Here are some profiles that are on the docket.
A team captain
Jean-Louis Borloo, a former minister who once owned the Valenciennes football club, has been floated as an option in Elysée circles in recent days.
One of his biggest selling points: “He won’t be the man who has to ask the president permission to take a leak,” said a government adviser, granted anonymity to speak candidly.
Borloo, like Macron, comes from France’s political center, but he doesn’t belong to the French president’s political team. He founded UDI, a small centrist party, and is seen as much more independent from Macron than other centrists.
Borloo is someone who can “speak to the left” and won’t be seen as “so openly as a Macron lieutenant,” said a parliamentary adviser from Macron’s Renaissance party.
As someone who has distanced himself from daily politics, he is not a threat to France’s (many) presidential hopefuls.