Mussolini first gained fame through acting and modelling. In 1982, as a singer, she released a city pop album entitled Amore. Mussolini starred in her final film in 1990 and left the industry after a producer asked her to change her name.
Mussolini left politics temporarily in December 2020 for a reality television career.[7] She returned as an MEP in November 2022, succeeding Antonio Tajani, after he was appointed in the Meloni government.[8]
She married customs policeman Mauro Floriani on 28 October 1989. Contrary to tradition, she proposed to him.[9] Together they have three children,[10] Caterina, Clarissa, and Romano—the last named after his grandfather. Later, the children adopted their mother's surname, but she went through a complex legal process to allow them to do so. She has since campaigned for Italian law to be changed to allow all children to take their mother's last name if they wish.[11]
Her husband was one of the accused scheduled to appear in court for a child prostitution trial in 2015. In 2013, Floriani was one of around 50 men—among them celebrities, professionals, priests, journalists and politicians—who were accused of paying two teenage girls, aged 14 and 15, for sexual services in Rome.[12] Wiretaps revealed he was one of the clients who contacted the girls most often. In 2015, Floriani pled guilty to soliciting the services of an underage prostitute, and received a one-year suspended sentence.[13]
In 2001, Mussolini was involved in an altercation while filming for a Porta a Portatalk show episode on sexual harassment. She was verbally accosted by Katia Bellillo, then Minister for Equal Opportunities, who got up and approached Mussolini. In response Mussolini verbally and physically attacked Bellillo, calling her an "ugly communist" who should "go and live in Cuba."[16][17]
She has been a painter since 2014 and her first solo exhibition was held during 2015 in Rome.[18][19]
Mussolini also appeared as a glamour model,[21] including on the cover of two European editions of Playboy, in Italy (August 1983) and Germany (November 1983).[22][23] "When you are an actress, you are dealing with the body. Every actress does topless and stuff like this; you have to," she has said.[16]
Mussolini continued as an actress into the 1980s. Some of the films she featured in were made for Italian television. However, she still acted in standard cinematic films, such as The Assisi Underground in which she played a nun; the movie focused on the Roman Catholic Church rescuing Italian Jews from the Nazis in 1943.[24] She starred in her final film in 1990 and then left the film industry to continue studying after a producer asked her to change her name.[16]
In 1993 Mussolini was a candidate for the post of mayor of Naples, but was defeated by Antonio Bassolino. She claimed that her relations with Gianfranco Fini, leader of the Alleanza Nazionale, never were very good; she then later withdrew, resigning over differences with him at least once.[27] She unsuccessfully challenged him for the leadership of the party when he withdrew support for Mussolini in a television interview in January 2002.[28][29]
Formation of Social Action
Mussolini suddenly left the National Alliance on 28 November 2003, following the visit of party leader and the Deputy Prime Minister Gianfranco Fini to Israel, where he described fascism as part "the absolute evil" with regard to the Holocaust as he apologised for Italy's role as an Axis Power during the Second World War.[30] Mussolini, however, defended the right of Israel to exist and declared that the world "should beg forgiveness of Israel."[31]
Following her resignation, Mussolini formed her Social Action party, originally named "Freedom of Action," and organised a coalition named Social Alternative. This made her the first female leader of an Italian political party.[5] The move was read in the Italian media as surprising because of Mussolini's "progressive" stances on many issues, including abortion,[32]artificial insemination,[33][34]gay rights[35] and civil unions.[36] She has been an outspoken feminist[37] and has been described by conservative commentators as a "socialist"[38] and a "left-winger."[39]
In response to a comment made by UKIPMEPGodfrey Bloom in which he said that "No self-respecting small businessman with a brain in the right place would ever employ a lady of child-bearing age. That isn't politically correct, is it, but it's a fact of life. The more women's rights you have, it's actually a bar to their employment."[40] and: "I just don't think [women] clean behind the fridge enough,"[41] Mussolini responded by saying
I know the English have a sense of humour about themselves, but I am from Naples and I can say that us women do know how to cook and clean the refrigerator and even be politicians, while perhaps Godfrey Bloom does not know either how to clean the refrigerator or how to be a politician.[42]
In March 2005, Mussolini was banned by a local court from regional elections held the following month for presenting fraudulent signatures.[43] "This is an affront to democracy, if they're going to exclude the Social Alternative they will have to exclude all the parties, because all the signature lists are false," Mussolini told Reuters.[44] Mussolini went on a hunger strike to protest the decision.[45] However, at the end of the month Italy's top administrative court, the Council of State, annulled the decision and she stood for election.[46]
In November 2007, remarks by Mussolini triggered the collapse of the far-right Identity, Tradition, Sovereignty grouping within the European Parliament.[47] Mussolini declared that all Romanians were criminals in remarks regarding immigration policy. This prompted delegates from the Greater Romania Party to quit the group, bringing the group below the minimum number of members to qualify as a caucus and receive Parliamentary funding. In the 2019 European Parliament election, she lost her bid for re-election to the European Parliament.[14]
Views on social issues
In 2006, she responded to claims by the transgender Italian parliamentary candidate Vladimir Luxuria that she was a "fascist" by saying that it would be better to be a fascist than it would be to be gay.[48]
Her stance on homosexuality changed consistently from the late 2000s. In 2010, Mussolini condemned the Vatican's comparison of homosexuality with paedophilia, stating "You can't link sexual orientation to pedophilia … this link risks becoming dangerously misleading for the protection of children".[49] In 2022, she supported the anti-homophobia "Zan bill" and she refused to provide her gender information on her MEP identity card after returning to the European Parliament.[50]
End of political career
She left Forza Italia in 2018, following the party's decision to be in opposition to the Conte government.[51] She has used Twitter to defend the memory of her grandfather from critics such as actor Jim Carrey, and fans of Scottish football club Celtic F.C.[1][52]
^Quote in the original language Italian: "So che gli Inglesi hanno il senso dell’autoironia, ma io sono napoletana e posso dire che noi donne sappiamo cucinare e pulire i frigoriferi e facciamo anche politica, mentre forse Godfrey Bloom non-sa né pulire i frigoriferi, né fare politica."
