Elections in Spain, EU balances also at stake: What Sanchez risks

A defeat for Pedro Sanchez in Spain’s early elections risks destabilising the political balance in the European Union, putting the socialists and democrats in a weaker position in Brussels and pushing them towards a more confrontational stance.

Sanchez, the only socialist-linked leader currently running a large EU country, has served as a centre-left counterweight to decisions in a European Council dominated mainly by the centre right. Spanish MEPs make up the largest national delegation of the Socialists and Democrats (S&D) group in the European Parliament. When Sanchez reaches a deal in the Council, Spanish MEPs can usually carry his position through the group, even in the face of internal objections.

Sanchez has called early elections for November 29, after two housing decrees were voted down in Parliament.

A change of government in Madrid would upset this balance, senior S&D lawmakers told POLITICO. Polls suggest the country could be led by the centre-right People’s Party, with the support or cooperation of the far-right Vox party.

“There might be a temptation to look more carefully at the Council’s positions if there is no longer a socialist prime minister of a large country,” said René Repasi, head of Germany’s SPD delegation in the European Parliament.

Another senior S&D lawmaker said Sanchez has helped to “balance” decisions at the leaders’ table, and that his absence would disturb the informal alliance between the S&D, the liberals and the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP), on which European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen relies to pass legislation.

“If what comes out of the leaders’ table and the guidance she gives the Commission becomes more conservative, it will be less attractive for progressives to feel part of that governing majority,” said the lawmaker, who was granted anonymity to speak about sensitive group matters.

The S&D has also lost ground elsewhere in Brussels. Since the 2024 European elections, which shifted the European Parliament further to the right, the EPP has passed several pieces of legislation with the support of far-right groups.

The socialists have less representation in national governments and fewer commissioners of their own, fuelling repeated tensions and efforts to repair the alliance with the EPP.

With Sanchez leaving government, the last centre-left leaders would be Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen and Malta’s Robert Abela, while Magdalena Andersson is trying to form a government in Sweden.

Spain’s elections will mark the start of a year of important votes in major EU countries, including Italy, Poland and France, where the far-right National Rally leads the polls ahead of the 2027 presidential elections.

Far-right forces in Brussels are pressing the EPP to lift its ban on cooperating with them and to break its traditional ties with the S&D.

The S&D, the European Parliament’s second-largest group, has repeatedly threatened over the past two years to withdraw its support for von der Leyen, while some lawmakers demand a stronger stance on EU policies.

Spain’s Iratxe García, who leads the group, has so far kept Spanish lawmakers in line. She faces a leadership vote on October 21, although she is widely expected to keep her post.

If Sanchez loses the elections, all of the S&D’s largest national delegations, from Italy, Romania and France, will be in opposition in their home countries.

The only S&D parties still in government would be their junior partners in Germany and Austria, together with Denmark’s Social Democrats, whose tough stance on migration limits their influence in the group.

Without a heavyweight prime minister from a large EU country to keep the S&D in line, von der Leyen would face greater pressure to make more concessions to lawmakers already frustrated by centre-right votes with the far right.

“If von der Leyen continues to deliver on the S&D’s priorities, she will have the group’s support, and if not, then she will lose the group’s support,” Repasi said.

A formal alliance between the EPP in Spain and the far-right Vox, he added, “would divide us even more.”

The S&D would also have fewer “incentives” to compromise without Sanchez’s presence, the second senior lawmaker said, because the group would have less responsibility for maintaining stability in the EU institutions.

“The institutional responsibility to guarantee support for the Commission and stability in the EU institutions would no longer exist,” the lawmaker said.

A tougher stance would be easier for the centre left “if the EPP continues to reach deals with the far right and the European Commission fails to offer a politically attractive agenda that progressives can sell to their voters.”

One diplomat called the socialists’ threat to withdraw support for von der Leyen “not credible”, saying it would isolate the group further.

“They simply feel the need to send a signal to the EPP,” the diplomat said.

Weakening or removing von der Leyen also runs against the S&D’s interests, the diplomat added, because the EU has moved further right since she took office and “the next person to come would be much less inclined to work with them.”

Brussels is expected to become a battleground between Spain’s two main parties, with Spanish lawmakers leading the socialists in the European Parliament, while their EPP rivals form that group’s second-largest national delegation.

The elections are also affecting talks on the EU’s next seven-year budget, known as the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF), which Brussels aims to conclude by the end of the year.

“This will do the MFF no good,” said a Commission official, warning that Spain risks dragging out the already tense negotiations.

The EPP and its allies will try to insert debates into the Parliament’s agenda to cause trouble for Sanchez, the official said, making the talks more likely to be “turbulent”.

Spain’s fundamental budgetary position will not change under a new government, a second diplomat said, but “the elections will be a distraction” and “will not encourage finding compromise”.

The EPP’s Siegfried Mureşan, the European Parliament’s chief budget negotiator, warned EU countries not to use the elections to delay the talks ahead of a leaders’ summit in mid-October.

“The European Council will not use the political situation in Spain as an excuse for further delays.”

EPP leader Manfred Weber declined to comment on what a Sanchez defeat might mean for the socialists’ influence in Brussels, but expressed support for Spanish opposition leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo.

“The future of Spain is now in the hands of the Spanish people,” he said.

“At a time when vision and reform are needed more than ever, the EPP is proud to strongly support Alberto Núñez Feijóo. He has our full support.”

If Sanchez loses the elections, the consequences will not be limited to Madrid alone. The result could directly affect the balance of power in the European institutions, further weakening the weight of the centre left and making it harder to preserve the political majority that currently supports Ursula von der Leyen’s Commission.