Italy’s Meloni easily wins confidence vote in parliament

By FRANCES D’EMILIO
Associated Press

ROME (AP) — Italy’s new far-right-led government of Giorgia Meloni has won the first of two required confidence votes in Parliament by a comfortable margin. The vote in the lower Chamber of Deputies Tuesday night was 235 in favor of her coalition government and 154 against. The coalition needed at least 195 votes for a majority. On Wednesday, the new government will face a vote in the upper chamber, the Senate, where it also holds a solid majority. Earlier Tuesday in the Chamber, Meloni laid out her government’s policy aims, firing back at domestic and foreign critics who are worried that her far-right politics might undermine European unity or the civil rights of Italian citizens.