Emmanuel Macron’s stepdaughter says she’s still hurt by her mother’s ‘forbidden relationship’ with the future French president – ​​and also addresses bizarre rumor that Brigitte was born a man

Emmanuel Macron’s stepdaughter has spoken for the first time about her mother’s scandalous affair with the future president of France.

In an interview that will make both Macron and his first lady, Brigitte Macron, uncomfortable to read, Tiphaine Auzière admits she is still wounded by the “forbidden relationship” between a married teacher and a teenage student.

Ms Auzière, who has just published her first novel, also used her conversation with Paris Match to address claims that Brigitte was born a man.

Ms. Auzière was only 10 when she discovered that her teacher mother had a student 25 years younger than her.

Brigitte was still married, so her three young children were left to constantly speculate about the ‘forbidden relationship’ in Amiens, northern France.

“I learned a lot about human nature,” Ms. Auzière, now 40, said in the interview published Thursday.

“I know that in these moments we must focus on the essentials and move forward without regard to criticism.

‘The attacks, the gossip, the judgments. It wasn’t yet the age of social networking, but we were in a small provincial town. Everything is known.

“Despite all this, they held on. I gained an open mind, a desire to move forward without listening to ambient noise, and a greater tolerance.”

Ms Auzière was particularly angry that her humiliated father, André-Louis Auzière, was forced to leave the family home in 1994, even though he only divorced Brigitte in 2006, allowing Macron to marry her a year later.

“A family separation can be a sadness and an opportunity,” Ms. Auzière said. ‘Recomposition can prove to be an enrichment. I have a beloved father and stepfather.”

Tiphaine said she always spoke of Mr. Auzière in the present tense, even though he died in 2019 at the age of 68.

Paris Match describes how ‘Tiphaine Auzière was a child when the scandal broke.’

The magazine describes how ‘the young Emmanuel often rang the doorbell at the Auzière house and the rumors continued to grow.

‘Rumors that obviously had an impact on the three children of the household.’

Ms. Auzière’s sister, Laurence, was 17 years old at the time and a classmate of Emmanuel Macron, who is the same age.

Ms Auzière said the rumors of a “forbidden relationship” were devastating for all the children, including her brother Sébastien, then 19.

All were students at La Providence, the Roman Catholic secondary school in Amiens, where Brigitte was a drama teacher.

Ms Auzière, whose new legal novel is called Assizes – referring to a criminal court – said she was also hurt by claims on social media that Brigitte was born male.

“I worry about the level of society when I hear what is circulating on social networks about the fact that my mother is a man,” she said.

“The confidence with which it is said and the credibility given to it is proclaimed. How can we resist disinformation on social networks?’

Brigitte Macron won a defamation case against a freelance journalist who spread rumors about her gender last year.

Mrs. Auzière, a qualified lawyer, now lives in Calais with her husband and two children.

Emmanuel and Brigitte Macron’s paths first crossed at an exclusive high school in northern France.

The now French president was only 15 years old when he met Madame Auziere, a teacher 24 years his senior, at Lycee La Providence in Amiens.

The teacher and her student had been working on the play The Art Of Comedy by the Italian writer Eduardo De Filippo every Friday evening at school for months, adapting it for all students who wanted to participate.

As the audience clapped before the curtain came down, the teen bowed and kissed his teacher on each cheek as she smiled in obvious delight.

And there was a glimpse of what was the beginning of a love affair between Macron and Brigitte.

Macron, the son of two respected local doctors, was adored by staff for his hard work and intelligence.

39-year-old Brigitte was married to banker André-Louis Auzière at the time, with whom she shares three children.

The duo would work on the play late into the night. Neither had to travel far home: the teacher to a house she shared nearby with her banker, husband and children, while the student walked the short distance to his parents’ house in an affluent part of Amiens.

It was only when the play was finally performed, in front of proud parents and family, that there was a glimpse of what was the beginning of a love affair between Macron and Brigitte.

“Every Friday I would spend hours writing a play with her,” the president of France later revealed. ‘We talked about everything. And I discovered that we had known each other all along.’

As for Brigitte, whose eldest daughter Laurence was in the same class as Macron, she was fascinated by his “exceptional intelligence.” She thought he was so gifted that it was as if ‘I was working with Mozart’.

The first sign other students got that the relationship was more than academic came during the play’s closing party at a local restaurant, with a contemporary watching as the pair shared what he described, cryptically, as a “tender moment.”

Their romance blossomed and caused a scandal in the province. Macron’s parents then sent him to Paris to attend another school, but his desire to be with his teacher and pursue her persisted.

In an interview with Paris Match magazine, the 70-year-old said she told herself that once Macron was in Paris, he would “fall in love with someone he belonged to.” [own] age’, but that didn’t happen.

The First Lady further explained that she had postponed marriage to her husband for ten years for the sake of her three children, who are about the same age as her younger partner.

Brigitte’s son is three years older than Macron and her daughters, now aged 46 and 39, are the same age as her second husband.

Brigitte eventually married Macron – then a civil servant in his late 20s – in Le Touquet on October 20, 2007, after divorcing her estranged husband André-Louis Auzière the year before.