Anti-AIPerson

Giorgia Meloni

Prime Minister of Italy

Italy’s prime minister made AI risk a signature theme of her G7 presidency — warning that AI threatens to replace human intellect and impoverish the middle class — and passed the EU’s first national AI law, with prison terms for harmful deepfakes.

Politician

Wikipedia Message on AI and Work (2026)

In her words

It is no longer man’s physical labour that is being replaced, but his intellect, which is what has always made man irreplaceable by a machine.

— Governo Italiano, 2026

If this process is not controlled, more and more workers risk becoming useless, and the scenario we face is one of progressive impoverishment of the middle class.

— Governo Italiano, 2026

Biography

Giorgia Meloni (born 1977) has been prime minister of Italy since October 2022 — the first woman to hold the office — leading the Brothers of Italy party. Among heads of government she has been one of the most persistent voices framing AI primarily as a threat to work and human dignity rather than an economic prize.

Making AI risk a G7 headline

Announcing Italy’s G7 presidency in January 2024, Meloni named AI’s impact on the labour market as a defining theme, warning of a revolution in which human intellect risks being replaced. She then broke precedent by inviting Pope Francis to address the G7 leaders’ session on AI in June 2024 — the first pope ever to attend a G7 — where algorithmic ethics topped the agenda. She has returned to the argument repeatedly, telling a February 2026 conference on AI and work that AI can only unleash its positive potential “if its development is guided by ethical rules that keep people, their rights and their needs at the centre.”

Europe’s first national AI law

In September 2025 her government passed Law No. 132/2025, making Italy the first EU member state with a comprehensive national AI law. It imposes prison terms of one to five years for distributing harmful AI-generated deepfakes, requires human oversight of AI in healthcare, education, justice and the workplace, and commits up to €1 billion in state-backed venture funding for AI and cybersecurity firms. The issue is also personal: Meloni sought damages from the makers of pornographic deepfakes of her, and in 2026 publicly shared a fake AI image of herself in lingerie to warn Italians how convincing such fabrications have become.