Spanish election threatens to blow up Brussels’ political balance

BRUSSELS — A defeat for Pedro Sánchez in Spain’s snap election risks destabilizing the EU by putting the Socialists and Democrats on the back foot in Brussels and pushing them into a more confrontational stance.

Sánchez, the only Socialist-aligned leader currently running a large EU country, has provided a center-left counterweight to decisions in a Council largely dominated by the center right. Spain’s lawmakers form the S&D’s largest national delegation in the European Parliament, and when Sánchez strikes a Council deal, Spanish MEPs can usually carry his position through the group, even over internal opposition.

A change of government in Madrid would disrupt that arrangement, senior S&D lawmakers told POLITICO. Polls suggest that the country will vote in an administration led by the center-right People’s Party, which would likely partner with the far-right Vox party.

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

A second senior S&D lawmaker said Sánchez helped “balance” decisions at the leaders’ table and that his absence would unsettle the informal alliance of the S&D, liberals and the center-right European People’s Party that Commission President Ursula von der Leyen relies on to pass legislation.

“If what comes out of the leaders’ table, and the guidelines it gives the Commission, becomes more conservative, it will be less appealing 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 lost ground elsewhere in Brussels. Since the 2024 European election shifted Parliament to the right, the EPP has passed some legislation with far-right groups. The Socialists have less representation in national governments and fewer commissioners of their own, fueling repeated tensions and attempts to repair the alliance. With Sánchez gone, the last center-left leaders would be Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen and Malta’s Robert Abela — with Magdalena Andersson working to form a government in Sweden.

Spain’s election will sound the starting gun a year of consequential votes across major EU countries, including Italy, Poland and France, where the far-right National Rally is leading the polls ahead of the 2027 presidential election. Far-right forces in Brussels are pressing the EPP to drop its ban on cooperating with them and break with its traditional ties to the S&D. 

Fewer incentives for compromise

The S&D, Parliament’s second-largest group, has repeatedly threatened over the past two years to withdraw support for von der Leyen, with some lawmakers urging a more forceful stance on EU policy.

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

Should Sánchez lose his election, all the S&D’s largest national delegations — from Italy, Romania and France — would be in opposition at home. The only S&D parties still in government would be junior partners in Germany and Austria, alongside Denmark’s Social Democrats, whose hardline 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 the center-right’s votes with the far right.

“If von der Leyen still delivers on S&D priorities, she will have the support of the group, and if that is not the case, then she will lose the support of the group,” Repasi said. A formal alliance between Spain’s EPP and far-right Vox, he added, “will drive us even more apart.”

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

“The institutional responsibility to guarantee support for the Commission and stability in the EU institutions will no longer be there,” the lawmaker said. A tougher line would be easier for the center-left “if the EPP continues striking 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 just feel a need to send a signal to the EPP.” Weakening or firing von der Leyen also runs against the S&D’s interests, the diplomat added, because the EU has moved further to the right since she first took office and “the next person coming in would be much less inclined to work with them.”

Turbulence ahead

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

The election is also weighing on talks over the EU’s next seven-year budget, known as the Multiannual Financial Framework, which Brussels aims to conclude by the end of the year.

“It’s not going to do any good for the MFF,” a Commission official said, warning that Spain risks dragging its feet during already strained negotiations. The EPP and its allies will try to put debates on Parliament’s agenda to cause discomfort for Sánchez, the official said, likely making the talks more “turbulent.”

Spain’s underlying budget position will not change under a new government, a second diplomat said, but “the election will be distracting” and “won’t incentivize finding compromise.”

The EPP’s Siegfried Mureșan, Parliament’s lead budget negotiator, warned EU countries not to use the election to delay talks ahead of a leaders’ summit in mid-October. “The European Council shall not use the political situation in Spain as an excuse for further delays.”

EPP leader Manfred Weber declined to comment on what a Sánchez defeat could mean for the Socialists’ influence in Brussels, but voiced support for Spain’s opposition leader, Alberto Núñez Feijóo.

“Spain’s future 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 stand firmly behind Alberto Núñez Feijóo. He has our full support.”

Zoya Sheftalovich and Tim Ross contributed reporting.