The Spanish right wing lives in anticipation of some catastrophe that will bring down Sánchez's government. They have been like this for eight years, and it's not that opportunities have been lacking: pandemic, wars, crises, natural disasters caused by fire and water, etc. There is also the corruption of the PSOE, which exists, but here they have the problem of the corruption of the right wing itself, which exists to a greater extent because it is structural. And finally there is immigration, which serves this type of right-wing to stir up hatreds, fears, and base instincts. With the crisis driven last week by Mohamed VI, halfway with Trump and Netanyahu, PP and Vox thought their opportunity had finally arrived, especially when some European countries appeared (ultraconservative Finland and the Italy of the fascist Meloni) that cried out to the heavens and even spoke of closing the Schengen area (which, by the way, is impossible, as no member state of the European Union can do it unilaterally). However, once again it did not quite work out for them. Some paid agitators, like Vito Quiles or Alvise Pérez, had to be escorted out of Ceuta by the police (in other places, like Palma, instead of protecting them, the agents prefer to beat citizens). Abascal, acting as a glorious admiral aboard a passenger ferry that he tried to pass off as a war frigate, managed to lose the patience even of the ultra Jiménez Losantos, who reproached him for his lack of patriotism. On the PP's side, the comic duo formed by Tellado and Feijóo has once again stammered their catastrophic discourse, which is already predictable and routine. Finally, Marlaska attended the meeting with the other European Interior ministers, and instead of a scolding, he managed to get general support.Faced with this failure, they have moved on to the second phase of the plan, which consists of initially resisting the reception of the quota of minors rescued in Ceuta corresponding to each autonomous community. The communities governed by the PP, many of them together with Vox, wanted to close themselves off in advance to receiving these minors (although they will eventually comply with the law, as they are also obliged to do so). Junts is added to this, which once again threatens Sánchez with withdrawing all support if he decides to send immigrant minors to Catalonia. It is the right wing that refuses to welcome, with a supposed discourse of protection of its own national integrity, or territorial, or whatever it may be, but which in reality is only a discourse of xenophobia and aporophobia, the hatred of the poor. In the case of Junts, it is somewhat pitiful to see them wallowing in this quagmire — so disrespectful of Pujol's thinking, which was always open to immigration — just to compete with the little fascists with espadrilles and carquinyolis from Aliança Catalana. As for Europe, the absence of a democratic right-wing leader like Merkel, who eleven years ago opened Germany to nearly a million people, mostly fleeing the war in Syria, is intensely felt. What a decline, in these eleven years, for the European right wing.

The Spanish government plans to activate all available mechanisms to respond to unaccompanied migrant minors who entered Ceuta from Morocco by swimming and are currently in the autonomous city. The Ceuta executive estimates there are "a thousand": "We cannot give an exact figure because the process of locating [the minors] and integrating them into the protection system is still ongoing," indicated the spokesperson for the local government of Ceuta, Alejandro Ramírez, this Tuesday at a press conference. Among these mechanisms is the distribution of unaccompanied children and adolescents among the autonomous communities, as pointed out by the spokesperson for the Spanish government, Elma Saiz, and confirmed by sources from the Ministry of Childhood led by Sira Rego. However, this approach has already put the right-wing on alert.

The Council of Statutory Guarantees (CGE) ruled this Tuesday, unanimously, that the bill to limit the speculative purchase of housing, presented by Comuns, violates the right to private property, inheritance, and freedom of enterprise. Furthermore, the consultative body – whose resolutions are not binding – concludes that processing it by a single reading contravenes Article 138 of the Parliament's Regulations, which governs this express procedure, and Article 23.2 of the Constitution, which refers to citizens' right to access public functions and positions in conditions of equality. The ruling also adds a third pillar of unconstitutionality: it considers that the key article of the proposal encroaches on the State's exclusive competence over the bases of contractual obligations. Faced with this scenario, the Minister of Territory, Housing and Ecological Transition, Sílvia Paneque, has assured that the Government will seek "all legal measures [...] to protect the right to housing in Catalonia" in accordance with the Statute.

New resignation at Junts: Jaume Giró tears up his party card. The former Minister of Economy has decided to resign as a member after he left all his positions in the party's executive and also his seat as deputy a year ago, as reported by Nació Digital and confirmed by ARA. Sources from Junts consulted by this newspaper explain that Giró communicated the decision to President Carles Puigdemont a few days ago, although they have not wanted to explain the reasons. Giró's departure is added to that of the former secretary of the Parliament's board, Eusebi Campdepadrós, who, as the ARA reported this Monday, he also resigned as a member on July 27, after the amnesty was applied to him, even though he had been distant from the party for months.

Eusebi Campdepadrós, former secretary of the Parliament's bureau, leaves Junts. As ARA has been able to learn, Campdepadrós communicated his decision to the party's executive a few days ago, on July 27, when he announced that he was leaving the formation after the Supreme Court had applied the amnesty to him. He considered, in this way, that his political stage had ended. Contacted by ARA, the now former Junts militant did not wish to make any statements on the matter.

Junts per Catalunya formalized this Monday its integration into the European Democratic Party (PDE), an adhesion that had been being finalized for months as the ARA advanced. With this step, the party led by Carles Puigdemont closes a long period of political orphanhood on the Old Continent, which dated back to 2018. It was that year when the PDECat was expelled from the Party of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE) under pressure from Ciutadans and in a context marked by accusations of corruption against the formation then led by David Bonvehí for the 3% case.

Not very noisy, but the electoral drums are beginning to be heard. The elections to the Parliament of Catalonia are still far off on the calendar, but in 2027 we will have a first test in the municipal elections and, who knows, perhaps there could be legislative elections in the State sooner than expected. Meanwhile, the polls that are being published are beginning to show some important underlying movements. One of these is the progressive decline of Junts, indicated by multiple surveys. In the May 2024 elections, Junts obtained second place, with 21.59% of the votes, while in the latest survey by the Centre d’Estudis d’Opinió, estimates attributed between 11% and 13% of the votes to them (and a loss of about 18 seats).

Ten days after leaving Girona's municipal government, Junts has made a significant announcement for the upcoming municipal elections in the city. Alongside Gemma Geis, who will repeat as the head of the list, Carles Puigdemont's party has confirmed the incorporation of Carles Ribas as number two. A former member of Convergència and a councilor during Marta Madrenas's term, Ribas ran four years ago with his own brand, ARA Girona, but narrowly missed entering City Hall after obtaining 1,579 votes (4.6%). These were insufficient to surpass the 5% threshold to obtain a councilor but were key to understanding that Junts lost half of its votes in the last municipal elections. Ribas is currently part of the Partit Nacionalista de Catalunya (PNC), founded by Marta Pascual, and will run in the city in coalition with Junts x Girona.

The emergence of Aliança Catalana (AC) in Parliament and the growth predicted by demography have led Junts to move to try to stem the vote leakage that polls foresee towards Sílvia Orriols' party. And it has done so mainly on immigration matters. Although Carles Puigdemont's formation has not yet presented its immigration plan —it has been delayed without any public explanation, but it coincides with the fact that a part of the party considers that the focus should not be placed on Aliança's framework—, it has made moves both in Parliament and in Congress, as well as in municipalities. What steps has it taken?

With the ECJ's endorsement still present and the day after former president Carles Puigdemont denounced Spain to the European Commission for non-compliance with the law, separatism has taken advantage of the last control session with the President of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa, to pressure him, but above all to bring back his hemeroteca. This has been done by the leader of Junts in the Parliament, Mònica Sales, when she told him: "First he said "no amnesty or anything like that"". Shortly after, the head of ERC in the chamber, Josep Maria Jové, was added, who asked him to "remember": "You didn't want it." The President of the Generalitat avoided engaging and defended looking "forward": "An amnesty was necessary so that negotiations could be normalized in Catalonia.

Businesswoman Anna Navarro, who was Carles Puigdemont's great bet in the 2024 elections, is leaving Parliament. In a statement, Junts has announced that the party's number two candidate has resigned her seat, taking advantage of the end of the current session. She did so during a meeting of the parliamentary group, citing "personal and professional" reasons, according to the text released by the party. Navarro, however, will remain linked to the organization: she will continue to be part of Junts' permanent leadership and executive committee. Before making it public, she had communicated her decision to the party leader, Secretary General Jordi Turull, and the parliamentary group leader, Mònica Sales. During this legislature, Navarro had not played a prominent role in Parliament or in the party's major day-to-day decisions, despite being presented at the time as the Junts' great signing.  

In Junts, the polls have not been good for some time in general. It is not only the latest CEO barometer, but since Salvador Illa's investiture as president, everything has been going downhill. This situation was discussed at the summit last Monday, reported by ARA, in which the secretary general, Jordi Turull, convened about twenty leaders, including mayors and heads of lists from regional capitals. "The party is doing well in Madrid, but not in Catalonia," was one of the most repeated phrases at the summit, according to various sources consulted. And it is not new: a large part of the party considers that Junts is functioning correctly in Congress, but not in Parliament. What is the criticism?

The World Cup final between Spain and Argentina this Sunday has highlighted the different stances within the independence movement regarding support for the Spanish national football team, a debate that already occurred during Euro 2024. But the insistence with which some of its leaders have come out in recent days with open shows of support for la roja has reopened a debate that the sovereignty movement has never fully resolved: what to do when Spain wins?

One of the cornerstones of the PP and Vox argument in recent weeks has been to point out that the Spanish government would supposedly be trying to alter the electoral roll by massively incorporating people of foreign origin. The "ley de nets" (law of the clean slate), which grants Spanish nationality to relatives of exiles during Francoism, and the extraordinary regularization of immigrants, which grants residence and work permits to people already in the country, have been the focus of criticism from the Spanish right and far-right. Not only because of the impact they predict it could have on the results of the upcoming Spanish elections —regularization does not grant the right to vote, while the "ley de nets" does grant this possibility— but also on the social structure and access to public services. Now Junts has partially joined these theses.

Ten months before the next municipal elections, the pro-independence tripartite that governed Girona since 2023 has come to an end. After a harsh article published on Sunday, in which the deputy mayor and candidate for re-election for Junts, Gemma Geis, had already anticipated that her "patience" had run out, the party of Carles Puigdemont has made the decision to leave the executive and move to the opposition. Geis announced this Tuesday morning at a press conference, accompanied by the party's six councilors. "Our degree of demand is very high and Girona deserves more," she stated.

The national board of Junts has convened this Monday at six in the afternoon a municipal summit with about twenty officials, including lead candidates and mayors of regional capitals in the country, to close the year by addressing the party's main challenges. And among these, the decline in surveys like the CEO's, just four days ago, and the rise of Aliança Catalana at the expense of the unionists reflected in it. With less than a year to go until the municipal elections and only three days before the resolution of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) on the amnesty, the general secretary, Jordi Turull, has led the direction in the online meeting, in which militants from multiple regions have expressed their opinion on the party's course in a complex context.

Any information that alters the perception of reality is news. A CEO poll has become an event because it attributes to Aliança Catalana an unusual jump from 2 seats to a range of 23-25 (third force). A punishment for Junts that has just been rounded off with ERC's conversion into the second force. The PSC, with a certain setback, continues to lead the situation. The left of the left, Comuns and company, remains in limbo.

The result of the CEO survey puts numbers to a reality that we have all felt on the street, that of the growing voting intention of many people towards Aliança Catalana. What happens is that these numbers are -or would be, rather- a political tsunami and would represent a new page in the history of Catalan society.Going from the two deputies they have now to 23-25 as the CEO says is a tsunami. And for Junts, going from 35 to 13-18 is also one.When a party's main message is as basic as “Save Catalonia” and it is formulated by a leader who is not at all empathetic, at the head of an unknown team, and, even so, their electoral expectations skyrocket, it means that they have connected with the real or suggested discontents of many people, in relation to insecurity in the streets, Islamic radicalism, “massive” immigration, the emigration of well-prepared young Catalans, the decline of the language or fiscal plunder. Many Catalans feel – and what is worse, notice – that the country is slipping through their fingers. And pay attention, because the diagnosis has found a new centrality in which voters from the integrating Catalanism of Junts and Convergència to the bullfighting and Vox Legion Spanish nationalists have come to coincide. 1 out of every 3 votes that Aliança Catalana would win would come from Junts, and 1 out of every 4 votes would come from Vox, united by the flag of Islamophobia. The current parliamentary majority of PSC, Esquerra, Comuns would barely hold on, with the PSC dropping from 42 to 36-38. The government of appeasement, the one of management, is not being sufficient, among other things because the management is clearly improvable.That Aliança Catalana has detected the causes of discontent does not mean it has the capacity to remedy them. In fact, far-right parties are specialists in identifying culprits, but they are not as effective when it comes to finding solutions; on the contrary, because there can be a very short step from harshness to hatred that breaks societies. And with hatred, we are heading towards a new social fracture. Look at the report by Sebastián Marín, about how about 400 people of Moroccan origin gathered last night in L'Hospitalet de Llobregat to follow France-Morocco in the World Cup, in a meeting organized by the Moroccan consulate in Barcelona. Let's take it as a phenomenon: we cannot confuse the effects of radical Islamism, or the crime associated with the poverty of some immigrants, with living alongside neighbors of the Islamic faith. And the far-right, as we know, mixes everything up.The CEO's survey implicates Junts and within Junts, President Puigdemont. He should have been able to live in Catalonia for months now, under the amnesty law, but the judiciary has blocked it. This harms the expectations of a party that heavily relies on the almost iconic figure of the president in exile. At the same time, it is evident that we have gone from a Puigdemont with political initiative, who moved around Europe and overcame arrests and was very present in the media to direct the message, to a Puigdemont who basically only speaks on social media, with an often resentful tone, marked by the almost nine years of exile, the poor results of the negotiation with the PSOE, which conveys the idea that he doesn't care about the PP or the PSOE, because for Catalonia's purposes they are the same. Puigdemont had the status of a political rock star. Today, Aliança Catalana is acting as a substitute for the interest in politics, for the emotional vote, that the Process represented. And Junts will not be able to address it effectively if it does not stop being a party angry with the world (for whatever reason it may have) and begins to generate confidence and pride among the people.

The PSC would win the parliamentary elections again if they were held today, despite maintaining a downward trend that would take them from the 42 seats obtained in 2024 to a range of between 36 and 38. However, the most relevant image offered by the barometer of the Centre d'Estudis d'Opinió (CEO) made public yesterday is the consolidation of Aliança Catalana on the right of the parliamentary spectrum. Sílvia Orriols' party climbs to 23-25 deputies (it currently has 2) and clearly surpasses Junts per Catalunya, its main rival, which would lose half of its support to a range of between 16 and 18 deputies. ERC is the other party that is rising, consolidating the second position already predicted by other polls, up to 24-26 deputies.

In the fifth most populated city in Catalonia, Junts has faced difficulties in recent years. Long gone are the five councilors in Sabadell that it had from the CiU era, when it led the opposition: currently it only has two and, moreover, they have been expelled from the formation for disobeying and confronting the opinion of the Junts assembly in the city. In fact, de facto, there is currently no Junts representation in Sabadell. This Tuesday, however, the agreement –worked on for months– for a joint candidacy between several parties led by Junts and headed by the former ERC leader in the city, Gabriel Fernàndez, has been signed. And, under the name Acció per Sabadell, it has been formally sponsored by the Junts general secretary, Jordi Turull.