Italy’s populist right looks menacing

ON MAY 20THEU Italy’s interior minister, Luciana Lamorgese, was due in Tunis with the ’s commissioner for home affairs, Ylva Johansson, to investigate and discuss a humanitarian crisis that has opened deep divisions in Italy’s new government. So far this month 4,290 migrants have reached Italy’s shores, compared with 1,654 in the whole of May last year. Many set sail from Tunisia. The number of arrivals in 2021 is now more than 13,000—triple the volume in the same period last year. And the summer months, when crossing the Mediterranean is easiest, lie ahead.All this is manna from heaven for Matteo Salvini, the leader of the populist Northern League and the politician who has suffered the most since Mario Draghi came to power in February. The League’s poll ratings have fallen since mid-2019 (see chart). That was when Mr Salvini (pictured) torpedoed an earlier coalition in which the League was allied to the maverick Five Star Movement. (He had hoped to nab the top job, but failed.) His party now has the backing of less than 22% of voters, compared with more than 37% at its peak, although that still makes it the country’s most popular party.