Spain’s Prime Minister calls early election after housing crisis defeat — SkimNews
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- Pedro Sanchez called a snap Spanish general election for November 29, 2026, after parliament voted down his housing relief measures on October 2; the next general election had not been scheduled until August 2027.
- Catalan separatist party Junts — on whose support Sanchez's minority government depends — voted against the housing bills, arguing they were hastily drawn up and would worsen the housing crisis.
- Tens of thousands of protesters marched in Madrid and other Spanish cities on October 3 demanding affordable housing, triggered by the eviction of 87-year-old Maricarmen Abascal from her Madrid flat of seven decades after an investment company sought to raise her rent 275%.
- Housing costs in Spain have surged over the past decade, with average rents nearly doubling and asking prices up about 90%, according to real estate website Idealista.
- Conservative PP leader Alberto Nunez Feijoo welcomed the snap vote, saying 'If eight years have not been enough, why would four more be?'; polls place the PP ahead of the Socialists but short of an absolute majority, likely requiring far-right Vox support to govern.
- Spain has been operating under its 2023 budget for several years, with no new national spending plan passed under Sanchez's government.
Why it matters: Sanchez is betting that Spain's faster-than-peer economic growth and falling unemployment can outweigh the housing anger that triggered the snap call, but polls favor the PP — which would likely need far-right Vox to govern, raising the prospect of Spain's first far-right-influenced national government. The same housing crisis that forced the election may now decide its outcome.
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