If Giorgia Meloni thought that she could put her April spat with Donald Trump over the pope’s criticism of the US war on Iran behind her, she had not banked on the US president’s capacity to bear a grudge.
Trump reignited tensions by telling an Italian TV journalist that the Italian PM had “begged” him for a picture at the recent G7 meeting in France. The Spanish newspaper El País suggested that Trump’s feathers had been ruffled by a video at the same meeting, showing Meloni appearing to scold him. In any case he doubled down on his tale in a Truth Social post, adding that Meloni wanted the photo to boost her flagging approval ratings, which he blamed on her failure to support the US in the Iran war.
Trump’s line of attack is hardly surprising, but Meloni’s forceful response is. In a social media video, she said Trump’s claim about the picture was “made up”. She expressed puzzlement at the US president apparently treating his allies worse than his adversaries. Fusing personal and national pride in a single retort, she concluded: “I do not beg, nor does Italy.”
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In a subsequent Instagram post , she insisted that her supposed slide in popularity had nothing to do with the US – although in an acerbic jibe, she added that being friends with Trump was not helping. Meanwhile, Antonio Tajani, Meloni’s foreign minister, cancelled plans to attend a US-Italian business forum in Miami.
It is hard to know if this rift is real or performative. In Trump’s eyes, Meloni’s sin appears to be one of lèse-majesté – specifically, failing to show the due deference of a subordinate to her boss. For Meloni, the clash is a matter of substance, namely Trump’s inability to appreciate the value of the western alliance.
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Yet Trump’s hostility to Europe is not exactly breaking news. In fact, on every previous occasion on which Trump has opened a new front – from tariffs to the quasi-abandonment of Ukraine to threats against Greenland – Meloni has been conspicuous by her silence. Even on Iran, ostensibly the immediate cause of Trump’s discontent, it took weeks for Meloni to shift from a position of “neither support nor condemnation” to distancing Italy more clearly from the war. Even now, the Italian government is working with the US administration to patch things up: Tajani has confirmed his attendance at Thursday’s celebration of the 250th anniversary of American independence at the Rome residence of the US ambassador, who has also offered conciliatory words. The hope is that the relationship suffers no further damage. What seems clear is that the personal bond between Trump and Meloni is almost ruined. But that is not necessarily a net loss for the Italian premier.
Meloni may be genuinely concerned about Trump’s Europe policy, but the root of the rift is less geopolitical strategy than strategic electioneering at home.
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Although he exaggerates them, Trump is not wrong when he speaks of Meloni’s popularity problems. In a March referendum, voters roundly rejected a judicial reform package she championed. Despite the lingering differences between Italy’s main opposition forces, the centre-left Democratic party (PD) and the anti-establishment Five Star Movement (M5S), they are set to forge an alliance ahead of the next general election, due by 2027 at the latest. And National Future, a newly formed force led by Roberto Vannacci, a former general turned firebrand hard-right demagogue, has gained support at the expense of Meloni’s three-party governing coalition. According to polls, the coalition is set for defeat in the elections.
But publicly clashing with Trump, who is deeply unpopular in Italy, carries electoral advantages. On her left, it deprives the opposition of a major line of attack over Meloni’s previous closeness to Trump. On her right, it forces the National Future on to terrain that Meloni now strives to dominate: a nationalist conservative narrative rooted in tropes about western civilisation that also rejects subservience to the US.
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She hopes, too, to strengthen her position within the European right. Distancing herself from Trump serves Meloni’s goal of drawing a sharp line between herself and pariahs such as one of her former allies, the pro-Trump Viktor Orbán. She would rather align now with the French National Rally, whose presidential candidate, Jordan Bardella, could become Europe’s foremost nationalist leader if he wins next year’s presidential election.
The solidarity expressed with Meloni across the Italian political spectrum (Vannacci included) and by European leaders over Trump’s efforts to humiliate her validates her political instincts. Whether those instincts are enough to win her re-election is another matter. Aware of this, Meloni is pushing for changes to the electoral law that would give bonus seats to the winning coalition, compel parties not already sitting in parliament such as Vannacci’s to collect 500,000 signatures and force coalitions to name their candidate for the premiership in advance. In one stroke, Meloni would drive a wedge between the opposition parties, with both the PD and M5S leaders, Elly Schlein and Giuseppe Conte, coveting the premiership, and either exclude Vannacci or force him to join her coalition on her terms.
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The electoral reform, which the opposition has denounced as a semi-authoritarian power grab, is under review in parliament. Its approval will mark the unofficial start of the election campaign. Lacking major policy successes or legislative achievements, Meloni will confidently insist she has remained truthful to her conservative principles while also ensuring political stability. Ideological coherence is harder to claim, however, after flip-flopping on what was previously presented as the strategic wisdom of political closeness to Trump. And when stability is pursued through last-minute changes to the electoral rules, confidence begins to look more like performance than conviction. Meloni can only hope that voters don’t care about the difference.
