In Italy, Jordan Bardella defends his identity vision of Europe, alongside his transphobic and conspiratorial allies

2023-12-03 20:18:09
The president of the National Rally, Jordan Bardella, seated among other leaders of European far-right parties, during a joint meeting in Florence (Italy), December 3, 2023. CYRIL BITTON / DIVERGENCE POUR “LE MONDE”

After the Uffizi Museum, the gallery of horrors. During a short visit to Florence, Italy, on Sunday December 3, Jordan Bardella was able to admire the masterpieces of the Renaissance during a private visit, then hear, in the front row in the Fortress of Basso, a succession of Islamophobic, transphobic and conspiratorial remarks made by its European allies. Immersed in this cultural broth of European far-right parties, the president of the National Rally (RN) was one of the key speakers at the meeting organized by his partner Matteo Salvini, leader of the League and vice-president of the council Italian.

In speeches with Trumpist overtones, participants denounced the alleged destruction of the “natural family”the “replacement of the population of European origin” orchestrated by ” the elite ” and the supposed power of the American philanthropist of Hungarian origin George Soros, favorite target of anti-Semitic conspirators. With his stage partners, Jordan Bardella reaffirmed his desire to defend a “Europe of major projects, cooperation, Europe of borders and identities”.

The meeting put Florence in turmoil six months before the European elections in June 2024, which will coincide in Italy with the municipal elections. In response to the Eurosceptic rally, the mayor of the Tuscan city, Dario Nardella (Democratic Party, center left), lit up the main Florentine monuments with European blue, while a demonstration brought together a few hundred people near the meeting. “By its history, Florence is incompatible with a language of hatred and fear”replied Mr. Nardella.

Devitalize the European Union

There was much talk of hatred and fear in a congress hall where the leaders of the Identity and Democracy (ID) group in the European Parliament rubbed shoulders with some 1,500 League activists and elected officials. Fear of “demographic crisis”in the mouth of the Bulgarian Kostadin Kostadinov, leader of the ultranationalist party Vazrajdane (“Renaissance”), for whom, “thanks to the policies of the anti-European elites in power, the population of European origin is aging, decreasing, and being replaced by Africans and Asians”.

The solution ? Let the peoples of Europe activate “their immune system (…) to be masters of their own home and not guests”, the expression of an organicist conception of society held by the extreme right. Known for his homophobic and anti-Roma remarks, the Bulgarian was seated to the left of Jordan Bardella, in the front row. He is the subject of an investigation in his country for “hate speech”, after comments on the Shoah triggered the ire of the World Jewish Congress.

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