The European Parliament denounces the Sánchez government's 'attacks on the rule of law'

The coalition government of socialists and communists in Spain has been attacking the separation of powers and the rule of law for years.

Spain: the list of the institutions that reject the socialist attack against the rule of law
Statement of the General Council of the Judiciary of Spain against the amnesty: it is “a serious violation of fundamental rights”

The report “deplores the attacks on the rule of law and the separation of powers
carried out by the Spanish Government”

The European institutions have shown astonishing indifference to these attacks... until now. Yesterday, the European Parliament adopted a report by the Petitions Committee (see PDF) for 2023. The report was adopted with 260 votes in favor, 194 against, and 110 abstentions. The full voting results can be consulted here (see PDF, page 109).

The approved text can be read in Spanish here (PDF). Point 24 of the text states the following:

Takes note of the sudden increase in petitions of Spanish origin in the second half of 2023 concerning the risks to the rule of law in Spain as a result of the Spanish Government’s intention to adopt an Amnesty Law contrary to constitutional and European law; deplores the attacks on the rule of law and the separation of powers carried out by the Spanish Government;

That statement received more votes than the entire report.

This last sentence did not appear in the initial draft of the report (see PDF, point 21), presented in April by the Romanian MEP Gheorghe Falcă, of the National Liberal Party, attached to the group of the European People's Party. The statement was added thanks to Amendment 38 tabled by the six Spanish MEPs from Vox (Mireia Borrás, Jorge Buxadé, Juan Carlos Girauta Vidal, Margarita de la Pisa Carrión, Jorge Martín Frías and Hermann Tertsch) along with three MEPs from the Patriots for Europe group: Pál Szekeres (Fidesz, Hungary), António Tânger Corrêa (Chega, Portugal) and Virginie Joron (Rassemblement National, France), as can be seen in the amendments document (see PDF, page 10).

Amendment 38 received more support than the entire report: 298 votes in favor, as well as 273 votes against and 15 abstentions (see PDF with the results, page 99). Among those who voted in favour of the amendment were all MEPs from the Patriots for Europe (PfE) group, almost all of the Europe of Sovereign Nations (ESN) group, except for one Hungarian MEP who abstained, the vast majority of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group, except for six who voted against: one Finn, two Belgians and three Czechs, and the majority of MEPs from the European People's Party (EPP, except for five who voted against and seven who abstained).

A vote in which the 'cordon sanitaire' against the right was broken

The most striking thing about this report is that the votes in favor of approving the text came from the centrists (the EPP supported the report en bloc, with only one abstention), from right-wing groups (specifically the majority of ECR, PfE and ESN MEPs), and six center-left MEPs (specifically from the Renew Europe group), in addition to eight non-attached MEPs.

This is the first time that the so-called "cordon sanitaire" imposed by centrists on the right, in collaboration with the left, the center-left, and the far left, has been broken. The Socialists voted en bloc against the report, along with the far left and the Greens, while the majority of center-left Renew Europe MEPs abstained.

The Von der Leyen Commission remains silent on these attacks.

The report approved yesterday is the first official rebuke from the European institutions to the Sánchez government for its attacks on the rule of law, something that has not occurred until now despite the seriousness of these attacks, with violations of constitutional legality, a broad offensive against judicial independence and the socialist assault on all types of institutions. It should be noted that it is unlikely to see such a pronouncement from the European Commission, chaired by German Ursula von der Leyen (EPP), since it is made up of a coalition of EPP members and socialists.

An alternative majority in the European Parliament

In any case, yesterday's vote demonstrates that an alternative center-right majority in the European institutions is possible, breaking the "cordon sanitaire" with the left. Of course, for such a majority to be formed, the EPP would have to abandon its dependence on the left, which has resulted in an ideological drift in recent years, moving it further and further away from the center-right (the position theoretically held by many parties in that group) to place itself strictly on the ideological left, while in some European countries the EPP parties (as is the case in Spain) act as rivals to the socialists.

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Photo: European Union. Pedro Sánchez, President of the Government of Spain, speaking at the European Parliament headquarters in Strasbourg on December 13, 2023.