In that role, the president represents national unity and guarantees that Italian politics comply with the Constitution.

On 20 April 2013, President Giorgio Napolitano agreed to run for a second term in an attempt to break the parliamentary deadlock in the 2013 presidential elections and was duly reelected the same day.

According to the Constitution, the election must be held by a secret ballot, with the senators, deputies and regional representatives all being required to vote.

Members of the electoral college, mostly being part of political parties, can make public or undisclosed agreements between each other on a name to vote as a candidate, but the votes during the ballot remain secret as only the candidate's name is revealed but not the voter who wrote it so it's not always clear, especially to the public, if such agreements are there and if a party or a group of voters actually comply with them during a ballot.

For these reasons, during the ballots, there could be votes for public figures not related to politics (actors, singers, soccer players for example or even fictitious characters) or non-feasible candidates.

Those kinds of votes are not fully beyond a political strategy, considering they're secret and that the first ballots require a larger winning majority.

This prevents any officeholder from being reelected by the same houses, which have a five-year mandate, also granting some freedom from excessive political ties to the appointing body.

The president's term may end prematurely by voluntary resignation, death in office, permanent disability due to serious illness, or impeachment and conviction for the crimes of high treason or attack on the Constitution.

Mattarella felt that Savona's Euroscepticism would endanger Italy's relationship with the EU; he took the line that as the guardian of the Constitution, he could not allow this to happen.