The Spanish right on Wednesday claimed the government’s mass regularisation of undocumented migrants is an attempt to boost the electoral roll, despite the fact that beneficiaries won’t be able to vote in the next election.
The Spanish opposition has leaned into a theory that the government’s recent blanket regularisation of over up to 800,000 undocumented migrants is a ploy to “alter the electoral register” in its favour.
The claim, previously promoted by far-right Vox, stirs up fears of a supposed massive increase in the electoral roll as a result of the regularisation, something, presumably, that the Spanish right fears would favour the governing Socialists (PSOE). But this isn’t the case.
PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo stated on Wednesday that the Sánchez government “has no right to increase the electoral roll by more than 800,000 people”, despite the fact that any undocumented migrants who might benefit from the measure will not be able to vote in the next elections, whether municipal votes or general election scheduled for 2027.
Q&A: How Spain’s mass regularisation of undocumented migrants will work
Madrid President Isabel Díaz Ayuso has gone further and described the regularisation of migrants as “a trap” that “could alter the electoral roll”.
Spain’s government recently approved a decree which will give at least 500,000 undocumented migrants the right to work and reside in the country. But according to the Funcas think-tank around 840,000 undocumented migrants lived in Spain at the beginning of January 2025.
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As a general rule, immigrants who obtain a residence permit have to wait five years before they can apply for the right to vote, and they will only be able to exercise this right in municipal elections, and not all of them, but only those who come from countries with a reciprocity agreement with Spain.
However, migrants from Latin American countries, Andorra, the Philippines, Equatorial Guinea or Sephardic Jews can apply for Spanish nationality after two years of residence, which will entitle them to vote in general elections, though the process often takes far longer in reality.
The standard waiting time for Spanish citizenship via residency is ten years for other foreigners.
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Writing in El País, PP expert Elsa García de Blas notes that “in any case, neither group would be eligible to vote in the 2027 elections” but the measure, PP sources tell de Blas, has a clear “electoral and electioneering objective” for the future, they feel.
Feijóo also claimed that the regularisation will have a “pull effect”, something not borne out by the evidence of several previous mass regularisations by Spanish governments, including those by the PP. All governments since the restoration of democracy, except for Rajoy’s, have approved mass regularisations of illegal immigrants.
This includes the PP Prime Minister José María Aznar, who in 2000 and 2001 allowed 503,000 migrants to regularise their situation.
Linking the regularisation to ongoing naturalisations via the so-called Grandchildren’s Law, Feijóo added: “The government has no right to increase the census by more than two million people with the Grandchildren’s Law and by regularising the immigration of more than 800,000 people”.
The PP leader also criticised the government for approving the measure by decree rather than a vote, saying that it “goes against the majority in Congress and against agreed European policy” and urging Sánchez to “take it to Congress, for debate and a vote”.
His party has already asked Brussels to analyse whether it contravenes EU migration policy agreements and whether a measure of this scope can legally be applied across the board or must be done on a case-by-case basis.
READ ALSO: Most undocumented migrants in Spain not Africans arriving on boats
In recent months, Feijóo has sought to portray his party as the sensible choice for “organised” migration in Spain, not as lenient as the Socialists and not as anti-immigration as Vox.
The Spanish far-right party have been rising in the polls and taking votes from the centre-right Partido Popular, which may explain why the PP has been proposing tougher migration laws, ranging from introducing an Australian-style points-based visa system, to not offering permanent residency to migrants without proof of integration in Spain.
READ MORE: The 10 migration laws that will impact foreigners if Spain’s PP reaches power
