Italy’s pro-migrant opposition is doing everything in its power to grant citizenship to another 2.5 million people.

On 8–9 June, Italy will hold a referendum on whether to halve the waiting period for foreign nationals applying for Italian citizenship. If the reform is approved, the required residency period will be reduced to five years, potentially allowing around 2.5 million foreign nationals to obtain citizenship.

The referendum was initiated after opposition parties and pro-migrant organisations—including Oxfam Italia—collected more than 500,000 signatures last September, reaching the legal threshold required to call a public vote.

Despite strong resistance from the ruling Brothers of Italy (FdI) party, led by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, the government was forced to schedule the vote after the Constitutional Court had ruled in January that the proposal was admissible. Currently, foreign nationals must reside in Italy for at least ten years before they can apply for citizenship through naturalisation. Children born in Italy to foreign parents are also not eligible for citizenship until they turn 18.

Supporters of the reform argue that the current system is restrictive and inconsistent with the practices of other European countries, such as Germany, the United Kingdom, Spain, and Portugal, where the naturalisation process typically takes five years. In France, naturalisation is granted after two to five years, depending on individual circumstances.

The proposal has sparked fierce debate within the Italian government. Prime Minister Meloni, who came to power in 2022 on an anti-immigration platform, has consistently opposed changing the citizenship law, calling the ten-year requirement “the appropriate period for acquiring citizenship.” Matteo Salvini, deputy prime minister and leader of the League party, shares this position.

However, the issue has caused tensions within the governing coalition. Antonio Tajani, leader of the centre-right Forza Italia party and also deputy prime minister, proposed an alternative last year. Under his plan, children would be eligible for citizenship before turning 18 if they had continuously studied in the national education system for ten years.

For the referendum proposal to pass, voter turnout must exceed 50 plus one per cent of eligible Italian voters, and a simple majority is required. In order to boost turnout, supporters of the change pushed for the vote to be held on the same day as the local elections on 25–26 May. However, the government exercised its right to schedule the referendum for a different date.