Matteo Salvini Says Leftist Vandals Are ‘Red Nazis’

Italian interior minister Matteo Salvini took to the offensive Friday after a group of 15 anarchists attacked a booth of the Lega party in Trento, calling the thugs “Red Nazis” and promising to continue undeterred.

The leftist anarchists attacked a gazebo Thursday that had been set up in the city’s central square on the day of the weekly market.

The aim of the gazebo was to explain to citizens the Salvini security decree, enacted to curb terrorism and illegal immigration and streamline certain immigration procedures.

The anarchists, chanting slogans against the Lega and waving posters with the words “Hangman for Salvini” and “Security and repression,” overturned the tables in the gazebo, throwing flyers and other materials to the ground.

“For the umpteenth time, the usual troublemakers wanted to show their opposition to freedom of thought, since they wanted to keep us from explaining to the people the good done by Matteo Salvini and the Lega through the Decree Security,” said Mara Dalzocchio, leader of the Lega in Trento.

“They are people who do not accept any democratic principle and who smear our cities every day with insulting writings,” he said.

For his part, Mr. Salvini took to social media Friday, calling the anarchists “Cowards!” on Facebook.

“Just another act of violence by the Red Nazis. You do not scare us, we will not give up!” the minister wrote.

This is not the first assault on Mr. Salvini’s party in Trento. Last November, a group of violent alt-Left protesters blocked a railway station and attempted an assault on Mr. Salvini in the northern Italian city.

The protesters, described by local media as “anarchists,” many of whom were wearing hoods to hide their faces, laid heavy chains across tracks at the Trento station to block trains, and threw paint across the windshield of a locomotive.

A poll earlier this month revealed that the Italian public stands behind the Salvini security decree, despite opposition from several left-wing mayors and Catholic bishops.

The survey revealed that only a small minority of Italians (19 percent) would like the government to reopen the country’s closed ports to migrants.

A significant majority of Italians (64 percent) are favorable to Matteo Salvini’s decision to close the country’s ports, and this preference spans all social segments regardless of gender, age, educational qualifications, employment status, or religious faith, including Catholics who regularly attend mass, the poll found.

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