Kamilla Galicz (Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies)
Citizenship Suspension from the Fundamental Law to the Citizenship Act
On 14 April 2025, the Hungarian Parliament approved the 15th amendment of the Fundamental Law, which introduced the notion of ‘citizenship suspension’. Two months later, on 11 June, the Parliament amended the Citizenship Act to lay down a detailed procedure for suspending the Hungarian citizenship of those naturalised dual citizens who are deemed to pose a threat to public order, public or national security. Building on the critiques published here and elsewhere (here and here), this post aims to make two contributions. First, it will critically analyse the new procedure that entered into force on 30 June. Second, zooming out to the broader context, it will contribute to the academic debate on the securitisation of citizenship and highlight how citizenship suspension is weaponised as a legal instrument by an illiberal democracy.
The Procedure in a Nutshell
In contrast with previous reforms that have concerned citizenship acquisition, the Amendment Act introduces new sub-sections 9/A-E to the Citizenship Act on the rules of suspension. The new measure exclusively concerns naturalised Hungarian citizens who also hold the citizenship of a third country. In other words, those risking statelessness and citizens of other EU and EEA Member States (including nationals of EU candidate countries) are exempted. The Hungarian citizenship of naturalised dual citizens may be suspended upon two cumulative conditions: first, the person’s conduct is deemed to pose a threat to Hungary’s public order, public or national security; second, the suspension is proportionate to the seriousness of such a threat and the legal and social status of the person concerned. The law envisages a non-exhaustive list of four types of conduct:
- engagement in foreign military or public service (the law exempts those who are forcibly taken or serve for an allied state or whose service is not likely to pose a threat by nature);
- activities against Hungary’s sovereignty, constitutional order or national security in the representation, mandate, or interest of a foreign power or foreign organisation;
- contacts with entities classified as terrorist organisations under international law,
- conviction of certain crimes by final judgment (e.g. crimes against humanity, crimes against the constitutional order, terrorism-related crimes).
The procedure shall be initiated ex officio by the Minister of Justice, appointed by Government Decree No. 175/2025 of 30 June. Nevertheless, anyone may submit notifications in relation to naturalised dual citizens deemed dangerous. The minister shall assess the seriousness, frequency and consciousness of the conduct and whether the suspension is necessary and proportionate taking into account the person’s effective ties to Hungary, including the suspension’s impact on his/her private and family life, and – if the suspension is based on criminal conviction or dangerous conduct – the time passed since the conviction or the display of such conduct and the person’s individual circumstances at the time of suspension. These criteria shall guide the decision concerning the period of suspension (maximum 10 years).
During the investigation, the minister may ask the opinion of the police or the National Information Centre. If it is not sufficiently proven that the person concerned has another citizenship, the minister shall ask him/her to make a declaration in this regard. The person may produce an official certificate that (s)he has no other citizenship (hence, suspension would make him/her stateless); otherwise, the existence of another citizenship is presumed. Appeals shall be lodged to the Supreme Court (Kúria) within 30 days from the final decision and are examined by a panel composed of five judges. According to the amendment of Act No. XC of 2023 on the entry and stay of third-country nationals, the person whose citizenship is thus suspended shall be expelled. Finally, the law envisages two ways for citizenship restoration: upon request, to lodge only once during suspension (if the person proves no longer to pose a threat to public order or public security, or /s/he has become stateless in the meantime) or automatically (if suspension is over and the person’s citizenship has not yet been restored).
Pitfalls of the New Suspension Procedure
The most problematic aspects of citizenship suspension, as included in the amended Citizenship Act, are the grounds and exceptions, the fragile balancing between the competent minister’s discretionary powers and the proportionality test, and the dubious effectiveness of due process guarantees.
Generating different classes of citizens
As regards its personal scope, suspension intends to prevent risks of statelessness compared to other national laws that do not confine citizenship revocation to dual citizens (such as the 2014 UK reform or the 2018 Italian Security Decree I). Nevertheless, it distinguishes not only between those who hold Hungarian citizenship by birth and those who have acquired it by means of naturalisation, but also within the latter group, i.e. between naturalised citizens of European and non-European origins. By creating a hierarchy of statuses, the new rules violate the principle of non-discrimination, which underpins international human rights standards enshrined, for instance, in Articles 2 and 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 9 of the Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, or Article 5 of the European Convention on Nationality. The differential treatment of third-country nationals by the amended Citizenship Act reflects the country’s well-known anti-immigration policy agenda and raises difficult questions on the legal nature of suspension and its effects.
In this regard, the drafting history of the amendment gives us some hints: the third preambular recital of the original proposal of 1 April established that “the law guarantees procedural transparency; decisions on the abolition of citizenship shall be published in the Annex of the Official Gazette (…).” (emphasis added) Whether the term «abolition» was a typo error or a Freudian slip remains a secret, for it was replaced with «suspension» by the revised proposal of 15 April. But what is citizenship suspension? Based on the list of conduct, one may rightfully ask whether this “both unprecedented and barely intelligible” legal instrument may be conceptualised as a disguised form of deprivation which targets naturalised dual citizens of non-European origins.
Indeed, like other national laws on citizenship deprivation (e.g., in France, Belgium or Germany) or the 2025 June memorandum of the Trump II administration on prioritising denaturalisation, suspension aims to remove – albeit temporarily – from the polity those who serve in a foreign state, have been convicted of serious crimes, including terrorism-related offences, or have ‘contacts’ with terrorist organisations. This last example was absent from the drafts and potentially covers the most remote forms of even involuntary or forced connections. The conducts suggest that citizenship suspension – like deprivation – is essentially “a technique for extending the functionality of immigration law in counter-terrorism” (as argued by Macklin). As regards its effects, two readings may be put forward. On the one hand, suspension may be seen as a sui generis sanction for past wrongdoings, which discriminates naturalised dual citizens vis-à-vis ‘ordinary’ citizens convicted of the very same crimes. On the other hand, it may be understood as a future-oriented measure to prevent someone’s unlimited entry, stay and freedom of movement by banishing them for a certain period of time. Ultimately, both conceptualisations raise an issue of international relations: notwithstanding the sovereign right to immigration control, it is contestable whether by suspension (or by revocation) the state may shoulder its responsibility for its unwanted citizens upon other states and the international community (as pointed out by Hailbronner and Bauböck).
One last remark on the material scope is in order. Compared to the conduct discussed above, activities against Hungary’s sovereignty, constitutional order or national security in the representation, mandate, or interest of a foreign power or organisation are even harder to concretise. Again, the drafting history elucidates the lawmaker’s intent: the original proposal envisaged suspension against someone who works for foreign actors “in a way incompatible with Hungarian citizenship.” Although incompatibility has been deleted, the final wording remains very vague, and the overall list is non-exhaustive. Hence, the provision provides ample margin to the executive to weaponise it against its political opponents, judges, journalists, civil society organisations and activists “financed by the West with corrupt dollars.” This leads to the next thorny issue: the limits of discretion and due process guarantees.
Limited Due Process Safeguards
The final text subjects the minister’s decision to a mandatory assessment of the sanctionable conduct and the necessity and proportionality of suspension based on multiple elements. Plus, the decision shall contain a detailed explanation of the legal basis, grounds and proof of suspension. Not included in the drafts, these criteria apparently seek to mitigate the highly discretionary nature of suspension by formally complying with Article 8 (4) of the Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, Articles 10-12 of the European Convention on Nationality, the Strasbourg Court’s case law (e.g., Ghoumid and Others v. France) or the – non-binding – Principles on Deprivation of Nationality as a National Security Measure. Nevertheless, they do not address the discriminatory treatment of third-country nationals highlighted above, and the entire procedure suffers from several black holes.
To start with, the minister may decide not to notify the person concerned about the launch of the investigation on public or national security grounds. Furthermore, it is not clear how personal data will be protected, and the minister’s powers and the involvement of the police and one of the (many) intelligence services are not precisely circumscribed. Intriguingly, the rules do not refer to the Sovereignty Office (the organ entrusted with the task of defending state sovereignty), which seems a strategic move to maintain a façade of EU compliance. By contrast, the fact that anyone may hand over information regarding naturalised dual citizens, based on which to launch the investigation, is alarming and might potentially lead to the resurgence of a denunciation culture that flourished in the socialist era.
The law does not sufficiently ensure the person’s right to information during the investigation and limits his/her involvement to submitting information upon the minister’s request. In particular, if there are substantial grounds but no final proof that the person is a dual citizen, the minister shall ask him/her to make a declaration. Unless the person declares to have another citizenship or proves the lack of it with an official certificate, the second citizenship is presumed. It is dubious how these convoluted rules will protect someone from situations of de jure and, more problematically, de facto statelessness. Plus, time limits are tight to make such a declaration (at least 5 days) and to lodge an appeal (30 days) and do not take into account the lengthy procedures to obtain official certificates from foreign authorities outside Europe. Likewise, the Supreme Court is bound to a 30-day deadline to rule on the appeal, and the scope of its review is limited to upholding or quashing the minister’s decision, as the law explicitly states that the Court has no powers to amend it. Overall, the effectiveness of due process safeguards is disputable, while the rules on citizenship restoration seem to be a lipstick on a pig.
Suspension, Securitisation and Democratic Backsliding
So, how does the Hungarian suspension procedure relate to citizenship revocation grounds increasingly prevalent across Europe? One may still argue that citizenship suspension is less problematic compared to other laws on deprivation or revocation: it is temporary, protects against statelessness, foresees guarantees and has effect from the final decision (cf. a recent UK proposal that would retroactively provide that an order of citizenship deprivation continues to have effect throughout the appeal stage). So, too much ado about nothing?
In my view, such a benevolent reading of the Hungarian citizenship suspension procedure would be misleading for at least two reasons. First, the critical analysis of the procedure and the lack of safeguards suggest that what is presented as suspension in fact amounts to revocation in disguise. Second, if assessed not only within domestic immigration law, but more generally within Hungary’s democratic backsliding, citizenship suspension is a further piece of the not-so-bad law of an illiberal democracy that formally complies with rule of law standards but is basically built on their systemic cheating. Hence, the fears of its instrumentalisation by a regime that is increasingly turning into an autocracy seem well-founded. Zooming out, the Hungarian suspension procedure, as well as the UK proposal on the retroactive effect of denaturalisation orders and the US memo on citizenship stripping for criminal conviction may be contextualised within the global trend of securitisation: conditions of (temporary or permanent) loss of status are attached to a state-imposed vision of the ‘good citizen’ and go hand in hand with immigration restrictions adopted on similar grounds. Citizenship is thus conceptualised in terms of ‘deservingness’, i.e., as a privilege to be a member of a (political) community that is increasingly harder to get but easier to lose.
The developments across Europe and in Hungary raise the uneasy question whether it is time for Europe (and the West) to seriously reflect on the state of democracy. After all, citizenship is an entry ticket for democratic participation; so, by changing the rules on who is in or out, we change the rules of democracy.
I would like to thank Maarten Vink and the GLOBALCIT Team for the comments and support to publish this post, as well as Giacomo Delledonne and Gábor Mészáros for their suggestions on the first draft.