Foreign Pool Report #1 / Meloni background

Buongiorno,

I am your foreign pooler for the visit of Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni to the White House. Please reach out if you have any questions or comments.

Meloni is the first European leader meeting with President Donald Trump in Washington since he announced 20 percent tariffs on EU goods on April 2 which he two days later paused for 90 days until July 9.

Schedule:

PM Meloni landed at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on Wednesday afternoon and spent the night at Blair House. Her arrival at the White House is scheduled for 12pm. The “official working visit” (White House) is supposed to start at 12:05pm and will include a leader-to-leader bilateral meeting, expanded bilateral meeting and lunch. The lunch in the Cabinet Room is scheduled for 12:05pm, the bilat in the Oval Office for 1:05pm.

The Italian leader will fly back to Rome tonight and will host Vice President JD Vance for a state visit on Friday.

Italian Delegation:

Ambassador: Mariangela Zappia

Diplomatic Advisor: Fabrizio Saggio

Military Counselor: Franco Federici

Head of the Private Office: Patrizia Scurti

Head of the Press Office: Fabrizio Alfano

Head of the Protocol: Francesco Piazza

Topics for the bilateral meeting:

Meloni’s priority is going to be the tariffs on European industrial goods – and she is believed to have a widespread mandate from Ursula von der Leyen to negotiate on behalf of the European Union. “The EU Commission President and the Italian Prime Minister are in regular contact; Meloni's intention to explain the European position in Washington is viewed very positively and has been closely coordinated with the Commission,” a spokeswoman for von der Leyen said on Monday.

Ahead of her trip, Meloni told business leaders that she supported a European Commission proposal for zero tariffs between the US and the EU, and that she would propose that in Washington. Von der Leyen has endorsed a zero-for-zero tariff agreement between the EU and the US, for example in a post on X last week. The plan calls for the reciprocal elimination of tariffs on existing industrial goods between the EU and the US.

“The challenge to explore, one that Italy supports, and President von der Leyen proposed yesterday, is the potential for removing mutual tariffs on industrial products under the ‘zero for zero’ formula,” Meloni said then.

Other likely topics of the discission will be China, Ukraine, defense spending, energy exports, and AI.

Meetings Trump/Meloni:

The two leaders met for the first time in December, 7 last year at the �lys�e Palace, where French President Emmanuel Macron hosted guests after the reopening of Notre Dame Cathedral. On January 5, Meloni and Trump met at his Mar-a-Lago golf club in Florida. 15 days later, she was the only European leader to attend his inauguration in Washington, DC.

Relationship:

Trump and Meloni, who heads the right-wing party Fratelli d'Italia (Brothers of Italy), seem to get along quite well. After their first meeting in Paris, he described her as “a real live wire” and someone he could work with “to straighten out the world a little bit.”

In late February, he called her “a wonderful woman” and noted that “Italy has got very strong leadership.” Meloni reposted Trump’s comments on X.

The Italian leader praised both Trump and Vance in her video address at the annual CPAC conference near Washington, where she has been speaking for years. She underscored their shared political agenda on topics like migration and called Trump’s re-election a major development in the rise of global conservatism.

Meloni has also called the US Italy’s “first ally.” In an interview with the “Financial Times” on March 28, her first interview with a foreign newspaper since coming to office in 2022, she said: “Italy can have good relations with (the) United States and if there is something that Italy also can do to avoid (a US) confrontation with Europe and to build bridges, I will do that – and it is in the interest of the Europeans.”

Meloni further said she hoped Trump’s “confrontational” approach on European defense would be a much-needed “stimulus” for the continent to take responsibility for its own security. “I like to say that crisis always hides an opportunity,” she said and added: “Our relations with US are the most important relationship that we have.”

The Italian Prime Minister is also known for having a close relationship with Elon Musk whom she has met on several occasions and called “a brilliant man.” Musk recently advocated for a free trade zone without any tariffs at a party congress of Matteo Salvini's far-right Lega in Florence. In a background call this morning, a senior Trump administration official did not say if Musk would attend the bilat.

Background on Trade:

Since Trump’s inauguration, the PM has aimed to play the role of bridge-builder between Brussels and Washington. She criticized Trump’s 10% tariffs of Italy’s exports as “wrong,” and said “The economies of Western nations are strongly interconnected. Such hard-hitting protectionist policies will end up hurting Europe as much as the U.S.". But she also called for negotiations and argued that retaliation may be counterproductive.

Meloni is under pressure to defend Italy's export-driven industry. Last year, Italy ran a 40-billion-euro (45.5 billion dollar) trade surplus with the United States – the third largest in the European Union after Germany and Ireland. 10% of Italy's total exports got to the US. Its top exports are machinery, pharmaceuticals, vehicles, fashion, food, and beverages.

European partners are closely watching if the PM is trying to exempt domestic specialties such as pasta, cheese, and wine from the tariffs. French industry minister, Marc Ferracci, warned last week that Meloni’s solo trip threatened to undermine European unity against the US tariffs. Negotiating tariffs is the responsibility of the European Commission.

EU Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic also visited Washington this week. After the meeting, Sefcovic stressed that the EU was willing to work toward a “fair deal,” including the offer of zero tariffs on industrial goods. He wrote on X that such an agreement would require a “significant joint effort on both sides.”

Background on Defense:

Italy only spends 1.49% of its GDP, which is below Nato’s 2 per cent target. In the background call this morning, a senior Trump administration official said, defense would “certainly” come up in the bilat: “There are 8 countries that aren't meeting their 2% threshold out of the 31 NATO member countries, Italy is, unfortunately, one of them”.

Economy Minister Giancarlo Giorgetti promised at a parliamentary hearing on Thursday that Italy would meet the 2% target on defense spending this year. But Trump is pushing NATO allies to lift military spending as high as 5% of GDP – which Italy's Defense Minister Guido Crosetto called “unthinkable” this week.

Since taking office, Meloni has continued Italy’s support for Ukraine. She was twice at the White House during Joe Biden’s presidency and according to my fellow Italian Correspondent Maria Luisa Rossi Hawkins, she still has a good relationship with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. But despite going along with allies during Biden’s administration, her party abstained, for the first time, on a European parliament resolution in March reaffirming support for Kyiv against Russian aggression. She also has been skeptical over the “coalition of the willing” advocated by French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

Meloni condemned the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine and pledged to keep sending arms. But unlike France and Britain, Italy rejects the idea of deploying its troops. The PM also has expressed faith in Trump’s efforts to come to a peace deal but emphasized the need for strong guarantees to ensure Russia does not restart the war in the future.

Background on the PM:

Meloni, 48, serves since October 2022 as Italy’s first female prime minister. In 2012, she cofounded the Brothers of Italy (Fratelli d’Italia, FdI), a party with neofascist roots, which she leads since 2014. From 2020 to 2025, she was also the president of the European Conservatives and Reformists Party.

Meloni grew up in Rome. At 15, she joined the Youth Front, a wing of the Italian Social Movement, a party that was founded by supporters of former Italian dictator Benito Mussolini and which has been described as “neo-fascist.” In 1996, she became the leader of the Student Action, a student movement that was part of the National Alliance, a post-fascist and national-conservative organization.

In 1998, she was elected as a councilor of the Province of Rome, holding this position until 2002. She became the national director and president of Youth Action, which was a youth chapter of the National Alliance. Following this, in the 2006 Italian General Election, she was elected to the Chamber of Deputies, where she became the vice-president. She also started to work as a journalist. In 2008, she was appointed the Minister of Youth under the Berlusconi government. She held this position until 2011, when Berlusconi was forced to resign.

Juliane Schaeuble

US Correspondent

Der Tagesspiegel

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