Spain's government opposes extending vote suspension to adult children of nationalized citizens

Government position

The State Attorney's Office, acting for the Ministry of the Presidency, Justice and Relations with the Cortes, has asked the Supreme Court to reject a request from Vox and Iustitia Europa to extend the suspension of voting in the 29 November general election to the adult children of people who gained Spanish nationality under the 'grandchildren law'. The filing argues that the extension would create uncertainty for those affected and could affect the final count. It also says the request falls outside the current procedure and goes beyond the object of the case. The government wants the court to summon the affected third parties before deciding on the interim measure, and it has asked for costs to be imposed on the groups that made the request.

Who would be affected

The Supreme Court has already suspended the vote for people who gained nationality under the law without documenting their parents' exile, a group the government puts at about 163,000. Iustitia Europa asked the court last week to extend the suspension to everyone listed in Annex III of a 2022 Justice Ministry instruction. The government's filing puts that annex at 189,678 entries as of 31 July 2026, just before the electoral roll closed. In the same filing, the government said that a month later it had raised the number of nationalities granted through this route to 195,872 and acknowledged another 134,405 approved applications still awaiting registration. A separate account of the filing gives 189,578 for the same annex, so the sources differ on the exact count.

Workload and the count

The government says that identifying the roughly 163,000 people already covered took about six weeks of uninterrupted work, from mid-September to the end of October. The filing explains that neither the consular registry nor other administrative databases record the route by which nationality was acquired, so each consular office had to examine files one by one. That effort required extra staff, cancelled leave, work on public holidays and temporary closures to the public across 172 consular offices. The government argues that repeating this for the rest of the annex would be impossible in a shorter timeframe, and that the filing does not say what material and human resources would make it possible.

Annex III entries (31 July 2026)189,678

Nationalities granted via route (a month later)195,872

Approved applications pending registration134,405

Annex III entries (31 July 2026)

189678 count

Nationalities granted via route (a month later)

195872 count

Approved applications pending registration

134405 count

Data from the article text

In its filing, the State Attorney's Office put the core objection plainly:

“The nominal list being requested does not exist”

The filing also warns that the suspension could leave ballots cast but still waiting to be counted, which could affect the final tally and its proclamation.

Court timeline

The Supreme Court's Contentious-Administrative Chamber declined on Friday, 30 October, to adopt the measure urgently and without hearing the other side. Instead it gave the parties three days to file arguments, a deadline that runs out on Tuesday, 3 November, the day the government filed its response. Iustitia Europa and Vox argue that if the judges have suspended the parents' vote, the children's vote should be examined with the same rigor. The government counters that the measure would exceed the case and would question the legality of a Justice Ministry instruction.

The government's lawyers also say the petition is hard to act on in practice:

“It is itself indeterminate and impossible to comply with at the moment it is requested”

The court has yet to rule on the interim request, and the government's filing asks it to hear the affected families first.