In what may be something of a first in political history, French President Emmanuel Macron publicly addressed persistent stories that his wife is transgender. While this is not the first time such persistent rumors of transgenderism have dogged a prominent political wife, it is the first time a politician has publicly confronted them.

Emanuel Macron Breaks Silence on Rumors His Wife Is Transgenderhttps://t.co/5LTBOIwO6O

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French President Emmanuel Macron has angrily hit back at longstanding conspiracy theories that his 70-year-old wife Brigitte was born a man and is transgender, calling them “false and fabricated.”

Macron, 47, was unusually candid and emotional about the ongoing speculation in certain right-wing circles about Brigitte Macron, whom he married in 2007.

“The worst thing is the false information and fabricated scenarios,” Macron said at an International Women’s Day event in Paris Friday after he guaranteed the right to abortion in France’s Constitution.

“People eventually believe them and disturb you, even in your intimacy.”

Indeed, it would be difficult to be intimate with someone while thinking they might possibly be transgender. I mean, Brigitte Macron, 70, started dating the 15-year-old Emmanuel Macron when she was his drama teacher and her daughter was his classmate. He could be thinking that he doesn't know what a non-transgender woman looks like, and maybe she is.

Last year, Brigitte Macron successfully sued two people for defamation but got something less than vindication.

It refers to two defendants – Amandine Roy, a 52-year-old clairvoyant, and Natacha Rey, 48, who styled herself as a freelance journalist.

Both had appeared on a four-hour YouTube video in December 2021 in which they claimed that Brigitte was born as a baby boy called Jean-Michel Trogneux in 1953.

This is infact the name of Brigitte's brother, and Ms Macron was called Brigitte Trogneux before her first marriage.

The defendants also claimed that Brigitte's first husband, André-Louis Auzière, had never actually existed before his reported death in 2020, aged 68.

A judge sitting at Lisieux, in Normandy, originally fined the two women the equivalent of £1,700 each, after finding them both guilty of libel.

But, following appeals, Roy was fined the equivalent of just £850, and Rey had £1,300 of her £1,700 fine suspended, meaning she had to pay just £400.

No matter the story's veracity, this has firmly ensconced itself in political legend. LBJ allegedly forced a political opponent into holding a press conference to deny that he had sex with hogs. When Virginia Representative William Scott was stung by a New York Times article labeling him at the top of the "Ten Dumbest Members of Congress," he promptly called a press conference to deny it. Publicly denying that your wife is a man is the stuff of which legends are made.