From #OccupyPD to the ambition to become dem secretary: who is Elly Schlein

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From #OccupyPD to the race to become dem secretary. Fresh from an electoral campaign in which she enjoyed a lot of personal success (it was strongly desired by Letta), Elly Schlein took the field in the Pd congress (and in the race for the secretariat). With a live broadcast on Instagram, the former vice president of Emilia Romagna has formalized her adhesion to the constituent phase of the new party. A necessary move since, in fact, Schlein is not part of the Democratic Party, having been elected to the House as an independent.

Schlein’s name is therefore added to that of the candidates in pectore: the governor of Emilia Romagna Stefano Bonaccini, on pole for the succession to Letta, and the mayor of Florence Dario Nardella. And of those officially in the field: the mayor of Pesaro Matteo Ricci and the former minister Paola De Micheli.

Volunteer in the election campaign in support of Obama

Young, woman, leftist, LGBT militant, aims to bring the world of movements and associations to the party, with the themes of youth work and precarious work at the center. She was born 37 years ago in Lugano, Switzerland, to an Italian mother and an American father, in 2008 she leaves for Chicago, where she volunteers in the electoral campaign in support of Obama, against John McCain.

The OccupyPD protest mobilization

In April 2013, in the days of the election of the President of the Republic and of the 101 snipers who drowned the candidacy of Romano Prodi, Elly together with many others gave life to the national protest mobilization OccupyPD against the broad agreements, organizing the network at the national. In June, in Bologna, Schlein organizes the “102idee per change” initiative, a day in favor of the participation of members and voters in the choices of the Democratic Party, from which 102 proposals for the political rebirth of the center-left are born. The next day, the guys from OccupyPD give Prodi their “We are more than 101” t-shirt.

Experience in the European Parliament

On 25 May 2014 she was elected to the European Parliament with over 54,000 and 800 preferences. You work mainly on the issues on which you engaged in the electoral campaign: rights, immigration, fiscal justice, ecological conversion, the fight against corruption and the mafias.