Aliança Catalana started the week with morale through the roof after a survey by El Periódico placed it as the second force in the next elections to the Parliament. However, the Islamophobic party ends the week with a new controversy related to the management in the mayor's office of Ripoll that has put it in the eye of the hurricane: the hiring of Sílvia Orriols' daughter as an interim local police officer. Now the controversy does not revolve around whether her daughter, Guinadell, met the merits for the position, but rather whether the procedure offered sufficient guarantees of impartiality in the face of a possible conflict of interest.

The Ripoll City Council has hired one of the daughters of the town's mayor, Sílvia Orriols, as an interim local police officer. Orriols herself announced this at the plenary session on Tuesday evening and made it clear that she had not placed "anyone in a position" and that she had "absolutely abstained from participating in anything affecting the process," even though she was the one who appointed the tribunal formed by officers of the corps. "Just as I cannot benefit her with my position, I also cannot prevent her from fulfilling her dream," she stated in response to the opposition's reproaches. The position was announced as "urgent" to guarantee the "correct provision of service" given the "structural understaffing of officers," Orriols pointed out.

Let's start with the big headlines that the latest barometer of the Centre d’Estudis d’Opinió of the Generalitat, which confirms already known trends in our political landscape. Aliança Catalana positions itself as the third force – in a technical tie with the second, ERC – in the Parliament, thanks to votes that leave Junts per Catalunya, which shows unexpected weakness. Meanwhile, the PSC, despite accumulating a great deal of power, not only does not advance, but recedes. All of this coincides, for example, with the survey published by this newspaper last May, although Sílvia Orriols' rise was not as pronounced then as it is now.Before continuing, it is worth pointing out that polls are only a snapshot, the reflection of a specific moment in a reality – in this case, political reality – that is constantly evolving. Shortly after the photograph was taken, the situation has already changed and is different. In this regard, it should be remembered that we are in July 2026 and the Catalan elections will be held, if they are not brought forward, in the spring of 2028. There is a long time to go. Many things, foreseen and unforeseen, have to happen between now and then. For example, it is very possible that next year we will have a PP-Vox government in Madrid, and we also have to expect that the amnesty will have been fully effective and Carles Puigdemont will have returned to Catalonia. However, polls serve to help us understand and better grasp the situation we are in.The main protagonists today are, without a doubt, Sílvia Orriols and her party. Never before, since the recovery of democracy, has such a rapid and resounding rise been seen. Aliança is receiving support from many people who had voted for Junts. It is also taking voters from Vox. It is very clear that Orriols's main appeal is the call against immigration, especially against Muslim immigration. This fact should serve for everyone to realize that the migratory issue must be addressed, whether one likes it or not. It cannot be allowed to be taken over and capitalized on by either Aliança or Vox. The fact that these two parties have an estimated voting intention of practically 25% indicates that immigration – in the volume that Catalonia has received it – is perceived as a problem by many citizens. It is an important concern. If we do not want the dehumanizing and often impossible recipes of the far-right to continue advancing, the rest of the forces must face the phenomenon head-on, they must foster an honest debate and they must make realistic – autonomies have few competences in this matter – and sensible proposals. Hiding our heads in the sand and pretending that nothing is happening leads us to a disastrous scenario.

The CEO survey confirms the trends that ARA's already pointed to and which draws a double axis of growth on the Catalan political map: one that concentrates opposition to Salvador Illa's executive, and which is currently held by Aliança Catalana, and another that gathers the left-wing vote considered most useful to stop the far-right, which is currently ERC of the Junqueras-Rufián tandem. To summarize, we can say that Aliança is the anti-Illa party and ERC is the anti-Orriols party. And currently, the survey places these two parties vying for second position in hypothetical parliamentary elections.

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.

After decades of what was known as "Iberian exceptionalism" – the absence of radical right-wing formations in the peninsula's parliaments – this political spectrum has not only burst into the Parliament of Catalonia, but has done so twice over. A study by the Institute of Political and Social Sciences (ICPS), published this Wednesday, thoroughly analyzes the rise of Vox and Aliança Catalana (AC), two parties that, despite defending diametrically opposed national projects, are primarily fueled by the same electoral driver: rejection of immigration.The ICPS study challenges the idea that the growth of these parties is solely due to polarization and the management of the independence process. While the territorial conflict created the right climate for Vox, led by Ignasi Garriga, to enter Parliament in 2021 and Catalan Alliance, led by Sílvia Orriols, to do so in 2024, the real driving force behind both electorates is structural. Both parties fully exploit "welfare chauvinism," a strategy that advocates for public services to be reserved exclusively for "nationals." Both the party led by Santiago Abascal and Sílvia Orriols' party agree in their platforms to associate immigration and crime, demand the deportation of irregular immigrants and the expulsion of unaccompanied foreign minors (MENA), and call for drastic measures to expedite the eviction of squatters. Economically, they also go hand in hand: they propose fiscal cuts, the abolition of taxes such as inheritance and gift tax and wealth tax, criticize excessive public spending, and generally call for a strong boost to free market policies.

In history, underlying continuities tend to be stronger than explosive ruptures. Even if they are continuities blended by the mixer of geek nostalgia, behind which one doesn't have to stir much to find the defense of unspeakable interests and ultranationalism. Now Donald Trump wants to return to the 19th century: commercial protectionism (multi-purpose tariffs), superpower geopolitics (peace through the threat of war, not diplomatic multilateralism), and shredded democratic institutions (strong, personalistic, autocratic political leaderships). Does the 21st-century Catalan resemble the 19th century as well? Political scientist Jordi Muñoz argued a few days ago for the similarity between territories where Sílvia Orriols' xenophobic Alliance has more demographic traction and the regions where 19th-century Carlism received more electoral support towards the end of the 1800s.

On June 17, 2023, the political reality of Ripoll changed completely. Silvia Orriols, under the banner of Aliança Catalana, became the first far-right pro-independence mayor in Catalonia, after Junts, ERC, the PSC, and the CUP failed to agree on forming an alternative government. The town of Ripoll, with about 11,000 inhabitants, deeply marked by the trauma of the 2017 Rambla attacks, became a key point in Catalan political geography and had a direct impact on the decisions of the national leaderships of the parties. The latest media case: that of the two socialist councilors who were sidelined amid reproaches for voting in favor of Orriols' budgets.

All recent surveys published in Catalonia, including the one from the ARA newspaper from the beginning of the month, agree in pointing to the growth of Aliança Catalana, an independence party with a xenophobic stance, mainly at the expense of Junts. This phenomenon represents a novelty in the history of Catalanism, which has always been predominantly inclusive and non-essentialist, and has a special capacity to penetrate what we have called the transversal axis of the far-right, an imaginary line that would connect Tortosa with Figueres through the interior of the country. That is why we wanted to visit these cities, along with Balaguer, Manresa, Vic, and Ripoll, to try to understand the factors that explain the growth of this vote.

That Gabriel Rufián and Sílvia Orriols are the two most popular politicians in Catalonia reflects quite severely the situation of our politics and, by extension, the state of mind, the spiritual state, if you prefer, of the country. I will not dwell on qualifications regarding their methods or discourse, neither the spokesperson for the Esquerra group in Congress nor the mayor – mayoress, she says – of Ripoll. It is enough to remember that they are two populist and polarizing styles. By this I do not mean, in any way, that they are equal or comparable (Rufián does not use Orriols' Islamophobia), but simply that I do not find them to be examples of good politics, nor commendable figures. It is also significant that neither Rufián nor Orriols are national politicians, even though Orriols has a seat in Parliament. The popularity we spoke of they have achieved outside of national politics, understood as that which has Catalonia as its scope and object. Rufián has been in Madrid for ages. Orriols has his epicenter in the city of Ripoll. Where are the national politicians? Well, all of them below Rufián and Orriols, as indicated by the latest poll published by ARA. The President of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa, occupies third place. And Carles Puigdemont, ninth (second to last). Oriol Junqueras appears in a not-so-bad fourth position. Furthermore, his party, which wins many votes, seems to be recovering from the dismal last electoral cycle. The problem here is another: Rufián is more popular than Junqueras both among the electorate in general and among Republican voters in particular. An insolent question for the leadership of ERC: in view of this, should the party strive to be more like Rufián or vice versa: should Rufián try to be more like the party? Let's add some other element. The capital change that is taking place in Catalonia is the meteoric rise of Aliança Catalana, Orriols' formation. This can change almost everything. One of the consequences of this growth, regarding the combination of forces, is that it will absolutely prevent a new pro-independence government in Catalonia. Whoever still has this dream should let it go. Forget about it for a long time. If it was already very complicated before, it will now become impossible. Neither the PSC, nor the PP, nor Vox will have achieved it. The voters of a party that, what a paradox, calls itself and wants to be more Catalan and more pro-independence than anyone else will have achieved it: Aliança Catalana. As can be seen, the general landscape drawn by the ARA poll – which agrees with other previous opinion studies – is between strange and bleak. And no, it is no consolation that in other places, near or far, they are worse off than us.

The poll we published in ARA this weekend dared to put numbers on the political reality, which, no matter how much scientific basis the work has, always ends up causing an endless discussion. Especially when there are still more than two years to go until the parliamentary elections, if the Illa government manages to complete the legislature, because the political, economic, and social situation is only getting more tangled.This is the first observation: the growing discontent would not be directed against the PSC, nor against Esquerra or Comuns, who support it, but would take the form of a historic shift of a large part of the country's electorate towards the far-right, curiously not large enough to force a change of government but sufficient to send Junts from second to fifth position.The growth of Alianza Catalana and Vox is more than probable (we'll see if in these proportions), and it's noticeable as soon as you step outside. The protest vote against everything, especially with the extraordinary increase in immigration that Catalonia has experienced, would take the form of the far-right, exactly as happens in all democracies. But the case of Catalonia, with its own political system and the strong influence of the Spanish political system, would present some elements to consider.The idea that ““és català tot aquell que viu i treballa a Catalunya (i ho vol ser)”” has been blown to pieces. A good part of the Catalanist voter doubts the strength that that powerful machine for “fer catalans”, which were the street, the school, the economy, the television, and the income difference with Spain, could now have, which without having its own state yielded extraordinary results. They doubt because countries with their own states like France and the United Kingdom have many problems, and because the mix of an immigrant influx, a digital cultural bubble, religious differences, and the marginalization of Catalan in schools and the legal inferiority of the language seems like a perfect storm for Catalan identity. And however aggressive Aliança Catalana's expressions towards Muslims may be, a sense of urgency prevails. In the case of Vox, the growth factors would be the Spanish nationalist reaction to immigration, to separatism, and to Pedro Sánchez's government, which is dragging on for them. Economic problems for many families, uncertainty for young people, an inaccessible housing market, bleak prospects in the labor market, artificial intelligence... The punishment vote, on the contrary, is served.It is not so strange that Orriols and Rufián are the best-rated politicians. To be rated, you first have to be known, and Rufián's star has not stopped growing, especially in Spain, and from this Spanish circuit, he grows in Catalonia. And Orriols, although less known, is on everyone's lips. However, personal rating and votes do not always go together. History is full of highly rated but poorly voted politicians.Good morning.

If there is a trend that the ARA survey confirms, it is that Gabriel Rufián is a politician highly valued by voters. Specifically, according to the poll commissioned by this newspaper, the ERC spokesperson in Madrid is the one who gets the best score and, in fact, the only one who passes (5). He is followed by the leader of Aliança Catalana, Sílvia Orriols, who gets a 4.2. The valuation of the far-right leader confirms the rise that all polls have shown in recent months. Both leaders are ahead of the president of the Generalitat and leader of the PSC, Salvador Illa, who gets a 4.1. With this data in hand, a first conclusion can be drawn: that one of the people, Gabriel Rufián, who has positioned himself as the battering ram against the far-right, is the best-valued leader, but that the leader who is the face, precisely, of the Catalan far-right is just behind.

The PSC has had two mayors in Ripoll since the recovery of democratic municipalities. Pere Jordi Piella was the first mayor after Franco and held the position from 1979 to 1993. Jaume Camps took over from 1993 to 1995. Neither of them, however, is currently a member of the PSC. The first left in 2017, not because of the Procés, but in disagreement with the PSOE's decision to abstain to allow Mariano Rajoy to be invested as president in 2016. The second has now resigned after the forced departure of the two socialist councilors who also abstained, but in this case so that the mayoress, Sílvia Orriols, could approve the budgets and not have to revive a vote of confidence doomed to failure.

Sílvia Orriols is considering running in the elections again. But she will not do so for Aliança Catalana. No, we are not talking about the leader of the Islamophobic party, who has already made it clear that she wants to revalidate the mayorship of Ripoll with the formation she created after breaking with the Front. We are talking about another Sílvia Orriols, the one who was mayoress of Llívia from 2011 to 2015 and who retired from politics in 2021."There is one year left until the elections and I do not rule out taking the step again at some point, because I did not like how I left," advances the Cerdaña politician in conversation with ARA, who reiterates that "it is not a definitively closed chapter." As for offers, there is no shortage. "Here we all talk to each other," she points out without specifying if she has any firm proposals. And if she received an offer from Aliança Catalana, would she accept it? "I would not accept it, I am more open and I do not like their discourse against immigration; here in the town we have always had immigration, and as a site manager, I work with people from all countries throughout the region."

Orbán, the friend of Trump and Putin, a figurehead of the European far-right, a Trojan horse in the European Union, has fallen resoundingly at the polls. Let his continental imitators and those who whitewash them and aspire to deal with him take note. Here the imitators are called Orriols and Abascal. Perhaps people are starting to be fed up with discourses of hate, division, and confrontation. With hopeless, enraged, and fatalistic shouting. With "everything is shit." With those who, instead of proposing viable solutions to very serious structural problems, look for enemies under every stone every day, magnify them, feed them. With those who fuel chaos, like Trump does.

Junts has been marking a tough stance against immigration for some time. They feel the breath of Aliança Catalana and Vox on their necks and believe the best strategy is to copy their discourse. I speak with the taxi driver and the doorman, the waiter and the shop assistant, and we all share the same feeling of weariness with a political class that seems to live light-years away from people's real lives. They play a game that isn't ours, even if they do it with our money and our lives. Now they're bringing up the burqa issue in Congress, knowing it's useless. Why are they doing it? Why are they throwing hours and public resources into the trash? To spread propaganda, of course, now that the one from Ripoll is chasing them. Catalan right-wing, like all Western right-wings, has completely renounced classical liberalism which spoke of good sense and order (that hypocrisy sustained on the violent exploitation of the working class) and is embracing cruelty organized and inspired by Trump. It is the perversion of stoking the hatred of the poor (even if they consider themselves middle class) against the poor who are a little poorer and already come from home with eroded humanity because they have had the whim to be born in another country. 

Beyond the very short-term vision that usually dominates political parties and this Wednesday's discussion in Parliament (surprise: the one who got more wet, or who spread more butter, was Orriols), the Ripoll episode, in which the municipal budgets presented by a fascist and racist party like Alianza Catalana were approved with the votes of two PSC councilors, points to the questions of a not-so-distant future. Questions like these: What policy will Catalan parties follow regarding AC, the day after the next municipal elections? Will they make a deal with it? Will they not make a deal but "consent" to receive its "external" support to invest mayors and government teams? And a little later, to approve budgets? Or will they follow (as should undoubtedly be done with fascist and/or far-right formations) a cordon sanitaire policy? The two socialist councilors have been dismissed for having contravened their party's position on this matter, and that is correct (if we're asking for things, this same speed would be appreciated, in all parties, in other internal matters, such as those affecting corruption or sexual harassment). But the reasonable doubt persists: in the next municipal elections, scheduled for 2027, all surveys and polls predict an exponential increase in votes and representation for AC, in line with the rise experienced by far-right and racist formations throughout the West (it is true that the first signs of a certain deflation are beginning to be perceived, such as Orbán's defeat in Hungary, Donald Trump's low popularity in the US, the small but significant changes of course by the opportunistic Meloni in Italy, but of course all this, as of today, means nothing concrete: talking about trend changes is premature and illusory).

Enric Pérez and Anna Belén Avilés are no longer representatives of the PSC in the Ripoll City Council. Nor does the local socialist group exist anymore in the capital of Ripoll. The PSC Federation of the Girona regions agreed this Tuesday to liquidate the Ripoll executive and create a management committee. The leadership has made this decision after the local group closed ranks with the two councilors, who had warned that no one from the candidacy wanted to replace them because they disagree with the decision to expel them. Both resigned on Monday after the party censured them for abstaining from voting on the budgets and allowing Aliança Catalana to approve them. Their resignation has opened an unprecedented crisis in the PSC of Ripoll. The two councilors have left with reproaches to the PSC, and now the leadership will have to find people willing to take over the seat for the remaining year of the term.

The right wing has already advanced its flirtation with the far right. And there is no time to lose. Two councilors from the PSC of Ripoll broke the taboo by saving the budgets for Sílvia Orriols, mayor of Ripoll and a reference of Catalan neofascism. Fortunately, the party has intervened and the councilors have placed their positions at the disposal of the PSC leadership, a step towards the exit door. We all know that, in the realm of local politics, the psychopathology of small differences between natural allies can lead to extravagant combinations, and that miserable personal interests can upset the apple cart. But, at a time when the PP has taken off its mask throughout Spain and Feijóo has opted for the normalization of Vox – carrying Abascal's baggage –, for the socialists to break the democratic taboo by giving recognition to the leader of the Catalan far right was a gift to the right wing (of Catalonia and Spain) and a disturbing – and apparently unnecessary – sign of weakness. We hope the anecdote will serve as a vaccine. Now that Pedro Sánchez seeks the role of European leader in the fight against neofascism, it was a pathetic gaffe.

The Orriols surname has become increasingly popular in Catalan politics since the mayor of Ripoll came to power with a fiery speech against immigration and against other pro-independence parties. She is one of the founders of Aliança Catalana, the far-right party that is gaining the most in polls, especially at the expense of Junts. But there is also an Orriols who precisely represents Carles Puigdemont's formation: Irina Orriols, the sister. She is a councilor in Sora, a small town of just over 200 inhabitants in the Osona region, bordering Ripollès. The political origin of the two sisters is the same, the Front Nacional de Catalunya. In fact, they ran together in 2019 in Ripoll, with Sílvia as the lead candidate and Irina in a symbolic number 9, to accompany her sister. But in 2023 they chose different paths and, in Sora, Irina Orriols was the fourth most voted councilor when she represented Junts with the open list system.