- Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez was re-elected by Parliament on Thursday, winning the votes of 179 of a possible 350 lawmakers.
- Sánchez’s victory immediately follows his leveraging of an amnesty deal with Catalan separatists in order to secure votes from the region’s representatives in Madrid.
- Oriol Bartomeus, professor of political science of the Autonomous University of Barcelona, noted that the new Sánchez government faces a unique hurdle because of the deal — the support keeping it in power was only garnered with “strings attached.”
Spain’s Pedro Sánchez was reelected as prime minister by the nation’s parliament on Thursday, when he leveraged a controversial amnesty deal to get the critical support from Catalan separatists to stay in power.
Sánchez, Spain’s Socialist leader since 2018, was backed by 179 lawmakers in the 350-seat lower house of parliament to form a new minority leftist coalition government. Only right-wing opposition deputies voted against him.
The vote came after nearly two days of debate among party leaders that centered almost entirely on an amnesty deal for Catalonia’s separatists that Sánchez agreed to in return for vital support to unlock another four-year term.
SPAIN’S SÁNCHEZ DEFENDS CONTROVERSIAL AMNESTY DEAL BROKERED WITH CATALAN SEPARATISTS
Sánchez won the vote after clinching the support of six smaller parties — including two Catalan separatist parties that command 14 seats — in recent weeks,
