How Will it All End? Some Thoughts From Milan
An Italian Horror Show or a Brazilian Trial?
I have recently spent time in Milan. I visited the square where Mussolini started his political career. On March 23, 1919, Mussolini gathered about 100 people — including ex-soldiers, nationalists, futurists, and disillusioned socialists — in Milan's Piazza San Sepolcro..
It all then advanced quickly—by 1921, the movement rebranded as the National Fascist Party (Partito Nazionale Fascista, PNF). He formed the Blackshirts (Squadristi), used violence and intimidation to suppress opposition. His rallying call was that if you wear black, you signal you are one of us. In October 1922, Mussolini staged the March on Rome, pressuring King Victor Emmanuel III to appoint him Prime Minister. From there, Mussolini gradually dismantled democratic institutions and established a full dictatorship by 1925. It was not until the same Milanese crowd gathered in Piazzale Loreto in April 1945 driven by the deep-seated anger for the years of Fascist tyranny, to hang Mussolini from a gas station beam.
Italy’s painful bout with fascism included the deportation of its Jews and did not end with Mussolini’s death. The current ruling party, led by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, is the direct ideological and organizational successor to the National Alliance. While Meloni has stated that FdI condemns anti-Semitism and embraces democratic principles, critics point to a reluctance among some party members to unequivocally condemn fascism or call themselves "anti-fascist."
Our Jewish guide, whose family miraculously escaped Auschwitz, told us that her son was recently invited by his group to wear black to a party. She refused to buy him a black shirt —it was a brave move—she was one of only 5,000 Jews left in a city that was showing definitive signs that it was about to revive its anti-semitic past.
A more hopeful future is provided by Brazil. Bolsonaro, another proto fascist, was removed from power through democratic means, defeated in the October 2022 presidential runoff election by Lula da Silva, who won with 50.9% of the vote in an extremely tight contest. This electoral defeat occurred despite Bolsonaro's systematic attempts to undermine confidence in democratic institutions in ways that mirror Trump’s attempts.
Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who headed the Superior Electoral Court during the election, became a central figure in defending democratic norms against Bolsonaro's attacks. The courts, based on my AI-driven research, took several decisive actions:
- **Combating Disinformation**: Moraes worked with digital platforms to combat fake news and reduced the time platforms had to remove flagged content from 24 hours to two hours. The second round of elections recorded a 1,671% increase in the volume of fake news reports compared to the 2020 elections.
“Protecting the Electoral Process**: When Federal Highway Police conducted targeted roadblocks to prevent voting in regions where Lula was polling strongly, Moraes ordered an immediate halt to the operations and later had the police director arrested
“Institutional Independence**: Unlike Trump's ability to pressure elected officials responsible for counting votes, Brazil's federal electoral courts showed "no qualms about standing up to Bolsonaro".
Crucially, when Bolsonaro attempted to persuade military leadership to support his plan to contest the election results, "while the Navy commander reportedly expressed willingness to join, the Army and Air Force commanders stepped back and withheld support". Military leaders offered "private assurances to former peers that they want no part in disrupting democratic order".
Brazil's courts, congressional leadership, business groups and civil society closed ranks to shore up trust in the integrity of the vote. Business leaders penned public declarations of their faith in the electoral system, understanding that a break with democracy would be "economic suicide".
However, a week after Lula's inauguration, Bolsonaro supporters stormed institutional buildings, causing an estimated $3 million in damages, with their message being "We do not accept the 2022 election results". Sound familiar?
- **Ongoing Investigations**: In March 2025, Brazil's Supreme Court unanimously voted to put Bolsonaro on trial for allegedly conspiring to overthrow the government after losing the 2022 election.
The Brazilian experience teaches us that it will take all the institutions in our democracy to defeat Trump, who will not be shy about holding onto power, since, like Bosanoro, who has been arrested and awaiting trial. It should be a trial everyone in the US watches carefully.
The Brazilian case demonstrates that democratic institutions can successfully resist authoritarian pressure, but this success required several factors:
1. **Judicial Independence**: The Supreme Court and electoral courts maintained independence despite sustained attacks.
2. **Military Restraint**: Unlike historical precedents in Latin America, the military refused to support a coup attempt.
3. **Societal Coalition**: Civil society, business groups, and even some political opponents united to defend democratic norms.
4. **International Pressure**: The director of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency told Bolsonaro's senior aides that he should stop casting doubt on Brazil's electronic voting system.
However, the experience left Brazil with "low confidence in Brazil's government and democratic systems," with 41% of Brazilians remaining "ambivalent toward democracy". This suggests that while institutions held, the deeper cultural and social foundations of democracy remain fragile.
The Brazilian experience shows that strong institutions can resist authoritarian capture, but require active defense by multiple actors across society. Unlike the historical transitions from military rule, this represented democracy defending itself against internal subversion while remaining formally intact—a model that we must hope that the US follows. After this nightmare is over, the US must address its structural democratic weakness and not continue to pretend that they don’t exist
This might include:
Abolishing the Electoral College, which allows minority rule;
Restructuring the Senate to reflect population rather than geography
Create constitutional amendments that explicitly protect voting rights and democratic participation.
Poscript
I have mentioned that getting rid of Trump and Trumpism must be a collective democratic effort —artists too have a role to play. While in Milan I was excited to see this amazing sculpture—
Made of the finest Carrara marble.—36 feet in height.— The sculpture first appeared in 2010, by the Milanese sculptor on the occasion of his retrospective at The Royal Palace of Milan.
The sculpture was privately funded ... it's installation in the high-profile Piazza Affari, the city and the new mayor, Giuliano Pisapia, decided to keep the sculpture on permanent display for at least the next forty years. The work sits outside of Palazzo Mezzanotte, a fascist-era building, and is home to the headquarters of Milan's stock exchange. The Italian stock exchange, the heart of Italian finance, is housed in Palazzo Mezzanotte, a neoclassical building that over the years has become an architectural symbol of Fascism.
Cattelan understood the layered symbolism of the location. If it weren't for the severed fingers, "L.O.V.E." by Maurizio Cattelan would show the infamous fascist salutation, and this can be interpreted as a political statement. L.O.V.E. / IPA The gesture works on multiple registers simultaneously—what appears as crude provocation reveals itself as sophisticated historical commentary. The artist took the Roman salute that fascists appropriated and corrupted it further, leaving only the middle finger standing while the others appear broken off, as if time and criticism had worn away everything except defiance.
The timing wasn't coincidental. "L.O.V.E.", known in Italian as "Il Dito" (the finger) is considered a comment on the economic recession and the protest against high finance which followed. L.O.V.E. / IPA The 2008 financial crisis had hit Italy particularly hard, and by 2010, the country was deep in economic turmoil that would lead to the broader European debt crisis. Placing a giant middle finger directly in front of the stock exchange headquarters suggested multiple targets—the financial system, the fascist architectural legacy, or perhaps the entire Italian political establishment that had failed to prevent the economic disaster.
As Wikipedia reports, “The artist's insistence on location reveals how central the site-specific nature of the work was to its meaning. This wasn't just any middle finger—it was this middle finger, in this place, facing this building, at this moment in Italian history.
The acronym L.O.V.E.—"Libertà, Odio, Vendetta, Eternità" ("Freedom, Hatred, Revenge, Eternity") L.O.V.E. (sculpture) - —reads like a manifesto of contradictions, capturing the complex emotions surrounding both Italy's fascist past and its financial present. At some point the artists will need to help us to express our emotions as we suffer through this discouraging period in our history.