Why are naturalised citizens being barred from voting in Spain’s election?
Spain’s Supreme Court has ruled that tens of thousands of foreign-based naturalised citizens will not be able to vote in the upcoming general election. Find out why, who exactly this affects and whether it will have an impact on who wins.
Q: What exactly has Spain’s Supreme Court ruled?
A: Spain’s Supreme Court has upheld the suspension of the voting rights of many overseas nationals who obtained Spanish citizenship under the Grandchildren’s Law. This leaves no further room for appeal for Spain’s Socialist government and means that only people directly affected by the court’s decision will be able to individually get their voting rights reinstated through the courts.
Q: What is the Grandchildren’s Law?
A: Spain’s left-wing government passed a law in 2022 that granted nationality to the descendants of Spaniards who fled the country during the 1936-1939 Civil War and part of General Franco’s 1939-1975 dictatorship. Initially it covered the descendants of Spaniards who were forced into exile due to political, ideological, sexual orientation or identity reasons, but later on the law was tweaked to presume that all all Spaniards who left the country between 1936 and 1955 were exiles.
Although not all these citizenship applications have yet been processed, it is estimated that over 2.4 million foreigners have applied for Spanish nationality via this route.
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Q: Why has this happened?
Vox and the lesser-known Spanish political party Iustitia Europa were the first to call for the suspension of the voting rights of these naturalised citizens, claiming that extending citizenship to the descendants of exiled Spaniards inflates the electoral roll, to the advantage of Spain’s ruling Socialists.
They took the matter to Spain’s Supreme Court, which ordered a temporary suspension on voting rights to those who couldn’t prove they were the descendants of exiled Spaniards, a ruling which has now been further confirmed after an appeal by Pedro Sánchez’s government for the ban to be lifted was shot down on October 12th.
Q: What does this mean in practice?
A: It means that anyone naturalised under the Grandchildren’s Law who doesn’t reside in Spain and hasn’t provided individualised proof that their direct relatives suffered exile for political, ideological, religious or sexual orientation reasons, will not have the right to vote in Spanish general elections.
Q: How many people will not be able to vote?
A: The ruling doesn’t affect all of those who have gained Spanish citizenship through the Grandchildren’s Law. The suspension of voting rights affects those registered overseas in the CERA register (Electoral Census of Absent Residents) and who obtained nationality under the general presumption of exile and not via documentary evidence.
According to government data, more than 163,000 naturalised Spanish citizens will not be able to vote.
Q: Why does this matter now more than ever?
Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has called a snap election for November 29th, making the Supreme Court’s decision immediately influential, at first glance.
In truth, it doesn’t necessarily mean that Spain’s ruling Socialists will lose 163,000 votes as a result.
In fact, previous overseas electoral data shows that many naturalised Spanish citizens abroad choose not to vote at all, with a turnout often under 10 percent in general elections.
