Constitution above politics: Italians rejected Maloney’s “legal revolution”.

54% of the public voted against Maloney’s reform, in a referendum held on Sunday and Monday, in which 59% of those with the right to vote participated. The coalition led by Maloney has already passed the reform in parliament, but the Italian constitution required a referendum due to the changes to the constitution that were involved.

Maloney actually tried to take advantage of the stable coalition she managed to establish in the last three years, against expectations and against the volatile nature of Italian politics, to effect a profound change that the Italian right has been demanding for a long time. It included the establishment of a body that would oversee part of the judiciary through a committee appointed by the parliament, which was seen as a threat to the authority’s independence. The proposal also included “severing tracks” between prosecutors and judges, after the right claimed a series of investigations against politicians by “leftist” prosecutors and excessive closeness between those who fill the two positions.

Maloney also tried to take advantage of the public’s disgust towards the continuation of processes in the Italian justice system, when civil proceedings take an average of seven years of hearings, criminal trials last eight years, and there are no less than 4.5 million open proceedings, about a third of which are criminal proceedings. Only four out of ten Italians express confidence in the country’s judicial system. As part of the attempt to build support for the reform, the government promised that trial times would be shortened by 40% as a result – but the results show that the public did not buy the promises.

Senior government officials: the judicial system functions as an “extermination squad”

Maloney surprised about three years ago when she led a former far-right party, with fascist roots, to lead the Italian coalition, after she cut to the center and showed great pragmatism in her relations with the European Union and regarding the Ukraine issue. In the last year, she especially took advantage of the ideological connections with the MAGA movement of American President Donald Trump and the Republican Party, in order to portray herself as someone who serves as a “bridge” between Europe and the United States.

Commentators this morning (Tuesday) defined the discrimination as Maloney’s “first mistake”, which estimated that reducing the scope of the proposed legal revolution and the relative complexity of the proposals would lead to its approval. Although she initially tried to distance herself personally from the referendum, in light of the polls predicting her loss, Maloney has intensified the campaign for a “yes” vote in the referendum in recent weeks. Some saw her reluctance to support the American war in Iran as evidence that she was trying to “please” the electorate, which is mostly opposed to the war, before the referendum.

Maloney tried to broadcast “business as usual” after the loss. “We will respect the results and continue to serve with responsibility and respect for the Italian people.” But in Italy they pointed out that the loss helps the opposition, and that the race for prime minister will in fact be reopened, if there are no changes, in the elections that will probably be held next year.

Before the referendum, the coalition headed by Maloney escalated the statements against the judicial system, and the Minister of Justice called the prosecution in Italy “mafia”, while the director general of the ministry said that the judicial system acts as a “killer squad”. Maloney herself accused the judicial system in Israel of harming the fight against illegal immigration, when she rejected a solution she initiated to deport asylum seekers to Albania.

The loss has already given a boost to the opposition, and especially to the leader of the Democratic Party, Eli Shlain. She led a campaign against the reform saying that it does not deal with the deep problems of the justice system and instead will make the system politicized and less independent.

After the results of the referendum were published, Shelin said that this is the “first step” on the way to changing the government in the elections, which are expected to be held next year. According to calculations in Italy, the coalition “lost” 2.4 million votes that supported it in the elections, but voted against the reform. Surveys revealed that the voters felt that they were “protecting the constitution” by voting against the reform, beyond specific political considerations. The young Italian generation, between the ages of 18 and 28, flocked to the polls, with 67% voting in the referendum of which 58.5% were against the reform.