The crisis in Ceuta has to do with the regularization of migrants?

MadridThe entry of thousands of migrants into Ceuta in the last few hours, which has already left several fatalities, has led the right and far-right to target the Spanish government's extraordinary regularization process for migrants. "The images coming from Ceuta demonstrate that granting Spanish, and therefore European, citizenship to more than 500,000 irregular immigrants is a wrong decision that encourages human trafficking," reacted Italian Vice President and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani quickly to the crisis. A narrative to which the PP, Vox, and even the White House have joined. The Spanish government, through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, has rushed to censor it. "It has nothing to do [...] unlike what is falsely being said from some quarters," Foreign Ministry sources stated on Thursday night. At Moncloa, they link it to "criminal mafias" who have taken advantage of the reading of the Supreme Court's ruling.

First of all, it should be taken into account that the people who have entered Ceuta and Melilla are not affected by the regularization process. The Spanish government's extraordinary measure ended on June 30 with 1,174,978 applications submitted. Since then, no one can apply for it anymore. Beyond its completion, it is a process full of strict and defined requirements, starting with the accreditation of residence in Spain before January 1, 2026. But also the fact of having been in Spain for five consecutive months before that date.

After what happened in Ceuta, the PP and Vox have stated that this process had generated a so-called "pull effect," an idea they already championed when the measure was launched. "No one should be surprised that thousands of people want to enter a country that regularizes a million irregular immigrants overnight," said the Secretary General of the PP, Miguel Tellado.

In this regard, however, it should be borne in mind that once the application is submitted, regularization is not automatic. First, the petitions must be admitted for processing and the Spanish government has three months to respond favorably or not. A month ago (the last day of the process) more than half of the applications had been admitted for processing. For the moment, rejected applications have not been made public. Once the application is accepted, beneficiaries will have a temporary authorization for one year to live and work in Spain. But then they must re-demonstrate certain requirements in order to renew it.

What has happened on other occasions?

But beyond the fact that the number of applications in authorized regularizations cannot be translated, this is not the first time that Spain has carried out a process of this nature. If what the government of Pedro Sánchez has approved is taken into account, the State has carried out six extraordinary regularization processes for migrants since the 1980s, two of which were under the government of José María Aznar (PP). And in parallel, it has launched other avenues to regularize the entry of migrants.

The last time a similar mechanism was carried out was in 2005 with the government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero (PSOE). Residence and temporary work permits were authorized for 576,000 people. "The improvements relating to the right to work in the formal economy that the new regulations entailed, for workers in an irregular situation, did not translate into a pull effect of immigrant workers attracted by the new situation [...] nor into a significant increase in the arrival of immigrants," concludes a report by the Social Observatory of the "la Caixa" Foundation from 2021 in collaboration with Pompeu Fabra University.

Throughout this time, various experts have already indicated that that process "did not cause" this effect. In fact, as the authors of the study point out, the process also had a positive impact on the economy: "Each regularized person contributed between 4,000 and 5,000 euros annually just in salary taxes," it is indicated. Joan Monrás, Professor of Economics and one of the authors of the study, stated that "the 2005 regularization had a clearly positive effect." Government sources insist, however, that "it is impossible" to link the current crisis in Ceuta with the regularization process.