Italian presidential election, 2015

Italian presidential election, 2015
1009 voters: 315 Senators, 6 Senators for life,; 630 Deputies and 58 regional representatives; 673 or 505 votes needed to win
	Composition Mattarella 665 Others 212 Invalids, blanks 132
President before election; Giorgio Napolitano ; Independent	Elected President; Sergio Mattarella ; Independent

Last updated April 10, 2019

The Italian presidential election of 2015 was held on 29–31 January, following the resignation of incumbent President Giorgio Napolitano on 14 January 2015. The office was held at the time of the election by Senate President Pietro Grasso in an acting capacity. Only members of Italian Parliament and regional delegates are entitled to vote. As head of state of the Italian Republic, the President has a role of representation of national unity and guarantees that Italian politics comply with the Italian Constitution, in the framework of a parliamentary system.

Giorgio Napolitano, is an Italian politician who served as the 11th President of the Republic from 2006 to 2015, and the only Italian President to be reelected to the Presidency. Due to his monarchical style and his dominant position in Italian politics, critics often refer to him as Re Giorgio. He is the longest serving President in the history of the modern Italian Republic, which has been in existence since 1946.

Pietro Grasso, also known as Piero Grasso, is an Italian anti-mafia magistrate and politician who served as President of the Senate from 2013 to 2018.

The Italian Parliament is the national parliament of the Italian Republic. The Parliament is the representative body of Italian citizens and is the successor to the Parliament of the Kingdom of Sardinia (1848–1861) and the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946). It is a bicameral legislature with 945 elected members and a small number of unelected members (parlamentari). It is composed of the Chamber of Deputies, with 630 members (deputati) elected on a national basis, and the Senate of the Republic, with 315 members (senatori) elected on a regional basis, plus a small number of senators for life, either appointed or ex officio. The two houses are independent from one another and never meet jointly except under circumstances specified by the Constitution.

Sergio Mattarella is an Italian politician, lawyer and academic serving as the 12th and current President of Italy since 2015. He was previously Minister for Parliamentary Relations from 1987 to 1989, Minister of Public Education from 1989 to 1990, Deputy Prime Minister of Italy from 1998 to 1999 and Minister of Defence from 1999 to 2001. In 2011, he became an elected judge on the Constitutional Court. On 31 January 2015, he was elected by the Italian Parliament to serve as President of the Italian Republic.

The President of the Italian Republic is the head of state of Italy and in that role represents national unity and guarantees that Italian politics comply with the Constitution. The President's term of office lasts for seven years. The 11th President of the Republic, Giorgio Napolitano, was elected on 10 May 2006 and elected to a second term for the first time in Italian Republic history on 20 April 2013. Following Napolitano's resignation, the incumbent President, former Constitutional judge Sergio Mattarella, was elected at the fourth ballot with 665 votes out of 1,009 on 31 January 2015.

Procedure

In accordance with the Italian Constitution, the election is held in the form of a secret ballot, with the Senators, the Deputies and 58 regional representatives entitled to vote. The election is held in the Palazzo Montecitorio, home of the Chamber of Deputies, with the capacity of the assembly room expanded for the purpose. The first three ballots require a two-thirds majority of the 1,009 voters in order to elect a President, or 673 votes. Starting from the fourth ballot, an absolute majority is required for candidates to be elected, or 505 votes. The presidential mandate lasts seven years.

The Constitution of the Italian Republic was enacted by the Constituent Assembly on 22 December 1947, with 453 votes in favour and 62 against. The text, which has since been amended 15 times, was promulgated in the extraordinary edition of Gazzetta Ufficiale No. 298 on 27 December 1947. The Constituent Assembly was elected by universal suffrage on 2 June 1946, at the same time as a referendum on the abolition of the monarchy. The Constitution came into force on 1 January 1948, one century after the Statuto Albertino had been enacted. Although the latter remained in force after Benito Mussolini's March on Rome in 1922, it had become devoid of substantive value.

The Palazzo Montecitorio is a palace in Rome and the seat of the Italian Chamber of Deputies.

The Chamber of Deputies is a house of the bicameral Parliament of Italy. The two houses together form a perfect bicameral system, meaning they perform identical functions, but do so separately. Pursuant to article 56 of the Italian Constitution, the Chamber of Deputies has 630 seats, of which 618 are elected from Italian constituencies, and 12 from Italian citizens living abroad. Deputies are styled The Honourable and meet at Palazzo Montecitorio. The Chamber and the parliamentary system of the Italian Republic and under the previous Kingdom of Italy is a continuation of the traditions and procedures of the Parliament and Chamber of Deputies as established under King Charles Albert (1798–1849), during the Revolutions of 1848, and his son Victor Emmanuel II (1820–1878) of the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont which led in the "Italian unification Risorgimento movement" of the 1850s and 1860s, under the leadership of then-Prime Minister Count Camillo Benso of Cavour.

The election was presided over by the President of the Chamber of Deputies Laura Boldrini, who proceeded to the public counting of the votes, and by the Acting President of the Senate Valeria Fedeli, instead of President Pietro Grasso who was serving as Acting President of the Republic since January 14.

Laura Boldrini, is an Italian journalist and politician, former President of the Chamber of Deputies of Italy. Previously she was a spokesperson for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

Candidates

Sergio Mattarella, a senior judge, was the candidate of Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and the governing Democratic Party.^[1]
Ferdinando Imposimato, another senior judge, was backed by the Five Star Movement.^[1]
Stefano Rodota, former Vice President of the Chamber of Deputies.
Vittorio Feltri, a journalist, was a presidential candidate of Lega Nord and Brothers of Italy

Matteo Renzi is an Italian politician who served as the Prime Minister of Italy from February 2014 until December 2016. After the rejection of his constitutional reform in the December 2016 referendum, Renzi formally resigned on 12 December when Foreign Affairs Minister Paolo Gentiloni was appointed new head of the government by President Sergio Mattarella. Renzi served, with a brief interruption, as Secretary of the Democratic Party from 2013 to 2018, when he resigned after the 2018 electoral defeat. He was also President of the Province of Florence from 2004 to 2009 and Mayor of Florence from 2009 to 2014. Renzi, who did not hold a seat in either house of Parliament during his tenure as Prime Minister, became a member of the Senate in March 2018.

The Democratic Party is a social-democratic political party in Italy. The party's secretary is Nicola Zingaretti, who was elected in March 2019, while Paolo Gentiloni serves as president.

Ferdinando Imposimato was an Italian magistrate and the honorary president of the Supreme Court of Italy.

Electoral college

Electors per parliamentary group (including the regional delegates) were divided as follows:

Composition of the electoral college
Party		Members (total)	Members		Share

Party		Members (total)	MPs (Chamber and Senate)	Regional delegates	Share
	Democratic Party (PD)	445	415	30	44.1%
	Forza Italia (FI)	143	130	13	14.1%
	Five Star Movement (M5S)	129	128	1	12.8%
	Popular Area (NCD/UdC)	74	70	4	7.3%
	Lega Nord (LN)	38	35	3	3.8%
	Left Ecology Freedom (SEL)	34	33	1	3.4%
	Civic Choice (SC)	32	32	0	3.2%
	Others	114	108	6	11.3%
Total		1,009	951	58	100.0%

Results

Candidate	First round	Second round	Third round	Fourth round
Sergio Mattarella	5	4	4	665
Ferdinando Imposimato	120	123	126	127
Vittorio Feltri	49	51	56	46
Stefano Rodotà	23	22	22	17
Emma Bonino	25	23	23	2
Romano Prodi	9	5	3	2
Antonio Martino	3	–	–	2
Giorgio Napolitano	–	–	–	2
Luciana Castellina	37	34	33	–
Lucio Barani	4	3	21	–
Giuseppe Pagano	3	7	11	–
Claudio Sabelli Fioretti	11	14	8	–
Marcello Gualdani	6	10	7	–
Mauro Guerra	–	3	5	–
Francesco Guccini	–	–	4	–
Luigi Manconi	–	–	4	–
Ignazio Messina	3	3	3	–
Angelo Perrino	–	–	3	–
Antonio Razzi	–	4	2	–
Ezio Greggio	2	3	2	–
Franco Frattini	–	2	2	–
Ernesto Abaterusso	–	–	2	–
Pier Ferdinando Casini	–	–	2	–
Michele Emiliano	–	–	2	–
Giovanni Malagò	–	–	2	–
Luigi Marino	–	–	2	–
Vincenzo Olita	–	–	2	–
Antonio Palmieri	–	–	2	–
Pasquale Sollo	–	–	2	–
Andrea Vecchio	–	–	2	–
Santo Versace	–	6	–	–
Paola Severino	–	5	–	–
Carlo Sangalli	–	4	–	–
Pierluigi Bersani	5	2	–	–
Giuseppe Scognamiglio	4	2	–	–
Agostino Marianetti	3	2	–	–
Anna Finocchiaro	2	2	–	–
Luciano Cimmino	–	2	–	–
Gabriele Albertini	14	–	–	–
Mauro Morelli	9	–	–	–
Massimo Caleo	8	–	–	–
Ricardo Antonio Merlo	3	–	–	–
Paolo Mieli	3	–	–	–
Antonello Zitelli	3	–	–	–
Dario Baldini D'Amato	2	–	–	–
Other candidates	48	61	70	14
Blank papers	538	531	513	105
Invalid papers	33	26	27	13
Absentees	34	56	40	14
Total	1,009	1,009	1,009	1,009
Source: Parliament of Italy

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References

1 2 Giada Zampano, "Lawmakers in Italy Fail to Elect President in First Round of Voting", The Wall Street Journal, 29 January 2015.

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[giada-1] 1 2 Giada Zampano, "Lawmakers in Italy Fail to Elect President in First Round of Voting", The Wall Street Journal, 29 January 2015.