The constitutionalist Alfonso Celotto, professor of Constitutional Law at Roma Tre University and one of the most anticipated names by legal experts following the debate on the new Italian citizenship law, used only two minutes and thirty-two seconds of speaking time at the Constitutional Court’s public hearing on Tuesday (9). Instead of going through the multiple points raised by the remission ordinances, Celotto chose to concentrate his argument on a single case: that of a minor born in Italy who, with the legislative change, lost his citizenship without ever having been able to express any will about it.
"Here we have a kind of automatic mass revocation of citizenship," he stated, quoting the words of... Courts of Turin and Campobasso to describe the impact of the regulation. According to Celotto, the legislation left behind "a series of interests, expectations, legitimate trusts and rights," with consequences that will result in numerous lawsuits. The oral argument, lasting two and a half minutes, was presented in a different way from the written defense that the team had filed days before.
The Mantua case and article 22
Celotto focused his intervention on the case originating from the Mantua Court, which involves a child. For him, the situation is distinct from that of adults who were waiting for or had already scheduled consular appointments, a system he himself called "a crazy system," referring to the long waiting lines at consulates and embassies.
In the case of the minor, the constitutional expert argued that the rule transforms a fundamental and imprescriptible right, citizenship, into a weakened legitimate interest. Celotto invoked the Article 22 of the Italian Constitution, which prohibits the deprivation of citizenship for political reasons, describing it as "one of the parameters most rarely invoked" before the Court.
The argument also relies on the recent decision of the Superior Court of Cassation, Ordinance 13.818, published after the Sentence 63/2026, in which the Court of Cassation reaffirmed citizenship as a "subjective right of primary importance," with even greater weight when it concerns a minor who was born Italian and who finds himself deprived of this right without ever having been able to exercise it.
In conclusion, Celotto asked the Court to reassess the issues raised, acknowledging that Sentence 63/2026 "provides a framework for all these issues," but arguing that the automatic loss of citizenship in the case of minors specifically violates Article 22 of the Constitution.
The Court did not issue a ruling during the session.
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