President-elect Donald J. Trump was meeting on Saturday with President Emmanuel Macron of France before attending the reopening ceremony of the Notre-Dame Cathedralbitstarz, making a splashy re-entry onto the global stage in his first foreign trip since winning the presidential election in November.
Mr. Trump arrived at Mr. Macron’s office at Élysée Palace, where the men shook hands and briefly hugged.
Mr. Trump, even before his inauguration next month, is seeking to wrest the mantle of representing the United States abroad from President Biden, whose international relevance is fading as his term nears its end. Mr. Biden will not be at the ceremony, but Jill Biden, the first lady, was planning to appear.
With open arms or reluctance, U.S. allies and rivals must once again receive Mr. Trump, who will take a seat at the ceremony in Paris alongside dozens of heads of state.
“President Emmanuel Macron has done a wonderful job ensuring that Notre Dame has been restored to its full level of glory, and even more so,” Mr. Trump wrote on social media on Monday, announcing his visit. “It will be a very special day for all!”
The ceremony at Notre-Dame will be the first in a series of events as the cathedral gradually resumes services and visiting hours after it was badly disfigured in a disastrous 2019 fire.
Mr. Macron will be eager to use the world stage to celebrate his government’s success in rapidly restoring the cathedral. But the reopening arrives at an untimely moment for the government: Michel Barnier, France’s prime minister, lost a no-confidence vote on Wednesday, leaving it rudderless. Mr. Barnier was forced to resign, while Mr. Macron must pick up the pieces of a fracturing coalition.
Many nations are bracing for a second Trump administration, and some foreign leaders have already made known their interest in working with the president-elect. Mr. Trump spoke with Mr. Macron by phone at least once as he planned his trip to Paris.
In the past, Mr. Macron has showered Mr. Trump with flattery, and he invited him to attend Bastille Day ceremonies in 2017. But their relationship deteriorated in 2018 when Mr. Macron supported the idea of a true European military defensebitstarz, one that could counter rivals like Russia but also the United States.