MEP Ilaria Salis Denounces 'Intimidating' Police Check in Rome Hotel Room

Italian MEP Ilaria Salis was subjected to a police check lasting approximately one hour in her Rome hotel room at 7:30 a.m. on March 28, 2026, hours before a planned national "No Kings" demonstration, triggering a sharp dispute between her party and Italian authorities over the nature and legality of the intervention. Salis, who represents Alleanza Verdi e Sinistra in the European Parliament, said two officers arrived directly at her hotel room door without any prior notice from reception and proceeded to question her for nearly an hour despite her immediately presenting her credentials. She described feeling "shaken and bewildered" by the experience. The Rome Police Headquarters responded swiftly, stating the check was a mandatory act triggered by a Schengen alert entered by Germany in early March and was entirely unrelated to the afternoon demonstration. The two accounts diverge sharply on several key points, including what questions were asked and whether the officers entered the room.

Salis says officers asked about march and dangerous objects Salis gave a detailed account of the exchange to multiple outlets, including Corriere della Sera and Fanpage.it, disputing the Police Headquarters' characterization of the intervention as a routine document check. She said officers asked her directly whether she intended to participate in the demonstration that day, whether she had taken part in other demonstrations in the past, and whether she was carrying any dangerous objects. „They asked me if I had dangerous objects, I replied: books, I don't know if they can be considered dangerous objects” — Ilaria Salis via Fanpage.it Salis also questioned the timing of the check, noting she had arrived in Rome on Thursday evening and had already spent one night in the same hotel without any police contact. „If there is a report for which they had to check me, why didn't they come on Friday morning and come today? The hotel should transmit where I am in real time, so it doesn't add up to me” — Ilaria Salis via Fanpage.it She concluded that the episode amounted to intimidation, adding that if such checks could be carried out on a sitting MEP, they could be carried out on any citizen exercising the right to protest. On social media, Salis wrote that Italy had become "a police state" and urged supporters to attend the 2 p.m. rally at Piazza della Repubblica.

Police Headquarters insists Schengen alert left no room for discretion The Rome Police Headquarters, led by Police Chief Roberto Massucci, issued a formal statement categorically rejecting any link between the check and the "No Kings" demonstration or recent public order legislation. The Questura stated that the intervention "originates, as a duty-bound act, from a report coming from a third country in the European panorama, which leaves no margin of discretion in the procedures required of the Italian authorities," identifying Germany as the source of the alert. According to the Questura, officers limited themselves to requesting documents from Salis and the person accompanying her, and halted all checks the moment they identified her as an MEP, without entering the hotel room and without conducting any search. The statement added that "in no case and in no way can the identification be linked to the recent regulations approved on public order." AVS leaders Angelo Bonelli and Nicola Fratoianni met with Massucci in person to seek clarification and acknowledged his assurance that the check was unconnected to the march, calling that finding "positive news." However, they maintained that the episode remained serious regardless of its origin, arguing it violated Article 68 of the Italian Constitution and the parliamentary prerogatives of a sitting MEP. „What happened is of unheard-of gravity and violates Article 68 of the Constitution and the constitutional guarantees of an Italian MEP” — Angelo Bonelli and Nicola Fratoianni via ANSA

AVS demands government act to shield Salis from German alert Bonelli and Fratoianni directed their criticism not only at the police but at the Italian government, demanding to know why Interior Minister Marco Piantedosi had not intervened with the German government to protect Salis's parliamentary immunity before the alert was acted upon. „We ask Minister Piantedosi and the Government for the reason why it did not intervene with the German government to remind and protect the prerogatives of a parliamentarian” — Angelo Bonelli and Nicola Fratoianni via ANSA The AVS leaders called on the government to announce concrete steps to engage Berlin and ensure that Salis's constitutional guarantees are respected going forward. Salis herself noted the broader implications of the episode, warning that if a Schengen alert from a foreign state can trigger a dawn check on a sitting MEP without prior notification to Italian authorities or to the parliamentarian herself, the same mechanism could be used against any member of the European Parliament. Salis was arrested in Budapest in February 2023 on charges of assaulting neo-Nazi activists during a demonstration. She spent approximately 16 months in detention in Hungary before her election to the European Parliament in June 2024 secured her release. In October 2025, the Strasbourg plenary confirmed her parliamentary immunity by a single-vote margin, a decision Salis described as a victory for antifascist Europe. European parliamentary immunity is designed, under EU treaty provisions, to protect MEPs from arbitrary political persecution and to guarantee the free exercise of their mandate. The incident unfolded on the same day as the national "No Kings" demonstration in Rome, a large-scale protest whose name and timing added political weight to the confrontation between Salis and Italian authorities, even as the Questura insisted the two events were entirely unconnected.