Meloni’s referendum defeat shows the cost of the Trump factor | Riccardo Alcaro

5 hours ago 12

Giorgia Meloni has a long history of defying expectations. She holds the record as Italy’s youngest cabinet member, at 31, and is its first female prime minister, thus overcoming two of Italian politics’ most formidable obstacles, gerontocracy and machismo. After she took office in autumn 2022, she quickly put to rest concerns that her post-fascist background would make her a foreign policy radical. Staunch support for Ukraine and a pragmatic relationship with EU leaders won her international credibility.

Against this backdrop, the defeat she suffered in this week’s referendum – where Italians rejected the government’s proposed constitutional reform of the judiciary by 53.2% to 46.8% – appears all the more significant.

Things were not supposed to go this way. Approval ratings for Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party have remained largely stable since 2022, a remarkable feat in Italian politics. She has also regularly outperformed most fellow European leaders in terms of popular support. And not long before the referendum, polls still had the yes campaign ahead. So what happened?

One reason is that Meloni overestimated – and oversold – the appeal of a reform that had long featured in her coalition’s agenda. Approved along party lines in parliament, the reform proposed fully separating the careers of judges and public prosecutors, and consequently dividing the Consiglio Superiore della Magistratura (CSM), the judiciary’s self-governing body, into two. A third, newly formed council would have assumed oversight functions. As with the current CSM, two-thirds of these bodies’ members would have been magistrates and one-third legal experts appointed by parliament. Most controversially, they would have all been chosen through a lottery, rather than a vote.

Meloni hoped to capitalise on widespread Italian dissatisfaction with the judicial system, which is slow and cumbersome, and at times unreliable. She also bet on the perception that public prosecutors are biased and politicised, a central narrative on the right since the Silvio Berlusconi era.

However, the yes campaign failed to persuasively make the case that the reforms would make the judicial system speedier and fairer. Italians, who generally hold their republican constitution in high regard, remained unconvinced. At the same time, the tone of the referendum campaign turned it into a no-holds-barred struggle between the executive and the judiciary. Opponents contended that the reform would subordinate the latter to the former, supporters claimed that it would stop prosecutors from constantly overstepping their constitutional mandate.

Solid evidence was scant in both cases, but the no campaign could point to a record of statements by the ruling majority – including Meloni herself – that reinforced the perception that the government was indeed after the prosecutors. Meloni’s alignment with foreign leaders whose democratic credentials are less than shiny, such as Hungary’s self-declared illiberal democrat Viktor Orbán, did not help her case. And then there was the Trump factor.

Meloni’s proximity to the US president has its roots in ideological affinity: she shares US conservatives’ framing of western civilisation as a community based on tradition, religion, and cultural and ethnic homogeneity. It also has its roots in strategic pragmatism, as the US is an irreplaceable partner for Italy. While this approach to Trump has been appreciated by Meloni’s electorate, it has failed to convince her opponents, who loathe his abrasive personality and hostility to Europe. They also point out – not without reason – that this closeness has not spared Italy from tariff pressures and demands for an impossibly high military spending threshold.

Trump’s decision to attack Iran and its implications for international security and Italy’s economy has put all this into much sharper focus. It may not have spurred many Meloni voters to change their mind, but it might have mobilised more Italians to vote no.

The breakdown of the vote reflects these dynamics: the central regions of Italy, traditionally left-leaning, and in major cities, where opposition to Trump is more widespread, recorded the highest turnout. Youth mobilisation was also significant, showing that the younger generations are unimpressed by Meloni’s record.

The referendum loss is undoubtedly a significant setback for the Italian prime minister. It forces her to shelve plans for a bolder constitutional overhaul strengthening the executive. It will also deprive her of a major legislative achievement during next year’s election campaign – unless she opts for a snap election, which is a real possibility. And in a lesson for other rightwing European leaders, Meloni’s loss has proved that her association with Trump is an electoral handicap. It is one that may become an albatross around her neck if the economic costs of the Iran war continue to rise, and Italy enters election season on the verge of a recession.

That said, Meloni retains the political strength to stage a rebound. Her ruling coalition may become more restive, but for now it has no incentive to break up or challenge her leadership. The opposition is a broad and diverse bloc, dominated by the pro-EU, centre-left Democratic party, and the populist-leaning Five Star Movement. It emerges energised by the referendum, but no less divided. Its weakness continues to be the prime minister’s greatest advantage. Meloni has been wounded, but she remains Italy’s most potent political force.