Catalan separatists voted to sever ties with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s Socialists, further weakening his minority government. Citing a “lack of will” from the Socialists, separatist Junts’ party leader Carles Puigdemont said Sánchez had failed to carry out the promises made in 2023 when he persuaded Junts’ seven lawmakers in the Spanish parliament to back his bid to remain in power. The break is dire for Sánchez, whose government has no hope of passing legislation without the support of Junts’ lawmakers. The prime minister has not been able to get a new budget approved since the start of this term and has instead governed with extensions of the 2022 budget and EU recovery cash. Without the backing of Catalan separatist lawmakers, the Socialists have no way to secure the additional funds needed to comply with U.S. President Donald Trump’s demands Madrid increase its defense spending. Puigdemont said the Socialists no longer “have the capacity to govern” and challenged Sánchez to explain how he intends to remain in power. But the exiled separatist leader appeared to reject teaming up with the center-right People’s Party and the far-right Vox group to back a censure motion to topple Sánchez outright. “We will not support any government that does not support Catalonia, this one or any other,” the separatist leader said, apparently ruling out collaboration with the parties, both of which are opposed to the separatist movement and its nationalist objectives. INCOMPLETE COMMITMENTS During his press conference in Perpignan, Puigdemont reprimanded Sánchez and his Socialist Party for failing to keep its promises. In exchange for Junts’ crucial support in 2023, the prime minister’s party committed to passing an amnesty law benefiting hundreds of separatists and other measures. While many of those vows — among them, new rules allowing the use of Catalan in the Spanish parliament — have been fulfilled, others are pending. The Spanish parliament passed the promised amnesty bill last year, but its full application has since been halted by the courts. Spain’s Supreme Court has specifically blocked Puigdemont — who fled Spain following the failed 2017 Catalan independence referendum and has since lived in exile in Waterloo, Belgium — from benefiting from the law, citing pending embezzlement charges. Carles Puigdemont said the Socialists no longer “have the capacity to govern.” | Gloria Sanchez/Getty Images The lack of change in his status quo is a source of deep frustration for the separatist leader, who in a 2024 interview with POLITICO said his greatest desire was to “go home to Girona, to enjoy my homeland and be with my wife and daughters … to lead a normal life that will allow me to become anonymous once again.” Puigdemont also cited the Socialists’ inability to get Catalan recognized as an official EU language as a reason for the break in relations. Spanish diplomats have spent the past two years lobbying counterparts in Brussels and national capitals and recently persuaded Germany to back the proposal. But numerous countries remain opposed to the idea, arguing the move would cost the EU millions of euros in new translation and interpretation fees and embolden Breton, Corsican or Russian-speaking minorities to seek similar recognition. The separatist leader added that the Sánchez government’s reluctance to give Catalonia jurisdiction over immigration within that region proved that although there might be “personal trust” between the Socialists and Junts’ representatives, “political trust” was lacking. Junts’ members are now called upon to either ratify or reject the executive committee’s decision in an internal consultation that concludes Thursday. The party’s supporters, who include Puigdemont’s most devoted followers, are expected to overwhelmingly back the move to break with the Socialists. Over the past two years Junts has hardly been an unwavering source of support for Sánchez’s weak minority government. The party has declined to back key bills and stressed that it is not part of the “progressive” coalition composed of the Socialists and the left-wing Sumar party, but rather a pragmatic partner that is solely focused on Catalonia’s interests. At a meeting of the Socialist Party leadership in Madrid on Monday, Sánchez insisted the party should “remain open to dialogue and willing to engage” with Junts. Following Puigdemont’s speech, Science and Universities Minister Diana Morant expressed doubts “Junts’ electorate voted in favor of letting Vox or the People’s Party govern” and said the Catalan separatists needed to “choose whether they want Spain to represent progress or regression.”

MADRID — With his conservative People’s Party comfortably ahead in polls and the Socialist-led government mired in scandals, Alberto Núñez Feijóo has never looked so close to becoming Spanish prime minister. In theory, Spain doesn’t need to hold a general election until 2027 but outrage over corruption investigations into the center-left party of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez is building to such a fever pitch that the country could well be heading for a snap election. This weekend, Feijóo will lead an extraordinary convention of his party in Madrid to confirm his position as leader and amplify the idea that he is ready to govern. “Let’s end this nightmare,” he told supporters as he lambasted Sánchez. “We just want to know when he’s going to sign his resignation letter.” Actually removing Sánchez, however, comes down to tight margins in parliamentary alliances. When grilled about why he had not brought a motion of no confidence in the battered government on June 18, Feijóo told Sánchez: “I don’t lack willingness, I lack four votes.” At the national level, most polls show the People’s Party (PP) leading Sánchez’s Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) by a clear margin — echoing the 2023 election. POLITICO’s Poll of Polls puts the PP on 34 percent and the Socialists on 27 percent. “Feijóo knows that it’s now or never, because I don’t think he’ll have another chance like this,” said Oriol Bartomeus, a political scientist at Barcelona’s Autonomous University.  Despite winning the most votes in 2023, Feijóo was unable to form a governing majority. Instead, Sánchez managed to bring together a broad coalition of allies — perhaps most critically a handful of small Catalan and Basque parties, which abhor the PP’s strident hostility to separatism and its willingness to engage with the far-right Vox. The pressures Feijóo faces in Madrid have pushed him to team up with forces further to the right, where he’s found strong allies in attacking the leftist government. Many polls suggest the PP and Vox could together win enough seats in an election to form a majority. But none of this means Feijóo will find it plain sailing to take power. His own party also has a corrupt image, while he faces stiff competition from within its ranks. Despite the woes of the Socialists, Feijóo may still lack sufficient support to build a governing alliance. While he certainly has a prime opportunity, nothing is guaranteed. SOCIALISTS UNDER SIEGE The most recent investigations into corruption have been a gift for Feijóo and his party, who describe the Sánchez government as “a mafia.” On June 12, Sánchez apologized to Spaniards for having trusted Santos Cerdán, his party’s No. 3, who was implicated by audio recordings in a kickbacks-for-contracts scheme. The affair also triggered an investigation into another former senior Socialist and Sánchez ally, José Luis Ábalos, who had been transport minister. Cerdán, who denies involvement in the scheme, has been placed in preventive custody. Alberto Núñez Feijóo, 63, took the reins of the conservative People’s Party in 2022 as a seasoned moderate who had won four elections in a row in the northwestern region of Galicia, a PP stronghold. | Carlos Lujan/Europa Press via Getty Images The recordings included sordid discussions about prostitutes and apparent evidence that Sánchez’s allies had rigged voting when he won the PSOE primary in 2014. Meanwhile, other recordings seemed to show party operative Leire Díez offering favorable treatment to a businessman in exchange for damaging information about the Civil Guard unit probing individuals close to Sánchez, including his wife and brother. Díez says she was gathering material for a book. Regardless of the revelations, the prime minister has refused to resign or bring forward elections, arguing that the scandals are isolated cases and that he is keeping an extremist opposition out of power.  As long as his delicate parliamentary majority remains in place, there is little Feijóo can do to oust him. SWINGING TOO FAR RIGHT? Feijóo, 63, took the reins of the party in 2022 as a seasoned moderate who had won four elections in a row in the northwestern region of Galicia, a PP stronghold.  He has launched fierce attacks on the government for its willingness to engage with separatists and push through an amnesty law to benefit the pro-independence Catalans, which form a critical part of the fragile Sánchez coalition.  Facing pressure from the right-wing media, Vox, and PP colleague Isabel Díaz Ayuso, president of the Madrid region and a potential competitor, Feijóo has variously described Sánchez as a caudillo — meaning “strongman,” a term used to refer to dictator Francisco Franco — “an international embarrassment” and “a veritable threat to democracy.” He has also taken this combative approach to Brussels, where the PP unsuccessfully tried to block the appointment of Spanish Socialist Teresa Ribera as European commissioner. In May, the PP successfully campaigned to thwart a Spanish government effort to make Catalan, Basque and Galician official EU languages — an important promise Sánchez made to the nationalist parties in his coalition. “Feijóo underwent a process of radicalization and now his position is one of a classic Madrid conservative leader,” said Bartomeus, who says he has still not won over many traditional PP voters. “But when you spend every moment warning of the apocalypse and then the apocalypse doesn’t come, you start to have a problem.” Frustrated, Feijóo has even floated the possibility Sánchez committed fraud in the 2023 general election. Pointing to apparent irregularities in the 2014 Socialist primary, he said: “If you’ve already robbed a jewelry store, why not rob a bank?” Such comments have drawn claims that the PP leader has strayed into the territory of Vox further to the right. “Feijóo is two interviews away from saying that the Earth is flat and vaccines kill,” said left-wing commentator Esther Palomera. NO STRANGERS TO SCANDAL The longer the famously resilient Sánchez digs in, the less time remains for Feijóo. That’s partly due to the high stock of two of his rivals in the PP: hardline maverick Ayuso and the moderate president of Andalusia, Juanma Moreno Bonilla, both seen as potential threats to take the leadership. The longer the famously resilient Pedro Sánchez digs in, the less time remains for Alberto Núñez Feijóo. | Magali Cohen/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images And that’s before we even get to the corruption problem within Feijóo’s own party. Sánchez took power in 2018 by removing the scandal-plagued PP of Mariano Rajoy from government. The judicial fallout from that era continues, with several cases involving conservative politicians still being processed.  In the spring of 2026, the “Operation Kitchen” case is due to come to trial, with former senior PP figures facing accusations of orchestrating a deep-state operation to destroy damaging evidence against the party. The trial could cement the idea that graft plagues both mainstream parties, bolstering the far right in polls. Meanwhile, the Socialists have reminded Spaniards of Feijóo’s former friendship with a notorious Galician drug trafficker, Marcial Dorado. In 2013, photos were published of the men on vacation together in the 1990s. Feijóo has never explained the circumstances of the relationship. Instead, he embraced the idea of being someone to whom success does not necessarily come easily. “Today, I tell you with all humility that I am better than the politician who achieves his objectives the first time around,” he said recently. Time is running out for him to prove that remains the case.

Catalans have had a heck of a ride the last decade. The Spanish region caught the world’s attention in 2017 when its politicians attempted to stage an illegal independence referendum. The national government in Madrid responded with a tough crackdown that saw half of the region’s leaders imprisoned and the rest fleeing to self-declared exile in Belgium and Switzerland. Years of protests, judicial proceedings and political flare-ups followed. But Europe’s favorite secessionist telenovela appears to have come to an end — at least for now. Last May, nationalist parties failed to secure a majority in Catalonia’s regional parliament for the first time in 30 years. Instead, voters backed 58-year-old Salvador Illa, a pro-unionist socialist politician who campaigned on social issues instead of separatism. The bespectacled and soft-spoken Illa, who served as Spain’s health minister during the Covid crisis and is close to Spanish PM Pedro Sánchez, is often cast as a boring technocrat. “What I want is to govern,” Illa said in an interview with POLITICO on his first trip to Brussels since his election. By “governing,” the socialist leader said he meant shifting the focus in Catalonia away from the independence movement that has monopolized the political scene for decades, and instead focusing on straightforward policies to improve the quality of life in one of Spain’s most prosperous regions. Illa stressed that he firmly defends “self-government for Catalonia,” but added that this should happen within a “plural and diverse Spain.” By working with the national government in Madrid, he believes he can improve the region’s public-health system, railway infrastructure, public services and employment opportunities — issues he stresses are important to all of the region’s residents, regardless of their views on Catalan independence. His objective is to “unite [and] pursue what unites Catalans,” he said. BALANCING ACT But Illa may have trouble achieving his goals. His minority government — which was sworn in the same day separatist leader Carles Puigdemont staged a dramatic return to Barcelona before returning to exile in August — is weak and depends on the support of one of the main independence parties, the Catalan Republican Left. Separatist leader Carles Puigdemont staged a dramatic return to Barcelona before returning to exile in August | Manaure Quintero/AFP via Getty Images While secessionist parties no longer have a majority in the regional parliament, the Socialist leader knows well that independence remains popular in Catalonia. But the movement is fragmented and plagued by infighting, allowing Illa to secure the support of one of the main independence parties — fracturing the movement’s common front. Illa believes that closer collaboration with the EU can help dispel isolationist tendencies within the region. To that end, he’s keen to redefine Catalonia’s presence in Brussels. Since 2004 the regional government has maintained a delegation just steps from the headquarters of the European Commission. During the past decade the space operated as a sort of embassy for the secessionist movement and promoted the pro-independence cause beyond Spain’s borders. “There was not … the participation that I believe Catalonia should have,” he said, adding he now wants the territory to play an active role in EU institutions like the Committee of the Regions, which gives them a voice on the bloc’s big issues. In a bid to change Catalonia’s image in Brussels, Illa recruited the seniormost Catalan official he could find in the EU institutions to lead the government’s foreign and EU department: Jaume Duch, former spokesperson and head of communications at the European Parliament. “Catalonia does not want to present itself to Europe as a problem,” he said, but instead to make “positive contributions” in Brussels.

MADRID — Carles Puigdemont humiliated Catalonia’s police force — and it may never recover. The force, the Mossos d’Esquadra, has long been a prominent symbol of the region’s identity and self-governing powers. Some within its ranks support Puigdemont, the former regional president who fled to Belgium after the failed independence referendum of 2017. Then came the events of August 8. Puigdemont made it clear that he would return to Barcelona when the regional parliament voted on a new president. He did indeed show up and made a speech surrounded by supporters and the media. As legal charges were still hanging over him because of the referendum, Puigdemont — public enemy number one for Spanish unionists — should have been arrested. Instead he disappeared, fleeing Spain through France and back to his home in Waterloo, just outside Brussels. Rather than arresting him, members of the Mossos helped him escape. Eduard Sallent, the force’s chief commissioner, admitted that it was “a very tough day for the Mossos” and said that officers who had helped Puigdemont escape — three were immediately arrested for alleged involvement — “did not deserve to wear our uniform.” The Mossos faced criticism from across the political spectrum. The center-left newspaper El País warned that “shame will cling to the record of this police force for a long time” and that suspicions had been raised about its possible collusion with Puigdemont. In 2017, when he was still Catalan president, Puigdemont praised the Mossos for being “not just at the service of a government, but at the service of the people, the people who make our country.” While the episode shone an unwelcome light on the Catalan police’s behavior that day, it also contributed to questions about the troubled institution’s credibility. Catalan communications expert and political commentator Carles Fernández said that while the Puigdemont escapade meant that the Mossos had “missed an opportunity to behave like a democratic, modern and reasonable police force,” the incident should also lead to “introspection and some resignations.” A SIGN OF REGIONAL POWER The Mossos d’Esquadra (its full, official name is the Policia de la Generalitat de Catalunya)  was created in the early 1980s, as part of an arrangement to grant Catalonia greater regional autonomy. Its powers were broadened in the mid-1990s to take on almost all major policing duties in Catalonia except for border and passport controls. Along with the Basque Country, it is the only region to have its own force with such powers. “Having the Mossos was extremely important for Catalonia, it was an opportunity to have our own modern police,” Francesc-Marc Álvaro, a member of parliament for the pro-independence Catalan Republican Left (ERC), said. He said the force was a crucial element of the region’s distinct identity, for both nationalists and unionists. The Mossos d’Esquadra (its full, official name is the Policia de la Generalitat de Catalunya)  was created in the early 1980s. | Cesar Manso/AFP via Getty Images That status was underlined in August 2017, when terrorists killed 16 people in Barcelona and the town of Cambrils, thrusting the Mossos into the spotlight. In the days after, officers shot dead six terrorists, and it became a common sight for people to break into applause when the police passed by. Some Catalans put flowers on patrol cars as a mark of gratitude. The most senior officer at the time, Josep Lluís Trapero, became a folk hero to many Catalans, who admired his self-assured manner and insistence on speaking in Catalan in press conferences. He was so popular that his face started appearing on T-shirts. Weeks after the terrorist attacks, Trapero and his force faced a very different kind of test when the Catalan government — led at the time by Puigdemont — organized a controversial independence referendum. Officers from across Spain were deployed to quell the rebellion, often through force. The Mossos, however, took a relatively hands-off approach, leading to many nationalists seeing them as the potential foot soldiers of an independent state. This inevitably drew the ire of Madrid, with accusations that the Mossos was conniving with the independence movement (a view compounded by an old video showing Trapero singing at a party with Puigdemont and other top nationalist figures). Yet although Trapero went on trial for sedition and disobedience in 2020, he appeared to distance himself from the secessionist cause by insisting that he would have arrested Puigdemont in 2017 if ordered to do so. “The Mossos went from being a police force which the Spanish state could not trust to a police force which the independence movement could not trust,” Oriol Bartomeus, of the Institute for Political and Social Sciences (ICPS) at Barcelona’s Autonomous University, said. Carles Puigdemont made a speech surrounded by supporters and the media. | Manaure Quintero/AFP via Getty Images “They constantly have to deal with the question: are you a true Catalan police force, representing the Catalan patriotic cause, or are you going to be a ‘puppet of the Spanish state’?” he added. “It’s perhaps the area where the Mossos have to tread most carefully.” REPORTS OF VIOLENCE Meanwhile, there has been well-documented intrigue and division within the leadership of the 18,000-strong force in recent years, driven at least in part by this political tightrope walk. There are other problems, including police violence. This year, four Mossos officers were given jail prison sentences for abusing a detainee and filing a false report; in 2023, six agents were given sentences for torturing two men they had stopped in a car; and last year, six agents were sentenced for a racially motivated attack on a migrant. While the investigation into how Puigdemont was able to escape continues, a new Catalan government faces the challenge of restoring the credibility of the police force. Salvador Illa, the Socialist former Spanish health minister, is the first non-nationalist to lead the region since 2010, reflecting a dip in support for independence. He has identified de-politicizing the Mossos as a priority. Illa’s government has already made several key personnel changes, which many see as pursuing that aim, and pledged that the force will be free of interference.    “We have a good police force but to be clear, things can always be better,” he said after taking office in August. “It’s important that the men and women who make up the Mossos force be able to carry out their job away from political confrontation.” Sallent, who was in charge of the force on the day of Puigdemont’s disappearing act, has been replaced, with Trapero returning in a more executive role. He answers directly to the regional interior minister, Núria Parlon, who echoed Illa’s words by saying that the Mossos had reached “the end of an era” and that “now, things need to be done differently.” The hope is that a force will eventually emerge that is not only better prepared to fight the petty crime that has been on the rise in Catalonia, but which would not allow itself to be so brazenly embarrassed again. 

Former European Parliament President Antonio Tajani was justified in refusing to recognize Catalan separatist lawmakers Carles Puigdemont and Toni Comín as members of the Parliament, the Court of Justice of the European Union ruled Thursday. Spanish law requires MEPs-elect to travel to the national parliament in Madrid and declare their allegiance to the constitution in order to be certified, but the separatist politicians declined to do so after winning seats in the 2019 European election, citing fears they would be arrested for their roles in the failed 2017 Catalan independence referendum. Because they refused to take the vow, Spanish authorities left Puigdemont and Comín’s names off the official list of MEPs-elect that Spain sent to the Parliament, and Tajani subsequently decided to withhold their credentials and bar them from entering the institution’s buildings. The politicians were only admitted to the Parliament by Tajani’s successor, David Sassoli, in January 2020, after the EU’s top court reaffirmed the immunity of elected MEPs and ruled member countries had no right to ban them from taking their seats. In its latest ruling, the Court of Justice said that the Parliament’s president can only recognize the MEPs whose names appear on the official list of elected lawmakers provided by national authorities. Tajani had “no power to review the accuracy of that list” and “did what he was required to do,” the justices concluded. The court’s final ruling came as a surprise because it went against the blistering nonbinding opinion issued by Advocate General Maciej Szpunar earlier this year, in which the court’s legal adviser argued Tajani had breached EU law by disregarding the election’s results and bowing to Spanish authorities. Thursday’s decision raises questions as to whether Comín, who was re-elected to the Parliament in last June’s election, will be able to take his seat. After the separatist politician once again refused to travel to Madrid to take the required oath, Spanish authorities omitted his name from the official list relayed to the Parliament. In July European Parliament President Roberta Metsola initially declined to recognize Comín as an MEP, opting to await the court’s ruling on the matter. On Thursday the president’s spokesperson told POLITICO that the Parliament had taken note of the judgment and instructed its legal services to examine its implications “in depth.”