Jean-Paul Huchon, Who Led the Paris Region for 17 Years, Dies at 80

Jean-Paul Huchon, the Socialist politician who ran the Ile-de-France region around Paris for 17 years and served as chief of staff to Prime Minister Michel Rocard, has died at 80. One of his sons announced the death to the AFP news agency and said Huchon died of cancer in the night of Thursday, October 22 to Friday, October 23, 2026.

From the budget office to Matignon

Huchon was born in Paris on July 29, 1946. He studied at Sciences Po and at the Ecole Nationale d'Administration, and joined the budget directorate of the finance ministry as a civil administrator in 1971. His career became tied to Michel Rocard, the Socialist leader he followed for decades. Huchon served as Rocard's chief of staff at the planning commission and at the agriculture ministry, and then at Matignon, the prime minister's office, from 1988 to 1991, when Rocard led the government of President Francois Mitterrand. Between those posts he also held senior management jobs in banking and in the group of the businessman Francois Pinault.

Conflans and the region

Huchon sat on the municipal council of Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, in the Yvelines west of Paris, from 1977, and served as deputy mayor under Rocard. When Rocard left the mayor's office in 1994, Huchon succeeded him and ran the town until 2001. In 1998 he won the presidency of the regional council of Ile-de-France, the region that contains Paris and is home to about 12 million people. He held the post for three terms, until December 2015. The region's biggest responsibilities are public transport and high schools, and Huchon led it through years of investment in both. Valerie Pecresse, of the right, succeeded him in 2015.

A conviction, and a second career

His time at the region also brought a court case. In February 2007 a Paris court convicted Huchon of an illegal taking of interest, in a case about regional communication contracts awarded to companies that employed his wife. He received a six month suspended prison sentence and a fine of 60,000 euros. In November 2008 the Paris court of appeal confirmed the conviction while removing the penalty of ineligibility that would have barred him from office.

After leaving the region, Huchon taught public institutions and governance at HEC Paris from 2016. He backed Emmanuel Macron in the 2017 presidential election, and in the second round of the 2021 regional election he supported Pecresse, his successor, against the left. He wrote a memoir of his years with Rocard, published in 2017, and a book about rock music in 2023. French profiles often noted his love of rock: he was remembered at the first Rock en Seine festival in 2003, where he watched PJ Harvey with open enthusiasm, and at a Lou Reed concert.

Tributes

Pecresse said she felt great sadness at the death of a former political opponent who had become a friend. She said their rivalry had given way to respect, that they shared an attachment to Ile-de-France and its people, and that a page of the region's history had turned. In Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, the town he served for close to 40 years, officials and residents marked the loss of the mayor who became the head of the region.