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Spain’s controversial new government

Spain's newly re-appointed Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez is congratulated by People's Party leader Alberto Nunez Feijoo, at the Spanish parliament in Madrid, Spain, November 16, 2023.

Spain's newly re-appointed Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez is congratulated by People's Party leader Alberto Nunez Feijoo, at the Spanish parliament in Madrid, Spain, November 16, 2023.

Javier Soriano/Pool via
Willis Sparks
By Willis SparksNovember 16, 2023
Willis Sparks
Willis Sparks is a senior editor for GZERO Daily. He is also a Director in the Global Macro practice at Eurasia Group, where he has worked since 2005. He has made speeches on international politics on every continent except Antarctica. Willis holds degrees from Brown University, the Juilliard School, Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, and the Institut d'Etudes Politiques in Paris. He also holds an honorary degree from the Moscow Art Theatre School. A native of Macon, Georgia, Willis has worked as a stuntman at New York's Metropolitan Opera. As a child, he declined an opportunity to spend an afternoon riding the Great American Scream Machine, a rollercoaster, with Ronald McDonald, for money. He has never regretted that decision.
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After weeks of bare-knuckle bargaining, Pedro Sánchez, leader of Spain’s Socialist Party, has secured a four-seat majority in the country’s 350-seat Parliament to win a second term as prime minister. The process has been exceptionally ugly.

Four months ago, the conservative Popular Party finished with the most votes in multiparty elections, but its leader, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, failed to find the coalition partners he needed to form a majority government. Sánchez has now succeeded where Feijóo failed by forming an alliance with Catalan nationalist parties conditioned on legislation offering amnesty to hundreds of Catalan separatists who tried and failed in 2017 to lead a process of secession from Spain. This is a choice Sánchez once pledged he would not make.

Sánchez says the amnesty can help heal old wounds. His critics charge that he has committed treason in order to win enough seats to keep his job. The country has been rocked by (sometimes violent) protests in recent weeks. The demonstrations may continue as the amnesty law moves forward.

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