In the weeks before her party took power in Italy at the front of a right-wing coalition 1½ years ago, Giorgia Meloni was already starting to tap the brakes on her previously ardent Euroscepticism.
Now, several days out from European elections, her Fratelli d’Italia (Brothers of Italy), a hard-right party with neo-fascist roots, is again set to top the polls. As a result the Italian prime minister finds herself a potentially crucial broker in the political horse-trading that will take place in Brussels after the votes are counted.
When Meloni became prime minister in October 2022, there were fears the arch-conservative would be an obstructive force around the table of EU leaders, stymying efforts to find consensus as Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban has consistently done. That turned out not to be the case. During her first European Council summit Meloni sought to make it clear she was somebody the other 26 leaders could work with, according to one source with knowledge of the discussion.
Originally from Rome, the 47-year-old politician had been seen as a rising star of the far right but has sought to moderate her image in power. Daniele Albertazzi, professor of politics at the University of Surrey, said Meloni had been very strategic in opting not to pick a fight she could not win with the EU.
Instead she tried to position herself as a partner who was pro-Ukraine and toed the European line on foreign policy. “I think she’s got a clear strategy, which is to be mainstream in international affairs and [then] she’s got a free hand internally,” he said.
Albertazzi, a commentator on Italian politics, said given the country was carrying substantial levels of public debt, the plan was to avoid aggravating the financial markets or Brussels. “Whoever is the prime minister is not strong enough to withstand a real clash with the European Commission, especially when they are giving us money,” he said. “Instead of pretending she’s going to have a fight and find a way to pretend she’s won this fight ... She’s just not going to have the fight,” he said.
A large part of Meloni’s shift towards the political mainstream has been her work with European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen on migration policy. Italy has traditionally been one of the main points of arrival for asylum seekers and migrants crossing the Mediterranean Sea to Europe.
Italy’s right-wing coalition has taken a tough line on migration, pushing ahead with a controversial plan to send asylum seekers to Albania to have their claims processed there. Last year Italy passed a law to increase the amount of time asylum seekers could be kept in detention facilities, to try to curb arrivals.
Europe’s policy on asylum has hardened in recent years and moved closer to where Meloni stands. The recently approved EU-wide migration pact reforms will see more detention centres along the bloc’s borders and quicker decisions on asylum claims and deportations.
If Fratelli d’Italia tops the poll as expected this weekend it will be seen as a vindication of the path Meloni has steered. At the moment the party has 10 seats in the European Parliament and Matteo Salvini’s far-right Lega has 23. But that is expected to be flipped. One observer of Italian politics predicted Meloni’s party will easily double their seats, and could even get close to 30 MEPs.
An analysis of spending on Facebook and Instagram advertising shows it is pumping nearly twice as much money into social media as other parties. Meloni’s face has been front and centre on those political ads and the party’s EU election campaign in general.
Polls have the party well ahead of the centre-left Partito Democratico and the populist left Movimento 5 Stelle. Meloni’s right-wing coalition partners Forza Italia and Lega are even further behind. Much of her party’s gains have come at the expense of Lega, which has had a faltering election campaign under Salvini, prompting internal unrest.
Similar to the last general election, the left side of the political spectrum has been more divided than the right. Elly Schlein, the 39-year-old leader of Partito Democratico, used a rally in Rome in recent days to talk about the need to save Italy’s creaking health system and create a more “social Europe”.
When Meloni became prime minister there were concerns her coalition could roll back abortion and LGBT+ rights. The senate recently approved legislation to give anti-abortion groups access to counselling centres for women considering terminating pregnancies.
There is no public groundswell to move backwards on LGBT+ rights, according to Albertazzi. “She’s going to be more subtle but I don’t think she’s going to pick open fights like Orban,” he said.
Meloni is also seeking to rewrite the rules of Italy’s notoriously unstable political system. Her proposed overhaul of the constitution would consolidate power in the office of the prime minister, who would be directly elected rather than nominated by the president. The contentious changes will probably be put to a referendum, the outcome of which will either bolster or dent Meloni’s standing.
Leo Goretti, head of Italian foreign policy at the Istituto Affari Internazionali think tank, said Meloni had “tamed” previous radical positions she promoted in opposition, such as questioning Italy’s use of the euro. This was down to a “pragmatic” recognition that the interests of Italy lay in “having more EU, not less EU”, he said.
If Fratelli d’Italia win upwards of 20 seats in the elections this weekend they will become a potentially important power broker in the next European Parliament, which is predicted to shift rightward.
Von der Leyen, who needs the support of a majority of MEPs to get a second term as commission president, has said she would be willing to rely on the support of Fratelli d’Italia. French far-right leader Marine Le Pen has also floated the idea of working with Meloni to try to bring together hard-right and far-right parties as a more united force.
Meloni’s track record in power points to the Italian leader leaning towards backing the commission president rather than Le Pen, in exchange for greater influence at the centre of EU policymaking. “She’s aligned with von der Leyen, this convergence has paid off for Meloni in terms of her international image and stature. I’m not sure if it is going to pay off for von der Leyen,” Goretti said.
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