Prosecutions, political ban, and continued influence of Silvio Berlusconi

Out of office, Berlusconi remained a highly visible figure, both through his media empire and as the defendant in ongoing criminal trials. In October 2012 he was found guilty of tax fraud in a case involving his Mediaset television network and was sentenced to four years in prison. Berlusconi announced his return to politics in December 2012, a move that helped trigger the collapse of the government of technocratic Prime Minister Mario Monti. A general election was held in February 2013, and a centre-left coalition, headed by Pier Luigi Bersani, captured the lower house of parliament. Berlusconi’s bloc, however, won enough seats in the Senate that it could, with assistance from Beppe Grillo’s populist Five Star Movement, prevent the passage of any legislation. The result was a hung parliament, the first time that such an event had occurred in Italy’s postwar history. Less than two weeks after the election, Berlusconi was sentenced to a year in prison for having illegally obtained and securing the publication of the contents of a police wiretap that involved a political rival.

While the legal proceedings against Berlusconi continued, Italy’s political establishment sought to resolve the parliamentary gridlock. In April 2013 Berlusconi and the PdL moved to support Enrico Letta, a moderate member of the Democratic Party (Partito Democratico; PD), and a cross-party coalition government was formed. Another trial reached its conclusion in June 2013, when Berlusconi was found guilty of soliciting sex from an underage prostitute and sentenced to seven years in prison and barred from serving in public office. As was the case in his other trials, the execution of the sentence was delayed, pending the conclusion of the appeals process. In August 2013 Italy’s highest court upheld Berlusconi’s conviction for tax fraud, although his sentence was reduced to one year as a result of a law enacted to reduce prison overcrowding. The verdict marked Berlusconi’s first actual conviction in more than a dozen attempted prosecutions, but his age made it unlikely that he would serve time in prison. The former prime minister was also subject to a political ban of five years, but this part of the sentence was referred to a lower court for review before its execution.

On September 28, 2013, just days before a committee was set to rule on the matter of his expulsion from the Senate, Berlusconi withdrew the PdL from the Letta government, ostensibly in response to a proposed 1 percent value-added tax increase. As Letta’s five-month-old administration appeared to be on the verge of collapse, Berlusconi faced a revolt from within, as dozens of PdL lawmakers pledged their support for the government. Berlusconi abruptly reversed himself, and on October 2, 2013, with the PdL once again participating in the governing coalition, Letta easily survived a vote of confidence. Later that month Berlusconi relaunched the PdL as Forza Italia. The party’s moderate wing, which had sided with Letta and forced Berlusconi’s volte-face, subsequently broke away under the leadership of Angelino Alfano to become the New Centre Right (Nuovo Centrodestra; NCD) party.

As a final ruling on Berlusconi’s Senate membership loomed, he once again withdrew his support from the government, moving Forza Italia into opposition. Letta comfortably survived the resulting confidence vote with the support of the NCD. After months of delays, on November 27, 2013, the Senate voted to formally expel Berlusconi. The decision carried with it a six-year prohibition on holding public office, a sentence that trumped the earlier political ban, and stripped Berlusconi of the prosecutorial immunity that he had enjoyed as a lawmaker.

Although no longer holding a legislative seat and barred from holding office until 2019, Berlusconi continued to serve as the head of Forza Italia and vowed to remain a fixture in the Italian political scene. He was briefly sidelined by heart surgery in June 2016, but, within months, Berlusconi was once again using his media empire to influence the Italian electorate. PD Prime Minister Matteo Renzi had proposed a constitutional referendum that promised to significantly reduce the power of the Senate, and early polling indicated that Forza Italia members were open to the proposal. Berlusconi came out strongly against the referendum, however, and it was overwhelmingly defeated in December 2016. Renzi resigned, and his successor, Paolo Gentiloni, led a caretaker government into elections that were scheduled for March 2018.

Political comeback

A resurgent Berlusconi led a coalition of his own Forza Italia, the anti-immigrant Northern League (Lega Nord), and the neofascist Brothers of Italy to victory in Sicily in November 2017. Berlusconi’s coalition narrowly topped the Five Star Movement but convincingly defeated the PD, dimming the hopes of a comeback by Renzi. Just weeks after his victory in Sicily, the 81-year-old Berlusconi appealed to the European Court of Human Rights in an effort to overturn his ban from holding political office. In the general election on March 4, 2018, Berlusconi’s coalition captured the largest share of the vote, narrowly topping Five Star, though Forza Italia finished behind Lega, a result that reflected Italian voters’ general dissatisfaction with mainstream parties. Months of debate failed to yield a government, however.

In May 2018, just days after Berlusconi agreed to allow Lega to open discussions with Five Star, a Milan appellate court overturned his ban from political office. Lega and Five Star eventually succeeded in forming a government, and Lega leader Matteo Salvini was named interior minister. Salvini used his position to advance a nativist Euroskeptic platform, and he quickly emerged as the most visible face on the Italian right. Berlusconi, however, continued to pursue a political comeback by tacking to the centre and promoting a pro-EU agenda. Although dogged by health issues, Berlusconi left the hospital after abdominal surgery to resume his campaign for a seat in the European Parliament. In May 2019 Forza Italia significantly outperformed expectations, and Berlusconi handily won his first electoral contest since the lifting of his political ban.