page_title: Democratic Party (Italy)
section_title: Leadership of Nicola Zingaretti
hierarchical_section_title: Democratic Party (Italy) / History / Leadership of Nicola Zingaretti
caption_attribution_description: English: Nicola Zingaretti in 2012.
context_page_description: The Democratic Party is a social-democratic political party in Italy. The party's secretary is Nicola Zingaretti, who was elected in March 2019, while its president is Valentina Cuppi.
  The PD was founded on 14 October 2007 upon the merger of various centre-left parties which had been part of The Olive Tree list and The Union coalition in the 2006 general election. They notably included the social-democratic Democrats of the Left, successors of the Italian Communist Party and the Democratic Party of the Left which was folded with several social-democratic parties in 1998; and the largely Catholic-inspired Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy, merger of the Italian People's Party, The Democrats and Italian Renewal in 2002. Thus, the party's main ideological trends are social democracy and the Italian Christian leftist tradition. The PD has been also influenced by social liberalism which was already present in some of the founding components of the DS and DL and more generally by a Third Way progressivism.
  The PD was the second-largest party in Italy in the 2018 general election.
context_section_description: Three major candidates, Martina, Nicola Zingaretti and Roberto Giachetti, plus a handful of minor ones, formally filed papers in order to run for secretary. Prior to that, Marco Minniti, minister of the Interior in the Gentiloni Cabinet, had also launched his bid, before renouncing in December and supporting Zingaretti. Zingaretti won the first round by receiving 47.4% of the vote among party members in local conventions. He, along with Martina and Giachetti, qualified for the primary election, to be held on 3 March. In the event, Zingaretti was elected secretary, exceeding expectations and winning 66.0% of the vote while Martina and Giachetti won 22.0% and 12.0%, respectively.
  Zingaretti was officially appointed by the national assembly, on 17 March. On the same day, former Prime Minister Gentiloni was elected as the party's new president. A month later, Zingaretti appointed Andrea Orlando and Paola De Micheli as deputy secretaries.
  In the run-up to the 2019 European Parliament election Zingaretti presented a special logo including a large reference to "We Are Europeans" and the symbol of the PES. Additionally, the party forged an alliance with Article One. In the election, the PD garnered 22.7% of the vote, finishing second after the League. Calenda was the most voted candidate of the party.
  On 3 July 2019 David Sassoli, a member of the PD, was elected President of the European Parliament.
caption: Nicola Zingaretti
exif: {"Image Make": "NIKON CORPORATION", "Image Model": "NIKON D700", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Picasa 3.0", "Image DateTime": "2012:10:12 23:56:15", "Image Artist": "NICCOLO' CARANTI", "Image Copyright": "NICCOLO' CARANTI", "Image ExifOffset": "306", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/125", "EXIF FNumber": "14/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Manual", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "6400", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2012:07:03 19:59:00", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2012:07:03 19:59:00", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "4", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "3", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Spot", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire", "EXIF FocalLength": "120", "EXIF SubSecTime": "91", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "91", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "91", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2494", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3275", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Manual Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "120", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "High gain up", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Hard", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0", "EXIF ImageUniqueID": "a2f96522740548a0cd2370cb30870dec"}