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Elections in Europe: Olaf Scholz humiliated, Giorgia Meloni soars

Scholz and Meloni are experiencing differing fortunes. Credit: Getty.

February 14, 2023 - 7:30am

The current political fortunes of Germany’s Olaf Scholz and Italy’s Giorgia Meloni could not be more different. This weekend, Scholz’s SPD endured its worst ever result in Berlin, securing a meagre 18% of the vote (in joint second place with its national coalition partner, the Greens).

Meanwhile in Italy, the Right continues to make advances across the country. Exit polls in the nation’s two most populous regions indicate that the Right-wing Lega Party’s regional president is expected to be re-elected in Lombardy. Thanks in large part to the success of Meloni’s Fratelli d’Italia, the Right-wing coalition has strengthened its foothold here and expanded its reach further south. If the polls are correct, Lazio looks set to have its first Right-wing government in 10 years, with the insurgent centre-Right candidate smashing his nearest opponent by 20 percentage points. Overall, projections show that Fratelli d’Italia will have its best result ever in an Italian regional election.

Credit: EuropeElects

These results mark a clear stamp of approval for Fratelli D’Italia leader Giorgia Meloni. During her time in office, her personal approval rating has risen by nine points to 51%, commensurate with the rise in support for her Party too. 

Compare this to her EU partner. Olaf Scholz has spent nearly a year longer in office, but it is only in the last two months that his approval rating has plummeted by 20 points to 33%. Lingering fears about a recession, energy crisis and a long war in Ukraine have all contributed to a sense of disillusion with the German Chancellor and his Party, all of which crystallised in a surge in support for the rival CDU Party on Sunday. “A year is short when you have to deal with three simultaneous crises and a repeat election,” Berlin Mayor Franziska Giffey (SPD) said on the night of the election.

Credit: EuropeElects

As heads of coalition governments, both Meloni and Scholz have fought hard to maintain unity, particularly on Ukraine. Earlier this week, Meloni’s administration was forced to downplay comments made by Silvio Berlusconi in which he blamed Ukraine’s President for the invasion. But while Meloni’s coalition partners are more dovish on Russia, Scholz’s have proven to be much more hawkish, with the Greens frequently pushing Scholz to provide more military support to Ukraine. Against the backdrop of an increasingly war-weary public, it is perhaps no surprise that support for the Party has been steadily falling this year too.

Meloni may be frustrated with Italy’s diminished role around the EU negotiating table, but soon Scholz and Emmanuel Macron may have no choice but to welcome her back into the fold.


is UnHerd’s Newsroom editor.

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Elliott Bjorn
Elliott Bjorn
1 year ago

haha, the Psychopathic Lefty Warmongers are getting punished at the polls for being totally owned by their Postmodernist Neo-Liberal/Con Military Industrial Complex – Biden, New World Order, WEF, Great Reset, Masters.

Maybe there is a chance for the world yet. MAGA, and MBGA, and MEUGA, haha, WWG1WEA. The Right want the Peace Table, want end of these endless, pointless, Evil and cruel, destructive, expensive wars – the Left just gotta ‘Kill and Spend’ every chance they get.

The voters are tired of $8 a dozen eggs and high energy bills and doubling of mortgages, and 30 years of decreasing real wages because Finance and Corporations Own the Politicians.

The Right want freedom, peace, prosperity, to keep their wages, to not leave their children with so many Trillions of debt they will never recover. They want the Classic Liberalism of the Enlightenment, Judeo-Christian values, Morality, Patriotism, rights with responsibilities, Duty, Family, and Personal Freedom. They want a Nation to put its citizens First – not put foreigners first like the psychopathic Left do. Law and Order; not criminals above victims, education not ideology, news not propaganda…

Roy Mullins
Roy Mullins
1 year ago
Reply to  Elliott Bjorn

Absolutely right – and they don’t want the insanity of net zero

Last edited 1 year ago by Roy Mullins
Chris Keating
Chris Keating
1 year ago
Reply to  Elliott Bjorn

Those people that you identify as Lefty warmongers are indeed warmongers and they deserve their punishment. However, there is very little leftish thought amongst any of them and I doubt that Marx would recognise them as supporters of his philosophies, at least judging by their actions.
The “Socialists” no longer believe in socialism in so far as they want to do anything to promote it. That is why they have disappeared in France and are endangered everywhere else. By and large they have become neo-liberals and seem okay with the dog-eat-dog world those policies have created.
Thus a lot of people are without a political home and are open to the siren call of the right. I don’t see that right -wing politics will usher in any sort of peace either as it feeds on fear, anger and paranoia, none of which I think are conducive to peace.
As for what the right offer, the poor want all that you have mentioned while the leadership want to ensure that none of that happens. These are the same contradictions that have played out countless times before and will play out again the same way bringing the same disappointment and misery. I don’t think that way to paradise is through punishing the usual scapegoats as it has been done so often in the past and has not been achieved using that method. But here we go again.

Paul K
Paul K
1 year ago
Reply to  Elliott Bjorn

‘They want the Classic Liberalism of the Enlightenment, Judeo-Christian values, Morality, Patriotism, rights with responsibilities, Duty, Family, and Personal Freedom.’

Never mind that half of these things directly contradict the other things. Let’s smash the libs!

Last edited 1 year ago by Paul K
Roy Mullins
Roy Mullins
1 year ago
Reply to  Elliott Bjorn

Absolutely right – and they don’t want the insanity of net zero

Last edited 1 year ago by Roy Mullins
Chris Keating
Chris Keating
1 year ago
Reply to  Elliott Bjorn

Those people that you identify as Lefty warmongers are indeed warmongers and they deserve their punishment. However, there is very little leftish thought amongst any of them and I doubt that Marx would recognise them as supporters of his philosophies, at least judging by their actions.
The “Socialists” no longer believe in socialism in so far as they want to do anything to promote it. That is why they have disappeared in France and are endangered everywhere else. By and large they have become neo-liberals and seem okay with the dog-eat-dog world those policies have created.
Thus a lot of people are without a political home and are open to the siren call of the right. I don’t see that right -wing politics will usher in any sort of peace either as it feeds on fear, anger and paranoia, none of which I think are conducive to peace.
As for what the right offer, the poor want all that you have mentioned while the leadership want to ensure that none of that happens. These are the same contradictions that have played out countless times before and will play out again the same way bringing the same disappointment and misery. I don’t think that way to paradise is through punishing the usual scapegoats as it has been done so often in the past and has not been achieved using that method. But here we go again.

Paul K
Paul K
1 year ago
Reply to  Elliott Bjorn

‘They want the Classic Liberalism of the Enlightenment, Judeo-Christian values, Morality, Patriotism, rights with responsibilities, Duty, Family, and Personal Freedom.’

Never mind that half of these things directly contradict the other things. Let’s smash the libs!

Last edited 1 year ago by Paul K
Elliott Bjorn
Elliott Bjorn
1 year ago

haha, the Psychopathic Lefty Warmongers are getting punished at the polls for being totally owned by their Postmodernist Neo-Liberal/Con Military Industrial Complex – Biden, New World Order, WEF, Great Reset, Masters.

Maybe there is a chance for the world yet. MAGA, and MBGA, and MEUGA, haha, WWG1WEA. The Right want the Peace Table, want end of these endless, pointless, Evil and cruel, destructive, expensive wars – the Left just gotta ‘Kill and Spend’ every chance they get.

The voters are tired of $8 a dozen eggs and high energy bills and doubling of mortgages, and 30 years of decreasing real wages because Finance and Corporations Own the Politicians.

The Right want freedom, peace, prosperity, to keep their wages, to not leave their children with so many Trillions of debt they will never recover. They want the Classic Liberalism of the Enlightenment, Judeo-Christian values, Morality, Patriotism, rights with responsibilities, Duty, Family, and Personal Freedom. They want a Nation to put its citizens First – not put foreigners first like the psychopathic Left do. Law and Order; not criminals above victims, education not ideology, news not propaganda…

Katharine Eyre
Katharine Eyre
1 year ago

I’m not sure if I would try and draw any pan-European conclusions about all of this. It’s an interesting thought, but I really think the poor performance of the SPD in Berlin has to do with the sheer level of governmental chaos there.
The article only mentions this in passing, but the regional election in Berlin was a repeat: the first time in history that such a thing has been ordered by a court because the first election was so strewn with errors that the result could not be accepted. This is the capital city of Europe’s economic powerhouse for goodness’ sake, and it can’t even hold its own elections?
I think the good people of Berlin have just had it up to the back teeth with the chaos and incompetence and want things to improve.

Dougie Undersub
Dougie Undersub
1 year ago
Reply to  Katharine Eyre

I think the pan-European conclusion is that voters everywhere are fed up with their failing, WEP-loving governments and are voting for the opposition.

Dougie Undersub
Dougie Undersub
1 year ago
Reply to  Katharine Eyre

I think the pan-European conclusion is that voters everywhere are fed up with their failing, WEP-loving governments and are voting for the opposition.

Katharine Eyre
Katharine Eyre
1 year ago

I’m not sure if I would try and draw any pan-European conclusions about all of this. It’s an interesting thought, but I really think the poor performance of the SPD in Berlin has to do with the sheer level of governmental chaos there.
The article only mentions this in passing, but the regional election in Berlin was a repeat: the first time in history that such a thing has been ordered by a court because the first election was so strewn with errors that the result could not be accepted. This is the capital city of Europe’s economic powerhouse for goodness’ sake, and it can’t even hold its own elections?
I think the good people of Berlin have just had it up to the back teeth with the chaos and incompetence and want things to improve.

Josef O
Josef O
1 year ago

The surge of Giorgia Meloni, and FDI, should not surprise, the lady is the embodiment of the common sense, simple talk with a nice woman grace. She is giving ,and will give, a good run for the money to the left.
In Germany instead, the CDU is recovering after 16 years of a disaster called Merkel. The CDU/CSU will reoccupy the central spot of German politics as it used to be for many decades before the reunification.

Warren Trees
Warren Trees
1 year ago
Reply to  Josef O

Why has every leader in virtually every first world nation in the world been considered a disaster after they leave office, yet they were ushered in during elections with such promise and hope? In my humble opinion, half of the “chaos” is concocted, because constant chaos is good for manipulators. It keeps our eyes off the ball as we commoners’ squabble over minutiae and don’t pay attention to where our money is really going. We have become woke, yet are still asleep.

Josef O
Josef O
1 year ago
Reply to  Warren Trees

While still in office some politicians are masters in chloroforming the people, this is my answer to your question.

Josef O
Josef O
1 year ago
Reply to  Warren Trees

While still in office some politicians are masters in chloroforming the people, this is my answer to your question.

Warren Trees
Warren Trees
1 year ago
Reply to  Josef O

Why has every leader in virtually every first world nation in the world been considered a disaster after they leave office, yet they were ushered in during elections with such promise and hope? In my humble opinion, half of the “chaos” is concocted, because constant chaos is good for manipulators. It keeps our eyes off the ball as we commoners’ squabble over minutiae and don’t pay attention to where our money is really going. We have become woke, yet are still asleep.

Josef O
Josef O
1 year ago

The surge of Giorgia Meloni, and FDI, should not surprise, the lady is the embodiment of the common sense, simple talk with a nice woman grace. She is giving ,and will give, a good run for the money to the left.
In Germany instead, the CDU is recovering after 16 years of a disaster called Merkel. The CDU/CSU will reoccupy the central spot of German politics as it used to be for many decades before the reunification.

Martin Johnson
Martin Johnson
1 year ago

And the opportunity for Berliners to vote against a national government that acquiesced, if not supported, an ally destroying the country’s largest source of energy and chemical feedstocks does not merit a mention?

Martin Johnson
Martin Johnson
1 year ago

And the opportunity for Berliners to vote against a national government that acquiesced, if not supported, an ally destroying the country’s largest source of energy and chemical feedstocks does not merit a mention?

Nicky Samengo-Turner
Nicky Samengo-Turner
1 year ago

Why can’t the corfam shod, terylene clad toiletories find a Meloni? Probably because she woulden’t pass the ” sticking your pinkie out when supping ‘ Hearl Grey in Sevenoaks” test?….

Nicky Samengo-Turner
Nicky Samengo-Turner
1 year ago

Why can’t the corfam shod, terylene clad toiletories find a Meloni? Probably because she woulden’t pass the ” sticking your pinkie out when supping ‘ Hearl Grey in Sevenoaks” test?….

polidori redux
polidori redux
1 year ago

“Georgia Meloni Soars”
Won’t do her any good

Ian Barton
Ian Barton
1 year ago
Reply to  polidori redux

As her authority is limited to merely being the “governor” of an EU colony, then her increased popularity will provide little extra power.

polidori redux
polidori redux
1 year ago
Reply to  Ian Barton

That is sorta what I was implying.
I was being a bit too cryptic

polidori redux
polidori redux
1 year ago
Reply to  Ian Barton

That is sorta what I was implying.
I was being a bit too cryptic

Nicky Samengo-Turner
Nicky Samengo-Turner
1 year ago
Reply to  polidori redux

Pray, why?

Ian Barton
Ian Barton
1 year ago
Reply to  polidori redux

As her authority is limited to merely being the “governor” of an EU colony, then her increased popularity will provide little extra power.

Nicky Samengo-Turner
Nicky Samengo-Turner
1 year ago
Reply to  polidori redux

Pray, why?

polidori redux
polidori redux
1 year ago

“Georgia Meloni Soars”
Won’t do her any good