes efforts to ban the service.

Political positions
In June 2020, Barrot together with fellow party member Patrick Mignola proposed a law to introduce mail-in voting to facilitate voting during the public health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in France.