The Supreme Court will rule on who can vote on November 29: the census is prior to the blocking of the net law

MadridIn recent months, the PP and Vox have spread suspicions about alleged electoral fraud in two directions: postal voting and the right to vote of those naturalized through the Democratic Memory Law. After Isabel Díaz Ayuso took less than an hour after the dissolution of the Cortes to recommend not voting by mail –a distrust that the PP spokesperson has disavowed–, the focus is once again on the Supreme Court, which a month ago blocked the right to vote for thousands of people until they prove that they are descendants of exiles. Following the call for the 29-N elections, both Iustitia Europa and Vox have demanded that the Supreme Court act to ensure that the precautionary measures are complied with, since the electoral body called to vote in the elections closed two months ago, before the high court took the measures. This morning, the Minister of the Presidency, Félix Bolaños, warned that if the Supreme Court maintains the decision, the 29-N census will be “altered” and would lose 400,000 people added to the Electoral Census of Absent Residents –CERA– since 23-J.

The Supreme Court drew a distinction between the articles of the Democratic Memory Law and an instruction published later by the Director General of Legal Security and Public Faith, Sofía Puente, which stipulates that the status of exiles would be presumed for “all Spaniards” who left Spain between July 1936 and December 1955, which facilitated obtaining nationality. Those who benefited from the second assumption were excluded, but those born outside of Spain who are descendants of exiles for “political, ideological, or sexual orientation and identity reasons” could vote if the consular registers issued a “certification” that accredits it.

Last Monday, October 5th, the Supreme Court began deliberating on the motion for reconsideration filed by the State Attorney's Office against the precautionary measures. The Spanish government argued that the growth of the CERA does not pose "any risk" and that, even if it did, it would be "so negligible" that "it would not justify curtailing the voting rights of hundreds of thousands of people." "No one can predict the direction of the vote, and in any case, it could not alter the electoral result by pure mathematics," it added. However, before making a decision, and as a result of the calling of early elections, the Supreme Court has granted a non-extendable deadline of 48 hours, which ends on Thursday at noon, for all parties to make statements regarding the briefs that Iustitia Europa and Vox have submitted ahead of November 29th.

What happens with November 29th?

The Electoral Law stipulates that the electoral census for an election closes on the “first day of the second month prior” to the announcement. Therefore, since the November 29th election was called on October 6th, the census that will be applied is the one in force on August 1st, prior to the precautionary measures, which were issued on September 10th. The Supreme Court established that the registration in the CERA of files that were open was suspended and that the “electoral effects” of registrations that had previously received the green light for “electoral processes that could be called” were also suspended.

In its document, to which ARA has had access, Iustitia Europa reports that the Directorate General for Consular Affairs presented a report three weeks ago acknowledging that there is no record of which path the beneficiaries of the grandchildren's law used to obtain nationality – whether through the law or the instruction – and that, therefore, 168,896 files must be examined individually. In parallel, the State Attorney's Office admitted that it was “materially impossible” to certify this within a “reasonable timeframe”.

Vox considers that this entails an “absence of traceability and correct management” of the files, which implies “negligence” or an “implicit lack of will” to comply with the precautionary measures. And Iustitia Europa complains that this “deficit” cannot cause the precautionary measure to lapse: “The Administration intends for the absence of information to be projected onto the validity and effectiveness of judicial protection,” it alleges. It believes it is a “legal loophole” that could mean that people who should be excluded “end up voting”.

Iustitia Europa wants the Supreme Court to determine "which registrations are subject to suspension of electoral effects" and demands that the JEC and the electoral census office report on the "exact status" of the execution of the precautionary measures. But Vox goes further and, in a document consulted by ARA, opts to suspend the electoral effects of "any person" registered in the CERA through the democratic memory law. In exchange, it offers that those registered be able to "challenge" the electoral census individually and, therefore, that they must be the ones to claim their right to vote.