Salvini in the USA for a new strategic partnership

(by Massimiliano D'Elia) The vice president of the Italian council Matteo #Salvini flew to Washington. A visit that had already been postponed before the elections. Today, however, after the outcome of the European elections, where there was a plebiscite in favor of the League, the visit takes on a different connotation, especially with an EU Commission increasingly on a war footing with Italy due to its excessive public debt.

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It is not known if he will meet Trump, because the rigid American protocol foresees that the tycoon can meet only heads of state.

However, there will be two heavy meetings with the head of the State Department, Michael Pompey and with the vice president Mike Pence.

There are many hot topics to discuss, terrorism, immigration, relations with Iran, Libya, Venezuela and F-35.

“Salvini, as soon as he landed, in a short interview, reiterated that it is necessary to guarantee investments in research and Defence. “We are here to strengthen the commercial presence in the USA”. 

It is not excluded that Matteo Salvini wants to explore other issues with the American ally that could affect Italian politics.

Salvini probably wants to ensure the Trump administration of Italy's total "loyalty" to the United States, given that the leader of the League, in the past, had revealed an approach to Putin's Russia, raising distrust in the Americans.

Just on the relationships with the Russia, Salvini said: "It would be a strategic mistake to remove Russia from the West to leave it in the arms of Chinese power. We need to bring Russia back to a table. Russia must be removed from Chinese power".

Another issue refers to the Italian public debt and the fact that most of the investors are American. Renewing and consolidating, at this moment, a strategic partnership with the USA could be the trump card of Italy, but above all of the League which would look with greater conviction at the early autumn elections, pulling the plug on the yellow-green government on a grueling, cloying and unproductive rhetoric.

But back to the trip to the USA. The American media define Salvini as the European leader who most "resembles Trump". Indeed, the The Washington Post claims that the leader of the League is the proof that «the best way to have a good relationship with the Trump administration is to be a bit like the president himself».

In Salvini they recognize the same skills as Trump in having been able to read "the belly of the people", that is «the discontent with the status quo, the distrust of the elites, the fear of newcomers».

The Washington Post argues that Italy could become the most reliable ally for the US within the European Union now that Britain is leaving.

Salvini himself confirmed this hope in an interview with the famous journalist Christiane Amanpour of the CNN, to which he said he wanted to talk to Pence about the partnership between the two countries "both economic and other types". In a different interview, on the NBC news, Salvini first expressed his personal admiration for the Trump administration, "not only for the attitude on immigration, but above all for the attitude on the relaunch of the economy, on the relaunch of work, on the defense of economic business, on the lowering of taxes ", and then added that he would consider it very important" to be a privileged interlocutor within the EU».

 

Salvini in the USA for a new strategic partnership

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