Why Italy’s Giorgia Meloni Broke With Donald Trump

This article is part of the TPM Café, the TPM opinion and news analysis site. It was originally published by The Conversation under a Creative Commons license..

Italian Prime Minister and leader of the far-right Brothers of Italy party, Giorgia Meloni, has made developing ties with foreign leaders a central part of her political strategy. A few years before winning Italy’s 2022 general election, she began cultivating ties with conservative America and Europe as part of a broader political rebranding effort aimed at projecting a more moderate image at home and gaining legitimacy abroad.

She later became a familiar face within Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) movement. Meloni shares similar views to MAGA on migration, sovereignty and national identity. She also aligns with the movement on a constellation of other themes ranging from the fight against “wokism” and the defense of the traditional family to the rejection of liberalism, globalism and environmentalism.

After Trump was elected president of the United States for a second time in late 2024, Meloni’s ties to the American far right suddenly became a foreign policy issue. But his relationship with Trump proved to be a more demanding balancing act than Meloni could have imagined. And now their alliance – at least for now – appears to be over.

On April 13, Meloni called Trump’s recent social media attack on Pope Leo, who had criticized the US-Israeli war against Iran, “unacceptable.” That drew a rebuke from Trump, who said Meloni “lacked the courage” to not join the war. The conditions for this rupture have been in place for some time.

The alliance of Trump and Meloni

Trump and Meloni’s shared far-right traits should not hide some key differences between the two leaders. In foreign policy, Meloni has taken a pro-NATO stance and is a strong supporter of Ukraine. These positions have helped Meloni in his so-called quest for “respectability,” but they clash with Trump’s lack of support for Ukraine and his bellicose stance toward NATO.

Politically, Meloni also faced constraints that moderated her leadership. Externally, the EU’s institutional and financial straitjacket has forced Meloni to work in collaboration with the bloc. This requirement has limited Meloni’s room for maneuver in his relations with Trump and clashes with the American president’s rejection of multilateralism.

Internally, the logic of coalition politics – particularly the moderate presence of the pro-European Forza Italia party in his government – ​​and the fact that centrist voters represent a decisive constituency in Italy have both acted as an additional centripetal force on Meloni’s agenda.

Despite these differences, Meloni’s ideological proximity to Trump initially translated into diplomatic gains that helped raise his profile among other EU leaders. She was the first European leader to meet with Trump after his 2025 global trade regime was imposed.

Meloni also managed to arrange a trilateral meeting in Rome with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and US Vice President JD Vance. After the meeting, Vance called Meloni a “bridge” between the two sides of the Atlantic.

Yet beyond the legitimacy gains for Meloni and his party, the material benefits Italy has derived from its relationship with Trump have been limited. Italy, for example, has not been spared from customs duties. He also failed to secure a rebate on Trump’s demand that NATO members increase their military spending to 5% of GDP.

The lack of tangible political gains from his ties to Trump could be one of the reasons for Meloni’s decision to distance himself from the US president. But another important factor is Italian domestic politics.

The indirect effects of Trump’s policies likely played a key role in Meloni’s recent defeat in the judicial reform referendum. This referendum, which took place a month after the start of Trump’s war in Iran, turned into a vote on the Meloni government.

The war in Iran has caused energy prices to rise across Europe and made Italians fear possible security repercussions. While a recent poll indicates that 79% of Italians now have a negative opinion of Trump, it appears voters used the referendum to signal their displeasure with Meloni ahead of the 2027 general election.

Opposition parties, left and right, hailed the result as a sign that voters are seeking change. And Roberto Vannacci, a former general turned politician, is capitalizing on voters’ growing unease with the impact of Trump’s policies. He has criticized Meloni for what he sees as his alignment with Washington and his soft approach to key far-right issues.

Trump’s attack on the pope — indefensible to Meloni as someone who identifies as Christian and whose party draws on a large Catholic electorate — gave the Italian prime minister the exit she needed to signal to voters her distance from Trump’s recent actions.

Meloni’s agenda remains skewed toward the far right, aligning with Trump’s in many ways, from identity politics and migration to his stance on the green transition. How these ideological similarities are received by Italian voters in the coming year will likely play a crucial role in determining Meloni’s political future.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.