Supreme Court freezes a voting bloc

The Supreme Court has suspended the right to vote of Spaniards living abroad who gained nationality under the so-called 'ley de nietos', a provision of the Democratic Memory Law that opens citizenship to descendants of people exiled during the Civil War and Franco's dictatorship. El Confidencial puts the number of naturalized people registered in the Census of Absent Resident Electors (CERA) at 163,020, a figure other outlets round to 163,000. On 10 September the court ordered the government to determine which of them were descendants of exiles. The Ombudsman, Ángel Gabilondo, has since filed an amparo appeal with the Constitutional Court and requested urgent precautionary measures.

Vox has asked the Constitutional Court to reject that appeal as premature, arguing that ordinary judicial remedies have not been exhausted. The party also says no current constitutional injury has been shown. Affected voters can file appearances and submissions until 22 October. Vox defended the court's measures in these words:

It merely disagrees with a weighing that the Supreme Court's Third Chamber made twice, with reasoning and a dissenting opinion.

— Vox

Consulates work through manual files

Consulates have been processing the case files without the official Digireg tool. According to ABC, the lists are being entered by hand into Excel spreadsheets stored on an internal Foreign Ministry network before being shared. The Office of the Electoral Census (OCE) holds digital data on only about 70,000 naturalizations from 2025 and 2026, and the ministry says it has received data from almost thirty consulates so far.

El Mundo reports that the ministry's sources concede full compliance is 'impossible' in some consulates, a warning the State Attorney's office had already made in a report dated 9 October. The ministry says the holidays of consuls in the affected offices were cancelled so the review could move faster. A column in El Confidencial argues the government let the deadline slip, noting that the operating instructions and the promised digital tool had not reached the consulates when the court confirmed the suspension on Monday, 12 October.

A race against the 22 October deadline

ABC reports that the five-business-day window for CERA claims over census errors closes on Monday, 19 October. Consulates plan to send the claims, along with the results of the file reviews they have completed, to the OCE between 19 and 20 October. The date of 22 October serves two purposes: it is the last day for submissions to the Supreme Court, and it is a fixed cut-off in the general electoral count.

Key dates in the voting suspension dispute
  1. Supreme Court orders the government to sort which naturalized voters qualify
  2. Sánchez announces the convocation of the general election
  3. Supreme Court upholds the suspension of the vote
  4. BOE publishes court order opening a five-day window to appear
  5. CERA claims window closes; consulates plan to send files to the OCE on 19 and 20 October
  6. Deadline for allegations and fixed cut-off in the general electoral count
  7. General election

El País reports that the Official State Gazette published the court order on Thursday, 15 October, opening a five-day window for affected people to declare their intention to appear before the Supreme Court. Those living abroad must find a lawyer and a procurador, and the power of attorney usually has to be obtained through a consulate or a notary, which takes time. The law firm of former judge Baltasar Garzón says it has received more than 5,000 requests and messages, mostly through lawyers in Argentina, from people in the United States, Germany, France, Brazil, Ecuador and Mexico, as well as Argentina itself. The firm is still deciding whether to take on the representation, and one option under consideration is to pick three representative cases from different countries.

Politics ahead of the 29 November vote

Vox leader Santiago Abascal told La Razón that he was pleased to have defeated the grandchildren law, and warned that Pedro Sánchez still had more tricks to alter the election result. Abascal said the 29 November elections will not be clean and predicted a campaign marked by violence and street pressure, which he blamed on the government's use of its militias. Vox's filing argues that the court's measures aim to preserve the legality and transparency of the census without annulling Spanish nationality. The dispute therefore sits between the court, the Ombudsman, the Foreign Ministry and the parties, with the census count set to close while the appeals are still open.