Hundreds of golden visa holders to sue over citizenship // More police accused of torturing vulnerable people // Huge problems remain in Leiria 100 days after storms
Portuguese news in English with Jorge Branco on Tuesday, May 12, 2026.
Hundreds of golden visa holders to sue over citizenship
More than 500 golden visa holders are set to sue Portugal over changes to the nationality law that will force them to wait years longer to become citizens, Expresso reports. North American lawyer Kevin Goff, who had six weeks left to wait under the old timeframe when the laws changed, said he felt like the rug had been pulled out from under him. Goff said he, his wife and children moved their lives to Portugal and started a fund building health clinics in the country’s interior. “Only I kept my end of the deal [with the government]. We feel betrayed, it was a trap,” he said. They’ll now have to wait eight years for citizenship because the new 10-year waiting period only applies from the day he received his residency card. That delay, caused by first SEF and then AIMA’s inability to comply with the legally mandated 90-day time limit to approve documentation, is just one of many complaints he and other golden visa holders have about the changes. One of the drivers of the legal action said those involved — mostly North American but also from other countries — simply wanted the Portuguese government to uphold its side of the contract, under which they expected citizenship within five years. Liberty Legal lawyer Madalena Monteiro said she was receiving inquiries daily from investors looking to take legal action.
Court rules stripping of citizenship unconstitutional
The Constitutional Court has again blocked the government’s attempt to allow naturalised citizens to be stripped of their citizenship for committing certain crimes, Público reports. The controversial measure was split out from the changes to the nationality law and instead passed through parliament as an addendum to the penal code. The judges unanimously rejected it on Friday, finding it violated the principles of equality and proportionality for creating a difference in law between those born Portuguese and those who earn the right to citizenship later in life. The law would have allowed judges to strip citizenship as an extra penalty for crimes — such as aggravated homicide, slavery, human trafficking, rape and sexual abuse and membership in a criminal or terrorist organisation — committed in the first 15 years as a Portuguese person. Such a law could only be considered proportional when applied to terrorism and crimes against the state, the judges noted.
