Rome elects its first female mayor


The first female mayor of Rome was elected Sunday, with 67 percent of the vote.
Virginia Raggi, a 37-year-old lawyer and city council member, won almost every part of the city in the run-off election, the Italian national newspaper Corriere della Sera reports. During the June 5 primary, she led Roberto Giachetti, backed by Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, by 11 percentage points. Giachetti conceded defeat a few hours after polls closed.
Raggi is a member of the opposition Movimento 5 Stelle (Five Star Movement), founded on the internet nearly seven years ago by television comic Giuseppe "Beppe" Grillo as an anti-establishment party, NBC News reports. Raggi focused her campaign on the poor condition of city streets and parking as well as a yearlong corruption investigation into politicians and their alleged links to organized crime.
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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
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