He was elected Deputy in the 2013 Italian general election and from 7 May 2013 to 20 July 2015 he was Vice-President of the 1st Committee (Constitutional Affairs of the Council Presidency and Interior) of the Chamber of Deputies, while subsequently he became a member of the "Standing Committee of the opinions" and of the council for the regulation of the Chamber.

[2] Since the inauguration of the government in June 2018, Toninelli has often been the handle to which the Parliamentary opposition clung to define the Conte Cabinet as "unprepared" and "incompetent".

In September 2018, in the report to the Chambers, Toninelli denounced "pressures" he suffered from "AISCAT" (Italian association of motorway companies and tunnels) not to publish "the motorway concession contracts and all related annexes", with the opposition calling him for better clarity; two days later Toninelli presented the offending documents, which however proved to be issued in months of January and March and addressed to his predecessor, Graziano Delrio.

[3] Later that same month, Toninelli announced the decree on the reconstruction of Ponte Morandi, after its partial collapse that killed 43 people, proposing the idea of a "livable bridge where to eat and have fun"—definition that has left many colleagues confused and Genoa people offended.

[4] In October 2018 Toninelli spoke about the "sectoral limitations by South Tyrol authorities that strongly damage the economy of Italy" referring to the Brenner Pass, which however he erroneously called multiple times as the "Brenner Tunnel".