Italy’s Meloni Has the Best Response to Europe’s Riots: Hold Rioters and Parents Accountable

Italy’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, is the one European leader who has shown the spine necessary to save her country from the riots running rampant across the continent. After the violence of October 17–18, Meloni delivered a powerful televised address condemning protests that had crossed the line into chaos and criminality.

Meloni approved a decree imposing up to five years in prison and fines of up to €20,000 for violent participation in demonstrations. It also holds parents financially liable for damage caused by their children, extends preventive detention to minors, and sends 500 additional soldiers to Milan.

The two nights of rioting in Milan’s Piazza Duomo that prompted the decree began with a demonstration organized by Italia in Piazza (Italy in the Squares). It drew more than 5,000 people protesting fuel prices, low wages, taxes, and conditions in public schools and healthcare.

Rioters looted shops, including Foot Locker, Decathlon, and a Carrefour supermarket. They set barricades on fire, attacked police, disrupted public transport, and smashed bus shelters and windows in historic buildings. Police fired 484 tear gas canisters on Saturday alone, and authorities said more than 100 officers were injured in Milan over the two days.

Losses to Milan shopkeepers exceeded half a million euros, and stores in the city’s luxury district began boarding up their windows for fear of another night of destruction. Clashes also took place in Bologna, Brescia, Bergamo, and Turin.

But the most disturbing detail was the age of those involved. Teenagers were being drawn into street violence organized and amplified through social media, mainly TikTok and Instagram. Of those detained in Milan, 220 of 271, or about 81%, were minors.

On Sunday, October 18, Meloni called a public-order summit for the following day at Palazzo Chigi, the prime minister’s office. Participants included Deputy Prime Ministers Matteo Salvini and Antonio Tajani, Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi, Defense Minister Guido Crosetto, and the heads of the police, the Carabinieri, the Guardia di Finanza (financial police), and the intelligence services. The Council of Ministers approved the decree on Tuesday, October 20.

In a social media video, Meloni said half of the 330 people arrested across Italy were of foreign origin, “born abroad or born in Italy to foreign families.” Hundreds of very young people, many of them minors, had arrived in small groups, “summoned by a video on social media,” she said. The youngest person identified in Milan was 11.

Her measures begin with up to five years in prison for violent participation in demonstrations.  Meloni said it applies to anyone in a group of five or more who throws stones, firecrackers, or sticks, and penalties increase for those who are masked. The decree adds massive fines of €10,000 to €20,000 and up to twelve years for organizers, including those who organize online.

Parents are financially responsible for damage caused by their children. “If the one who breaks is a minor, his parents pay,” Meloni said. She added that “whoever suffered the damage can claim against everything, against that family’s assets.”

Parents also face administrative fines of €500 to €1,000, doubled for repeat offenses. Property owners can ask a judge to issue a “decreto ingiuntivo immediatamente esecutivo,” or an immediately enforceable payment order.

The decree also extends preventive detention powers to dangerous minors and changes how criminal responsibility is assessed for those aged 14 to 18. Meloni said that currently, “for a boy between 14 and 18, the state must prove every time that he was able to understand.” Under the decree, that capacity is presumed “unless proven otherwise.”

The decree sends 500 additional soldiers to Milan until the end of the year. Salvini posted, “Dalle parole ai fatti: 500 militari in più per difendere Milano” (“From words to deeds: 500 more soldiers to defend Milan”).

A proposal to give soldiers arrest powers was dropped after objections from President Sergio Mattarella’s office. A proposed curfew was also dropped.

One difference between European and American culture is that in Italy, protests are a routine part of life, with various groups and organizations demonstrating regularly. Meloni, however, drew a clear line between the right to protest and acts of violence. “Protest is a right. Burning cities is not,” she said.

She also made clear that being a juvenile was no excuse. “Being 16 does not give you permission to destroy someone’s shop.” She continued, “We cannot allow young people to grow up thinking that smashing a shop window is a way to earn respect. Calling yourself a protester does not magically turn looting into democracy.”

Finally, Meloni warned, “If parents allow minors to repeatedly participate in destruction, Italy is now saying the financial consequences will land squarely in their living room.”

The rest of Europe needs this approach, and Democrats in the United States should follow Meloni’s example by tightening the rules against rioting and looting and trying more teenagers as adults in cases where they should have known better. Meanwhile, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani is hindering the NYPD’s ability to counter riots, as detailed in The Gateway Pundit.

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