Key Facts

• The new Italian law, effective since May last year, restricts citizenship eligibility to people with a parent or grandparent who was an Italian citizen at birth and did not hold dual nationality.
• Sabrina Crawford was seeking citizenship based on her great-grandfather but the new law stopped her application process.
• The law was created to reduce citizenship claims with weak connections to Italy and to clear long waiting lists at Italian consulates.
• Allegations of illegal citizenship grants to Hezbollah members and “discount deals” for citizenship in Brazil prompted tougher rules.
• Millions of people in countries like the US, Brazil, and Argentina have Italian ancestry from emigrants who left in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
• Italy’s constitutional court upheld the law, but the supreme court is reviewing whether the new rules should apply retroactively.
• The legal argument centers on "ius sanguinis" (right of blood), which allows citizenship claims through ancestry dating back to Italy’s unification in 1861.
• Italy does not grant citizenship to children born there if their immigrant parents are not citizens, and a recent referendum to change this failed due to low voter turnout.