On June 25, 2025, Judge Fabrizio Alessandria of the Tribunal of Turin issued Ordinanza n. 167/2025, the first constitutional challenge to D.L. 36/2025 itself. Unlike the earlier Bologna referral, which questioned whether unlimited ius sanguinis was constitutional, the Turin referral asked the opposite question: whether the government’s retroactive restriction of an already-acquired right was constitutional. It proposed a surgical fix that would preserve the reform’s prospective limits while striking down the retroactive mechanism.
The Case
The case before Judge Alessandria involved Maria Eugenia Escovar Alvarado and other petitioners (R.G. 6648/2025), who sought recognition of their Italian citizenship against the Ministry of the Interior. The case was filed after D.L. 36/2025 had already entered into force, making the petitioners subject to the new restrictions.
Rather than simply applying the new law and dismissing the case, Judge Alessandria conducted a detailed constitutional analysis and concluded that the retroactive mechanism of Article 3-bis raised serious constitutional doubts. He referred the question to the Constitutional Court.
The Constitutional Arguments
The Turin referral formally invoked three articles of the Constitution:
Article 2 (inviolable rights of the person): Citizenship as an expression of personal identity and legal status constitutes a right that the Republic is bound to recognize and guarantee.
Article 3 (equality and reasonableness): The retroactive mechanism treats identically situated persons differently based solely on whether they filed a lawsuit before an unknowable deadline, an arbitrary distinction that lacks rational justification.
Article 117, paragraph 1 (international obligations): Italian law must conform to EU obligations and international commitments, including Articles 9 TUE and 20 TFUE (EU citizenship), Article 15(2) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and Article 3(2) of Protocol 4 to the ECHR.
The Proposed Remedy: Partial Unconstitutionality
The most significant element of the Turin referral was not just the identification of constitutional problems but the specific remedy proposed. Judge Alessandria asked the Constitutional Court to declare Article 3-bis unconstitutional only insofar as it includes the words “also before the date of entry into force of this article” (“anche prima della data di entrata in vigore del presente articolo”) and the conditions in letters a), a-bis), and b). This would preserve the two-generation limit as applied prospectively while striking the retroactive mechanism and the March 27 deadline. The judge also proposed requiring a reasonable transitional period of six to twelve months for affected individuals.
The EU Law Dimension
The Turin referral was notable for its extensive engagement with European Union law. Judge Alessandria cited the CJEU’s jurisprudence in Rottmann (C-135/08), Tjebbes (C-221/17), and the Danish citizenship case (C-689/21), all of which establish that member states must respect EU proportionality principles when their citizenship decisions affect EU citizenship rights.
He also cited the German precedent specifically: Germany’s 1999 reform to the Staatsangehorigkeitsgesetz introduced a generational limit comparable to Italy’s but applied it only to births after January 1, 2000, with no retroactive effect. This reform has been in force for over 25 years without legal challenge, demonstrating that a prospective-only approach is both legally defensible and practically workable.
The March 12, 2026 Ruling
The Constitutional Court heard the Turin referral on March 11, 2026 and issued a press release on March 12 stating that the questions were declared “partly unfounded and partly inadmissible.” The UDHR and ECHR parameters were specifically identified as inadmissible.
However, the full written judgment has not yet been published, and the press release does not explain how the core arguments under Articles 2, 3, and 117 (in relation to EU Treaty provisions) were resolved. The written motivations may contain critical guidance, including whether the Court engaged with the proposed partial unconstitutionality remedy.
Importantly, the Turin referral was the narrowest of several pending challenges. The Campobasso and Mantova referrals raise additional constitutional arguments not present in the Turin filing, and those proceedings continue independently.
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This article is provided for informational purposes and does not constitute legal advice. Last updated: March 21, 2026.