WorldFEB 9, 2025

French President’s Wife Accused Of Being Transgender Following Viral Social Media Post

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A new conspiracy theory arises every single day and today’s targets none other than Brigitte Macron, the French president’s wife.

Just yesterday, a verified account on X that goes by @iluminatibot posted a photo of the current First Lady of France, alongside a picture of a young boy, and wrote, “Brigitte Macron, The French President’s Emmanuel Macron’s Wife is allegedly a MAN and it’s now going Mainstream in France.”

Highlights

A viral tweet on X claimed Brigitte Macron was transgender.
The conspiracy theory started in 2017, which caught the attention of France's First Lady.
Macron isn't the first public figure to face these baseless allegations.

Now, most people would assume a tweet made by a username with the words ‘iluminati’ in it would turn some away. However, it seems to have had the opposite effect as social media users are swallowing up the words — and let’s just say they have some harsh opinions.

A comparison between Brigitte Macron and a young boy released on social media has brought a conspiracy theory back into the light

Image credits: Aurelien Meunier / Getty

“So we went through the last decade of trans movement so these elites can normalise themselves,” read one comment.

Another said, “Once you realize we’re ruled by statistic pedophiles the world makes a lot more sense,” which earned more than 600 likes.

“It is very clear that Brigitte was born mail [sic],” a third claimed.

“Everybody knew really,” said a user. “The wigs are a dead giveaway!”

An additional comment read, “These elites are sick people.”

“That’s wild and disgusting,” a hater wrote.

Image credits: Chesnot / Getty

Others called out the account for the misinformation, saying the conspiracy theory was far too much of a stretch.

“It really doesn’t matter,” one person announced. “I’m not a fan of Trans but why should I care who or what she is?”

“That’s her brother in a family picture where the rest of her family, including her, has been cut out,” a netizen pointed out.

To set the record straight: Brigitte Macron is not transgender, and was born a female. The photo used in the social media post likely was a young version of her brother Jean-Michel Trogneux.

Comments were full of negative opinions

Image credits: UK Prime Minister

But a crazy conspiracy theory took shape in 2017 when Emmanuel Macron was first elected, according to Euro News.

Self-proclaimed journalist Natacha Rey pushed the idea that Brigitte had never existed and instead, her brother had changed his gender and started going by that name.

After, Rey was interviewed by Amandine Roy, a self-labeled spiritual medium, for a YouTube channel in 2021, and this wild claim quickly went viral before the French presidential election in 2022.

The claim was first made 8 years ago

Image credits: emmanuelmacron

Image credits: Quirinale.it

The only evidence to back this up was a picture of Jean-Michel as a child and his similarities to Brigitte — but they’re siblings, so of course, it’s common for the two to look alike.

The current First Lady of France then filed a libel complaint against both Rey and Roy. In September, they were ordered by the French court to pay €8,000 (~$8,265 USD) in damages to her and €5,000 (~$5,166 USD) to her brother.

Emmanuel Macron finally spoke out for the first time last year regarding this, saying, “There are still some crazies out there.”

And it turns out, Brigitte isn’t the first person to be subjected to this outlandish theory.

It reached so many audience members that Brigitte Macron took the two were responsible to court

Image credits: emmanuelmacron

The most famous example involves Michelle Obama, who openly admitted to facing transgender claims for years.

“I’ve heard about the swampy parts of the internet that question everything about me, right down to whether I’m a woman or a man,” she wrote in her 2018 memoir BECOMING.

“A sitting US congressman has made fun of my butt. I’ve been hurt. I’ve been furious. But mostly, I’ve tried to laugh this stuff off.”

Image credits: Antoine Gyori - Corbis / Getty

US-based LGBTQ+ organization GLAAD also offered their two cents on this phenomenon, saying, “The practice maliciously targets cisgender public figures — from Madonna to Melania Trump to Olympic boxer Imane Khelif to Kyle Rittenhouse — and then ‘investigates’ them offering fake pseudo-scientific ‘evidence’ that they are transgender, with the underlying bigoted and ignorant implication that being a transgender person is a bad thing.”

Additionally, these theories are made in an attempt to sway public opinion on a certain person, often linking to other conspiracies about global control, depopulation, etc.