Pina Picerno leaves the PD: “There is no longer a home for reformists”

Brussels – The Vice-President of the European Parliament, Pina Picierno, is leaving the PD. In an exclusive interview with the newspaper Il Foglio, Picierno has officially announced her departure from the Democratic Party, describing it as a “painful” but necessary decision. “The home of the reformists is no more,” she explains. In her view, the party has now lost its “drive towards governing complexity,“ preferring instead to “protect its own identity as a political objective in itself.” 

According to Picierno, “Reformism does not exist to preserve a community but to engage with reality, especially when reality takes on new, uncomfortable, and even unsettling forms.” The crux of her criticism lies in what she sees as a distortion of the original project: “The PD we envisioned at the Lingotto no longer exists.” Today, she laments, the party has drifted towards a “movement-oriented approach” influenced by the M5S in what she describes as a “normalisation of anti-politics.” 

A key point of contention is foreign policy. Picierno, who lives under police protection due to threats from Russia, criticises the ambiguity towards “Putin’s fascism”: “Can one be an anti-fascist today without being on the front line against Putin’s fascism?” the vice-president asks sarcastically. For her, “Kyiv reminds us every day that these values survive only when someone is willing to bear the cost.” 

In addition to political issues, Picierno laments a profound sense of personal isolation: “The national leadership of my party has not offered any support” in the face of the hybrid attacks I have suffered; on the contrary, “they wanted to silence what was happening to me.” 

The Vice-President appears to be increasingly focusing on centrism: in a post on Facebook, she states that there is a need for “a broad, pluralistic, popular, and reformist movement for those who believe in liberal democracy, Europe, and freedom.” 

There has still been no comment from her former colleagues in the European Parliament delegation, and questions are being raised about her possible departure from the Socialist Group. In this regard, ANSA sources report that she intends to join the European Democratic Party (PDE) and the Renew group, of which the PDE is a founding party alongside ALDE.