Estimates from migration think tanks show that the vast majority of those set to benefit from Spain’s migrant regularisation are Latin American, data that somewhat debunks misinformation about the measure.
Almost 90 percent of the undocumented migrants that will regularise their legal situation in Spain via the mass amnesty are Latin Americans, new data has revealed.
This goes directly against assumptions and misconceptions — many propagated by the international media — that the measure will gift residency rights to undocumented migrants who are mostly African and arrived in small boats.
Read a full breakdown of The Local’s myth buster on the measure here.
The amnesty will see between 500,000 and 800,000 undocumented migrants in Spain given residency and employment rights via an initial one year residency permit.
READ ALSO: GUIDE – How to apply for Spain’s migrant regularisation
“These figures debunk the alarmist narrative that Spain is being ‘Islamised’, that large numbers of people from other religions and cultures are going to arrive… when the reality is that the proportion of Christians among Spanish speakers is much higher than the national average. They didn’t arrive in small boats, they came to Spain via Barajas airport on tourist visas and have stayed here, becoming undocumented migrants,” Jorge Serrano, director of the Global Citizenship Foundation (GCF), explained to Spanish outlet 20 Minutos.
The organisation made the estimates after gathering data from the Funcas think tank and Spain’s National Institute of Statistics (INE). They show that almost nine out of ten migrants whose status will be regularised under the government’s new decree will be Latin American.
Most come from Colombia, which almost doubles the number of the second largest group, which is Peru.
They are followed by Honduras and Venezuela, although a significant number of regularisations are also expected among the Moroccan and Algerian populations.
In total Latin America accounts for the vast majority, with 86 percent of the total. One in three (around 170,000) residency permits will be granted to Colombian citizens, 12 percent (60,000) to those from Peru and around 10 percent (50,000) to those from Honduras.
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Venezuela (35,000 regularisations), Paraguay (30,000) and Argentina (25,000) also account for a significant proportion.
By contrast, Moroccan applicants account for just 2.9 percent of regularisations and Algerians make up 1.9 percent. Senegal accounts for around 0.4 percent.
Asian countries represent approximately 2.6 percent of the total, with applicants evenly distributed among countries such as China, Pakistan, India and the Philippines, none of which individually exceeds 1 percent of the total.
Similarly, estimates suggest that the process will not be as lenient as its critics portray it as.
Bearing in mind that migrants who arrived in Spain after January 1st 2026 are excluded from the scheme, combined with “the difficulties in obtaining the required documentation” within the application window, the GCF estimates an “effectiveness” rate of around 60 percent of total applicants.
In other words: six out of ten undocumented migrants in Spain will be able to get papers as a result of the mass regularisation.
READ ALSO: Q&A – How Spain’s mass regularisation of undocumented migrants will work
