Jean Castex

Biography

Jean Castex was born in 1965 in Vic-Fezensac in the Gers. He studied history at the University of Toulouse, then attended Sciences Po and the École nationale d'administration before entering the senior civil service.

He was elected mayor of the small Pyrenean town of Prades in 2008 and held the post for twelve years. On the national stage he served as chief of staff to Health Minister Xavier Bertrand in François Fillon's government and, from 2011 to 2012, as deputy secretary-general at the Élysée under President Nicolas Sarkozy. He also sat on the Languedoc-Roussillon regional council and, from 2015, the departmental council of Pyrénées-Orientales. A member of the UMP and then The Republicans, he later coordinated preparations for the 2024 Olympic Games and, in April 2020, the plan for lifting France's COVID-19 lockdown.

President Emmanuel Macron appointed him prime minister on 3 July 2020 after Édouard Philippe resigned. He led the government through the later phases of the pandemic and stood down after Macron's re-election, leaving office on 16 May 2022. He then headed the Paris transport operator RATP from November 2022 and became president of the national railway SNCF in November 2025.