ROME
\nItalian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni is heading to the White House for a meeting on Thursday with President Donald Trump, seeking to ease tensions over US tariffs on European goods and position herself as a bridge between Washington and Brussels.
\nMeloni is walking a tightrope between her ideological affinity to the president and her ties with European allies, who have criticized Trump\u2019s tariff hikes and his decision to exclude the EU from talks with Russia to end the war in Ukraine.
\nWhile Meloni is under pressure at home to protect Italy\u2019s export-driven economy, which last year ran a 40 billion euro ($45.4 billion) trade surplus with the US, she must also be seen to defend the interests of the whole 27-nation EU bloc.
\nFrench government ministers have warned that the nationalist Italian leader might undermine EU unity by going alone to Washington, but the European Commission, which has responsibility for negotiating trade accords, has welcomed Meloni\u2019s trip.
\nTrump\u2019s abrupt decision last week to pause most global tariffs for 90 days has relieved some of the pressure on Meloni, meaning that she won\u2019t feel the need to return with a deal, but rather to create the right environment for an accord.
\nROME\u2019S AMBITIONS
\nMeloni was the only EU leader invited to Trump\u2019s inauguration in January and this week\u2019s meeting will take place the day before she hosts Vice President JD Vance in Rome \u2014 back-to-back talks that could be crucial to furthering Italian ambitions to play a pivotal role in transatlantic relations.
\n\u201cIf she facilitates negotiations with Trump without penalizing Europe, she will emerge much stronger,\u201d said Castellani.
\nEuropean Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has so far not been granted an audience with Trump, meaning that she has to rely on others to promote EU interests.
\nA Commission spokesperson said Meloni and von der Leyen had been in regular contact ahead of the White House meeting.
\nBoth leaders have called for all of Trump\u2019s so-called reciprocal tariffs to be scrapped for the EU, and Meloni is expected to push for a \u201czero-for-zero\u201d deal on industrial tariffs between the two sides.
\nFrench officials fear Trump is seeking to divide and conquer Europe, and worry Meloni could play into his hands.
\n\u201cWe need to be united because Europe is strong if it\u2019s united,\u201d Marc Ferracci, the French minister for industry and energy, told FranceInfo radio. \u201cIf we start having bilateral talks, of course it\u2019ll break this momentum.\u201d<\/p>\n
CHINA
\nWhile Trump has frozen many tariffs, he has maintained a wall of levies on China and some analysts say this might bring China and Europe closer together.
\nSpanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez met Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing last week, and urged greater engagement with China in order to defend globalization and to oppose \u201cunilateral acts of bullying.\u201d
\nRome has distanced itself from his comments.
\n\u201cThe great clash underway is not between the US and Europe, but between the US and China,\u201d Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto told Reuters in an interview.
\nTrump and Meloni may also discuss defense and Castellani said Meloni might promise to hike defense spending in future.
\nItaly\u2019s defense budget was 1.49 percent of GDP last year even as Trump is pushing NATO allies to lift military spending to 5 percent of GDP.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
ROME Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni is heading to the White House for a meeting on Thursday with President Donald Trump, seeking to ease tensions over US tariffs on European goods and position herself as a bridge between Washington and Brussels. Meloni is walking a tightrope between her ideological affinity to the president and her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":472775,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-472749","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n