Listen on * Spotify * Apple Music * Amazon Music Der EU-Handelsausschuss hat für den Zolldeal mit den USA gestimmt, doch das Tauziehen ist noch nicht vorbei: Zwei Abgeordnete kämpfen als Delegation aus Brüssel in Washington um letzte Garantien. Joana Lehner und Jürgen Klöckner sprechen über das Finale und beleuchten zusammen mit einem US-Kollegen, ob Donald Trump den Deal als politischen Sieg im Inland verkaufen kann oder ob die deutsche Industrie weiterhin Milliarden an Zöllen verliert. Im Policy Talk begrüßen die beiden VDA-Präsidentin Hildegard Müller. Sie spricht über das „weinende und lachende Auge“ der Branche, die aktuelle Milliardenbelastung durch US-Zölle und die schwindende Wettbewerbsfähigkeit des Standorts Deutschland. Müller warnt: Wenn Europa wirtschaftlich schwach wird, verliert es im Spiel der Großmächte an Relevanz. In Berlin tobt derweil ein Ökonomen-Streit: Neue Studien vom ifo-Institut und dem IW Köln werfen der Regierung vor, große Teile des bisher eingesetzten Sondervermögens für Haushaltslöcher statt für neue Investitionen zu nutzen. Rasmus Buchsteiner berichtet Off the Record über das anfängliche Kommunikationsdebakel im Finanzministerium und die Frage, warum die versprochenen Bagger in den Kommunen noch immer nicht rollen. „Power & Policy“ zeigt jede Woche, wo und wie die Entscheidungen in der Wirtschaftspolitik fallen. ⁠Jürgen Klöckner⁠ und ⁠Joana Lehner⁠ von POLITICO sprechen mit Top-Entscheidern und liefern Off-the-Record-Einblicke aus der Redaktion und Machtzentren. Präzise Analysen, lange bevor Gesetze beschlossen sind. Der Podcast für alle in Wirtschaft und Politik, die einen Wissensvorsprung brauchen — immer donnerstags. Für Policy-Profis: Abonnieren und die Pro-Newsletter ⁠Industrie & Handel⁠, ⁠Energie & Klima ⁠und ⁠Gesundheit⁠. Jetzt kostenlos testen. Fragen und Feedback gern an ⁠powerandpolicy@politico.eu⁠ POLITICO Deutschland – ein Angebot der Axel Springer Deutschland GmbH Axel-Springer-Straße 65, 10888 Berlin Tel: +49 (30) 2591 0 ⁠information@axelspringer.de⁠ Sitz: Amtsgericht Berlin-Charlottenburg, HRB 196159 B USt-IdNr: DE 214 852 390 Geschäftsführer: Carolin Hulshoff Pol, Mathias Sanchez Luna

FRANKFURT —  Germany’s government has redirected the bulk of funds originally earmarked for infrastructure into covering budget gaps, according to new reports from two leading research institutes — raising fresh doubts about Berlin’s ability to deliver on its long-promised investment drive. The findings — coming a year after German lawmakers approved historic constitutional reforms to unlock hundreds of billions of euros in borrowing — could expose Chancellor Friedrich Merz to fresh criticism that his government has failed to harness a €500 billion infrastructure and climate fund to revive Germany’s stagnating economy. The scale of the misallocation is striking, according to the reports. The Cologne-based German Economic Institute (IW) calculates that 86 percent of the funds were diverted, while the Ifo Institute puts the figure at an even more damning 95 percent. “We have found that policymakers have used almost all of the debt-financed funds for other purposes, namely, to cover budget shortfalls. This is a major problem,” said Ifo President Clemens Fuest. After two consecutive years of recession, Germany’s economy barely grew in 2025. It was widely expected to pick up speed in 2026, helped by public investment. But a rebound appears to have failed to materialize thus far.  New headwinds from the conflict in the Middle East will make any recovery even more contingent on effective government spending, analysts warn. The IW report calculated that, last year, the governing coalition of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Social Democratic Party (SPD) in Berlin tapped just 42 percent of funds originally earmarked. The conservatives and SPD “had the chance to clear the investment backlog. So far, they have not taken it,” said Tobias Hentze of the German Economic Institute. According to Ifo, borrowing from the €500 billion fund increased by €24.3 billion in 2025. Actual federal investments, however, rose by only €1.3 billion overall from 2024. The reason, says Ifo, is that Berlin shifted investment commitments from the current budget into the special fund — known as the Special Fund for Infrastructure and Climate Neutrality, or SVIK — in order to make room for higher day-to-day spending. As such, the net increase in actual overall investment has been minuscule. “There were shifts of individual items from the core budget into the debt-financed [special fund] SVIK, particularly grants in the transport sector, which meant that less was invested in the core budget than in previous years,” said Ifo researcher Emilie Höslinger. “A large part of the special fund’s investments is therefore not truly additional.” Germany’s Bundesbank has previously called on the government to use the SVIK’s borrowing capacity “more purposefully” to ensure that the borrowed money actually creates the potential for faster growth in future, which will in turn make it easier to service the debt that has been taken on. Before the fund was launched, critics including the Federation of German Industries (BDI) warned that the potentially beneficial effects of the SVIK risked being diluted unless the money was put to use properly.

Listen on * Spotify * Apple Music * Amazon Music Von der Freigabe strategischer Ölreserven über die umstrittene Preisobergrenze an Tankstellen bis hin zur verschärften Missbrauchsaufsicht durch das Kartellamt: Jürgen Klöckner und Joanna Lehner erklären die Mechanismen hinter den Maßnahmen und warum Reiches Vorgänger Robert Habeck plötzlich wieder als Referenz dient. Im Policy Talk berichtet der Logistikunternehmer und Münchner IHK-Vizepräsident Georg Dettendorfer aus der Praxis. Er schildert, wie Treibstoffgleitklauseln in Verträgen die Liquidität mittelständischer Unternehmen auffressen, warum Frachtraum aus Osteuropa verschwindet und weshalb er jetzt staatliche Darlehen nach dem Vorbild der Corona-Soforthilfen fordert. Gesundheitsministerin Nina Warken muss Milliarden sparen, um die Krankenkassen zu stabilisieren. Warum sie dabei keine Rücksicht auf die mächtige Pharmalobby nehmen kann und weshalb sie für diesen Sparkurs dringend die Rückendeckung von Kanzler Friedrich Merz benötigt, ordnet Jürgen Klöckner ein. ⁠Hier den neuen Pro-Newsletter „Gesundheit am Morgen“ kostenlos testen.⁠ „Power & Policy“ zeigt jede Woche, wo und wie die Entscheidungen in der Wirtschaftspolitik fallen. ⁠Jürgen Klöckner⁠ und ⁠Joana Lehner⁠ von POLITICO sprechen mit Top-Entscheidern und liefern Off-the-Record-Einblicke aus der Redaktion und Machtzentren. Präzise Analysen, lange bevor Gesetze beschlossen sind. Der Podcast für alle in Wirtschaft und Politik, die einen Wissensvorsprung brauchen — immer donnerstags. Für Policy-Profis: Abonnieren und die Pro-Newsletter ⁠Industrie & Handel⁠, ⁠Energie & Klima ⁠und ⁠Gesundheit⁠. Jetzt kostenlos testen. Fragen und Feedback gern an ⁠powerandpolicy@politico.eu⁠ POLITICO Deutschland – ein Angebot der Axel Springer Deutschland GmbH Axel-Springer-Straße 65, 10888 Berlin Tel: +49 (30) 2591 0 ⁠information@axelspringer.de⁠ Sitz: Amtsgericht Berlin-Charlottenburg, HRB 196159 B USt-IdNr: DE 214 852 390 Geschäftsführer: Carolin Hulshoff Pol, Mathias Sanchez Luna

Listen on * Spotify * Apple Music * Amazon Music Der Iran-Krieg droht auch die deutsche Wirtschaft mit voller Wucht zu erreichen. Die Preise für Energie und Logistik gehen nach oben, und die Politik in Berlin muss sich fragen: Wie resilient ist der Standort gegen diesen neuen globalen Schock? Joana Lehner und Jürgen Klöckner analysieren, welche Krisenmechanismen jetzt wirklich greifen und warum das neue Heizungsgesetz der Bundesregierung plötzlich zum geopolitischen Risiko wird. Im Policy Talk spricht Martin Kröger, Hauptgeschäftsführer des Verbandes Deutscher Reeder, über die dramatische Lage in der Straße von Hormus. Seit Beginn der Offensive ist die wichtigste Meerenge der Welt faktisch unpassierbar. Kröger erklärt, warum deutsche Schiffe im Persischen Golf festsitzen, wie die Versorgung der Crews gesichert wird und warum staatliche Versicherungsgarantien, wie sie von Donald Trump ins Spiel gebracht wurden, allein keine Lösung für ein mögliches globales Logistik-Chaos sind. Außerdem ist Romanus Otte vom „⁠POLITICO Pro“-Newsletter „Industrie und Handel“⁠ zu Gast in „Off the Record“. Er hat Wirtschaftsministerin Katherina Reiche bei Veranstaltungen in Halle und München beobachtet. Romanus ordnet ein, wie sich Reiche beim Krisenmanagement schlägt, warum sie dabei ihre Komfortzone verlassen muss und wie ihr Auftreten insgesamt bei Vertretern aus Industrie und Handwerk ankommt. „Power & Policy“ zeigt jede Woche, wo und wie die Entscheidungen in der Wirtschaftspolitik fallen. ⁠Jürgen Klöckner⁠ und ⁠Joana Lehner⁠ von POLITICO sprechen mit Top-Entscheidern und liefern Off-the-Record-Einblicke aus der Redaktion und Machtzentren. Präzise Analysen, lange bevor Gesetze beschlossen sind. Der Podcast für alle in Wirtschaft und Politik, die einen Wissensvorsprung brauchen — immer donnerstags. Für Policy-Profis: Abonnieren und die Pro-Newsletter ⁠Industrie & Handel⁠, ⁠Energie & Klima ⁠und ⁠Gesundheit⁠. Jetzt kostenlos testen. Fragen und Feedback gern an ⁠powerandpolicy@politico.eu⁠ **(Anzeige) Eine Nachricht von Fuchs & Cie.: Bei Fuchs & Cie. zählen Leistung und Erfolg. Im Interesse unserer Klienten und ihrer Themen. Deswegen jetzt bewerben. Gerne mit einem Hintergrund aus den Bereichen Defence, Finance, Data oder Energy. Bewerbung per Mail an karriere@fuchs-cie.de. Wir verstärken unsere Teams in Berlin, München und Frankfurt.** POLITICO Deutschland – ein Angebot der Axel Springer Deutschland GmbH Axel-Springer-Straße 65, 10888 Berlin Tel: +49 (30) 2591 0 ⁠information@axelspringer.de⁠ Sitz: Amtsgericht Berlin-Charlottenburg, HRB 196159 B USt-IdNr: DE 214 852 390 Geschäftsführer: Carolin Hulshoff Pol, Mathias Sanchez Luna

Listen on * Spotify * Apple Music * Amazon Music Seit rund zehn Monaten ist der ehemalige Top-Manager Karsten Wildberger Digitalminister in der Bundesregierung. Er soll Deutschland modernisieren, entbürokratisieren und digitalisieren. Gemeinsam mit Kanzler Friedrich Merz verfolgt er das Ziel, Deutschland zur KI-Nation zu machen. Joana Lehner und Jürgen Klöckner sprechen über diese Strategie für Künstliche Intelligenz. Wildberger steht für einen neuen Stil: den Versuch, ein Ministerium wie ein Unternehmen zu führen. Wo ist er damit erfolgreich und wo droht er zu scheitern? Joana und Jürgen analysieren auch, was der Digitalminister bereits erreicht hat und wo Reformen weiterhin nur schleppend vorangehen. Ein weiterer Schwerpunkt ist der AI Summit in Indien. Wildberger ist Deutschlands Vertreter bei der internationalen Konferenz mit zahlreichen Politikern, Wirtschaftsvertretern und bis zu 250.000 erwarteten Besuchern. Teil der deutschen Delegation ist auch DeepL-CEO Jarosław Kutyłowski. Er hat den Online-Übersetzungsdienst zu einer Milliardenbewertung geführt. Von Neu-Delhi aus spricht er im Policy Talk über seine Diskussionen mit dem Digitalminister, über Rechenzentren außerhalb Deutschlands und darüber, warum er die großen KI-Konkurrenten aus den USA nicht fürchtet. Wie Wildberger in Indien empfangen wird, was er dort erreichen kann und wie sich der Minister gibt, wenn Kameras und Mikrofone aus sind, berichtet zudem Larissa Kögl vom neuen POLITICO Pro Technologie-Newsletter. Das Policy-Briefing für die digitale Macht von morgen startet in diesem April. ⁠Den exklusiven Testzugang gibt es hier.⁠ „Power & Policy“ zeigt jede Woche, wo und wie die Entscheidungen in der Wirtschaftspolitik fallen. ⁠Jürgen Klöckner⁠ und ⁠Joana Lehner⁠ von POLITICO sprechen mit Top-Entscheidern und liefern Off-the-Record-Einblicke aus der Redaktion und Machtzentren. Präzise Analysen, lange bevor Gesetze beschlossen sind. Der Podcast für alle in Wirtschaft und Politik, die einen Wissensvorsprung brauchen — immer donnerstags. Für Policy-Profis: Abonnieren und die Pro-Newsletter ⁠Industrie & Handel⁠, ⁠Energie & Klima ⁠und ⁠Gesundheit⁠. Jetzt kostenlos testen. Fragen und Feedback gern an ⁠powerandpolicy@politico.eu⁠ **(Anzeige) Eine Nachricht von Fuchs & Cie.: Bei Fuchs & Cie. zählen Leistung und Erfolg. Im Interesse unserer Klienten und ihrer Themen. Deswegen jetzt bewerben. Gerne mit einem Hintergrund aus den Bereichen Defence, Finance, Data oder Energy. Bewerbung per Mail an karriere@fuchs-cie.de. Wir verstärken unsere Teams in Berlin, München und Frankfurt.** POLITICO Deutschland – ein Angebot der Axel Springer Deutschland GmbH Axel-Springer-Straße 65, 10888 Berlin Tel: +49 (30) 2591 0 ⁠information@axelspringer.de⁠ Sitz: Amtsgericht Berlin-Charlottenburg, HRB 196159 B USt-IdNr: DE 214 852 390 Geschäftsführer: Carolin Hulshoff Pol, Mathias Sanchez Luna

LONDON — The Bank of England left its key interest rate unchanged at 3.75 percent on Thursday but signaled it expects to cut again later this year, given rising confidence that inflation is beaten. “All going well, there should be scope for some further reduction in Bank Rate this year,” Governor Andrew Bailey said in a statement. As a result of Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ budget, the Bank now expects headline inflation to fall to 2 percent by spring, much earlier than previously expected. However, it also cut its growth forecast for the U.K. economy this year to 0.9 percent, from 1.2 percent at its last round of forecasts in November.  Reeves decided last November to remove various green levies from household energy bills as of April, and also froze fuel duty and rail fares. The Bank estimated that will take 0.4 percentage points off inflation this year, reducing the need for big wage increases. The rate of wage growth has consistently outstripped what the Bank considers consistent with 2 percent inflation in recent years, but surveys suggest it will slow to below 4 percent this year as unemployment rises. Reeves’ second budget was in many ways the reverse of her first in 2024, when she raised employers’ National Insurance contributions, the National Living Wage and various administered prices. Companies responded by passing the higher costs on to consumers, briefly driving inflation back up above 4 percent.   The Monetary Policy Committee voted 5-4 to hold, with Swati Dhingra, Alan Taylor and deputy governors Sarah Breeden and Dave Ramsden all voting for a quarter-point cut.

LONDON — Victory is finally in sight for the Bank of England. But rate cuts aren’t. It’s taken Britain’s central bank longer to bring inflation under control than any of its peers on the global stage, but on Thursday economists expect forecasts to show that inflation in the U.K. will return to the government’s 2 percent target within the next two years, having overshot it for almost all of the last four. The pound surged to its highest level against the dollar in five years last month, as global confidence in the anchor of the world’s financial system appeared to fray due to the news flow out of the U.S. But there will be little else to set the pulse racing: Financial market participants are almost unanimous in expecting no change in the Bank rate from its current 3.75 percent. Even the extraordinary events of January, which saw the U.S. seize Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro and U.S. President Donald Trump threaten military force against his NATO allies over Greenland, seem unlikely to induce a shift in the Bank’s communication about the U.K.’s economic outlook. Extrapolating how these seismic events will translate into the U.K. economy has been hard. One of the more hawkish members of the Bank’s Monetary Policy Committee, Megan Greene, argued in a speech last month that while a stronger pound should help keep the cost of imports down, it could easily be offset by other factors, especially if the U.S. Federal Reserve were to be pressured by the White House into cutting U.S. interest rates more aggressively. Greene argued the MPC should focus on what is in its power to control. Here, the Bank is facing a familiar conundrum: growth is sluggish and unemployment is trending higher, but inflation is coming down — even if painfully slowly — and most business surveys suggest wage growth will continue to outstrip what is justified by productivity. Headline inflation ticked up again in December to 3.4 percent, still far above the 2 percent target. The latest data suggest that the economy is still more or less ticking along, growing at an annual rate of 1.4 percent in the three months through November. STILL ‘GRADUAL AND CAUTIOUS’ The narrow vote by the MPC to cut the Bank rate to 3.75 percent from 4 percent at its last meeting in December — and the unwavering message from the Bank that it will take a “gradual and cautious” approach to easing policy — means the committee will stay put on Thursday, according to Deutsche Bank economist Sanjay Raja. UBS economist Anna Titareva, meanwhile, reckons the vote will be split, with both Governor Andrew Bailey and Deputy Governor Sarah Breeden capable of voting again for a cut alongside Alan Taylor and Swati Dhingra, the two external members most concerned about the risks of a slowdown and an accompanying rise in joblessness. But that scenario would still leave Bailey in the minority against the remaining five of nine members in the committee. Most analysts still expect the Bank to cut interest rates twice this year. Inflation is set to fall from April as Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ decision to strip green levies off energy bills causes a drop in final prices for electricity. Deutsche’s Raja expects cuts in March and again in June, but says rates are unlikely to fall any further after that.

The problem of inequality has become so pressing that it needs coordinated global action to address it, a group of over 500 economists and scientists said on Friday. The group, which includes former Treasury Secretary and Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen along with French economist Thomas Piketty and Nobel Prize winner Daren Acemoglu, called in an open letter for the creation of a body akin to the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to coordinate action against what it saw as disastrous effects on modern society. “We are profoundly concerned, as they are, that extreme concentrations of wealth translate into undemocratic concentrations of power, unravelling trust in our societies and polarising our politics,” read the letter, referring to the findings of a G20 research committee led by noted American economist Joseph Stiglitz. Just last week, shareholders of electric vehicle company Tesla voted to award the company’s CEO, Elon Musk, a pay package potentially worth $1 trillion, the largest in history. Musk, also the owner of social media platform X, is already the richest man in the world. The IPCC has spearheaded the collection and dissemination of the scientific consensus on climate change over the past four decades and acted as a powerful force to push green policy forward. The economists said a new “International Panel on Inequality” would play a similar role, gathering evidence and pushing governments to act to tackle wealth gaps.  The proposal was first contained in a recent report on inequality authored by a G20 research committee led by Stiglitz, who focused on inequality in his time as chief economist at the World Bank in the 1990s. The report found that between 2000 and 2024, the richest 1 percent of humanity had accumulated 41 percent of all new wealth — versus the 1 percent that had gone to the bottom half of the global population. That’s equal to an average gain of $1.3 million for the top 1 percent, versus $585 for people in the poorest half. There have been marked political consequences of these large differences between the rich and the poor, with the report finding that countries with high levels of inequality were “seven times more likely to experience democratic decline than more equal countries.”  Stiglitz said in an interview with POLITICO that the growing gap between rich and poor is evidence that the past four decades of middle-of-the-road governance on both sides of the Atlantic has failed. Populists across the West, including U.S. President Donald Trump, had seized the moment, playing on the grievances that failure had stoked, he said.  “I do think that centrist politicians on both sides of the Atlantic bought into the neoliberal fantasy that if you had trade liberalization, financial liberalization, privatization, you would have more growth, and trickle-down economics would make sure that everyone would benefit,” said Stiglitz.  He praised the recent victory of the Democratic Socialist mayor-elect of New York, Zohran Mamdani, who he said was addressing people’s everyday concerns, in contrast to politicians of both the center-left and center-right. Mamdani, who last week surged to victory after defeating both Democratic rival Andrew Cuomo and Republican contender Curtis Sliwa, ran a strikingly effective media campaign centered on the city’s spiraling cost of living. His platform included promises to provide free bus travel, state-owned supermarkets and rent-controlled apartments.   Stiglitz, who described himself as “very market friendly,” nonetheless said he thought the left-wing mayor had opened up space for debate. Zohran Mamdani, who last week surged to victory after defeating both Democratic rival Andrew Cuomo and Republican contender Curtis Sliwa, ran a strikingly effective media campaign centered on the city’s spiraling cost of living. | Sarah Yenesel/EPA “He’s saying things that are important to people: things like housing, food, transport, health care,” said Stiglitz. “He’s just ticking down the list of things that make for the necessities of a decent life, and he’s saying things aren’t working right.”  Stiglitz won his Nobel Prize in 2001 for work on information asymmetries in markets, and served as a chief economist at the World Bank and as chair of the Council of Economic Advisers during former President Bill Clinton’s administration, where he had a famously rocky relationship with Treasury Secretary Larry Summers. With its embrace of globalization and the Internet revolution, Clinton’s team was hugely influential in drawing the parameters for the modern world economy. The influential economist said that tackling inequality wasn’t just a moral choice, but a political necessity. He added that the yawning gap between the rich and poor was undermining the U.S. in its economic and technological competition with China. “[The U.S.] won’t win if we are a divided society, a polarized society,” said Stiglitz, echoing rhetoric of the last Cold War. “The greatest weakness in the U.S. today is this division.”

The leader of what was once Italy’s largest separatist party may end up being the politician who unites the boot from top to bottom.  Hemorrhaging support and risking control of the far-right party that he heads, Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini is gambling his political future on a pharaonic bridge project that will connect the Italian mainland to the island of Sicily. The project faces a critical test on Wednesday when Italy’s Court of Auditors is expected to decide whether it complies with Italian and European Union law. A negative ruling by the court, which is a sort of public financial watchdog, would not necessarily prevent the project from going ahead. But it could prove politically costly for a project already under fire from Salvini’s political opponents.  Salvini, who is infrastructure minister as well as leader of the far-right League party, has called the project “the most important public work in the world,” and said construction could start in November. If built, the 3.7-kilometer suspension bridge spanning the strait of Messina would be the longest of its kind, connecting the toe of the Italian peninsula to the northeastern tip of Sicily.  It would provide the island’s 4.8 million inhabitants, who have until now relied on ferries and planes for access to the outside world, with road and rail lines to the rest of Europe.  The firebrand politician is an unlikely champion for the project. His party was founded more than three decades ago in the hinterlands of Italy’s industrial north with a goal of breaking the region away from the rest of the country.  The League’s founder, Umberto Bossi, made stopping “Roma Ladrona” (thieving Rome) his rallying cry, pledging to put an end to the redistribution of northern tax revenue to the more impoverished south. He vocally opposed projects like the redevelopment of the former steelworks in Naples’ Bagnoli district, which he saw as a northern-funded giveaway likely to end up lining the pockets of southern politicians. Now Salvini, who vocally opposed the bridge as recently as 2016, has become the foremost proponent of the massive public work, estimated to cost €13.5 billion. That would make it among the most expensive infrastructure projects ever built in Italy — and in the country’s southernmost regions to boot, known for the mafia and corruption. “Everybody in Lombardy and in Veneto is angry at Matteo [Salvini] and his obsession with the bridge,” said one senior League official who was granted anonymity to speak candidly, referring to the League’s two heartland regions. “Some think it won’t happen, and some think it will. But almost everyone in the party in the north thinks it’s a waste of money.” BRIDGE TO SOMEWHERE The idea of a bridge connecting the Mediterranean’s biggest island to the Italian peninsula has a long history. Already in antiquity, the Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder wrote of plans to span the strait with a series of interconnected boats. In 1866, five years after the unification of Italy, the future Prime Minister Giuseppe Zanardelli proclaimed: “Whether above the current or under it, let Sicily be united to the continent!” (His favored solution was an underground tunnel.) The idea of a bridge was revived in the 1970s and 1980s after scientific studies judged it was technically feasible. But it was only in 2009, under the premiership of Silvio Berlusconi, that workers symbolically broke ground on the Messina bridge. Technocrat Mario Monti, who replaced Berlusconi during the financial crisis, shelved the endeavor, citing the need to cut costs. In 2016 center-left Prime Minister Matteo Renzi briefly made his own push, which also ended up going nowhere.  Salvini — who built his political career on bold and divisive stunts, and who propelled his party into government after a Damascene conversion from regionalism to far-right nationalism — may be the politician who has come closest to seeing the millennia-old ambition realized. Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini is gambling his political future on a pharaonic bridge project that will connect the Italian mainland to the island of Sicily. | Simona Granati/Getty Images When Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni took power in 2022, Salvini was hoping to land the position of minister of the interior, a natural fit for a politician who came to prominence campaigning against immigration.  But Meloni’s landslide victory left the League with little leverage in the coalition government, and Salvini found himself shunted into the less prestigious role of infrastructure minister. The bridge is his attempt to turn that relegation into a leading role. “Salvini is something of a political animal. He lives for the hot button issue of the day,” said Nicoletta Pirozzi, who heads the EU affairs program for the pro-European Istituto Affari Internazionali think tank. “This idea of a major public work serves as his way to make his mark … to give himself a bit more centrality in the public debate.” A spokesperson for Salvini declined to comment. BETWEEN SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS Judging by the polls, Salvini’s gambit has yet to pay off. At 9 percent, the League is polling far behind its senior coalition partner, Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party, which has the support of nearly a third of the electorate. The Messina bridge has divided public opinion: Supporters point to the economic benefits, while detractors cite everything from the risk of earthquakes to environmental impacts and graft in a part of the country famous for corruption.  “At the moment, Salvini is caught between regional governors who need to answer to their constituents, the SMEs that are the backbone of Italian capitalism, and a populism that I wouldn’t even define as conservative, but actually far-right,” said Teresa Coratella, deputy head of the Rome office at the European Council on Foreign Relations. Meanwhile, Salvini’s party has suffered a steady exodus of members, many from the north. Old-guard stalwarts like former Budget Minister Giancarlo Pagliarini have expressed skepticism: “It’s a bit of a mysterious object. That’s why whenever I hear about it, I say ‘Oh Lord.’” Coratella said that Salvini has so far benefited from a lack of challengers within his party. But his luck may be taking a turn for the worse. Roberto Vannacci — a former general and a member of the European Parliament who like Salvini built his reputation on colorful outbursts — has galvanized parts of the electorate uneasy with Meloni’s moderate foreign policy. Vannacci’s rising star risks eclipsing Salvini, beating him at the outrage game he pioneered. So far, however, Salvini has managed to keep his party backing the bridge, despite a previous warning from Italy’s Court of Auditors in September that raised doubts as to whether the project will be as economically advantageous as the government claims. Meanwhile, WeBuild, the company heading the consortium that is building the bridge, has started hiring the thousands of workers that will be needed for construction. The Messina bridge has divided public opinion. | aleria Ferraro/Getty Images “There are the outcasts of the League who still use the argument, ‘This is a waste of money,’” said League senator Claudio Borghi. “But most of the party understands this is something that’s been beneficial for the north.”   Borghi added that even the more old-school regionalist governors were “starting to understand” the purpose of the project. Construction was meant to start this summer, but has been delayed.  “I think it will benefit the country as a whole,” said Marco Dolfin, a League councilor in the Veneto region. He was quick to point out, however, that the project itself originated with Berlusconi, not Salvini.  “We don’t go on the streets or to rallies with a flag that says ‘Long live the bridge,’” Dolfin said.