Conservative People's Party to win Spanish election with week to go, polls forecast

The conservative People's Party will win the Spanish election on July 23, several polls forecast on Monday, the last day they can be published, with just a week to go before the vote on Sunday.

The group hopes to make a comeback five years after it was ousted from power in 2018 in a vote of no confidence following the Gürtel corruption scandal. While in the past the PP ruled with an absolute majority, polls predict the party will need support from other forces, such as far-right Vox.

Spanish newspaper El Periódico published a survey on Monday showing the PP obtaining 126-130 seats, surpassing the Socialists' 104-108, followed by far-right Vox's 44-48 seats and left-wing anti-austerity Sumar's 37-40.

With these results, the right-wing parties PP and Vox, if they form a coalition, will either, depending on the range of seats counted, fall short of the absolute majority of 176, with 170 seats, or easily surpass it with 178 seats. Meanwhile, left-wing Socialist and Sumar will obtain a maximum of 148 seats, according to El Periódico's poll.

Similarly, La Razón daily's poll forecasts PP will get between 153-156 seats and Vox 26-28, with both parties obtaining the majority of seats. Meanwhile, the left would fall short of a majority even with the backing of all the other parties in the chamber, from Catalan pro-independence parties to other regional forces.

Spanish public broadcaster RTVE also expects the conservative PP to win. The group would get, after many polls, an average of 142 seats, with Vox securing 36, PSOE 106, and Sumar 33. With these results, PP and Vox would obtain 178 seats and left-wing parties 139.

Even if current Spanish PM and Socialist candidate Pedro Sánchez attempted to keep the top spot with a deal similar to that seen following the 2019 elections, there would only be 161 congressional representatives voting for him, 6 less than three-and-a-half years ago. At the time, 167 politicians backed the Socialist in a second vote to be appointed PM and 165 were against it.

In the last election, the Socialists won 120 seats, followed by the conservative People's Party's 89, Vox's 52 seats, while Unidas Podemos, the anti-austerity party in place before Sumar recently appeared, got 35.

Uncertainty for Catalan pro-independence parties

While the Socialist's Pedro Sánchez and PP's Alberto Núñez Feijóo are the main contenders in the battle to become Spain's next PM, the Catalan pro-independence parties could play a key role if right-wing parties fall short of a majority.

However, while Esquerra Republicana backed Sánchez's prime ministerial bid in 2020, Junts did not. Years later, both parties are competing against each other to be the most-voted pro-independence force.

RTVE's polls forecast ERC will get 1.43% of the vote while Junts will get 1.27%. This has them tied at 8 seats, with Esquerra losing 5 out of 13 they have had this last term and Junts keeping as many as in 2019. 

Spanish newspaper El País predicts 2.1% of the electorate intends to vote for Junts and 1.5% for Esquerra. La Razón, meanwhile, gives ERC 9-10 seats and 2.4% of the vote and Junts 8-9 seats with 2.1% of the votes.

El Periódico also expects ERC to get more seats than Junts, 8-9 to 7-8.

Around 0.6% of the electorate intends to vote for far-left pro-independence CUP according to, El País, while RTVE expects the party to lose 1 of the 2 MPs they currently have. The same result was predicted by La Razón newspaper.

CIS latest poll

A last-minute CIS poll published on Monday, the Spanish government-funder survey, predicts PSOE will win and would get 32.2% of the votes, just 1.4 percentage points more than the conservative People's Party with 30.8%.

Left-wing Sumar would be the third most-voted party with 14.9% of the votes, while far-right Vox would get 11.8%. 

Regarding pro-independence parties, ERC would be the fifth most-voted party in Congress with 2.1% of the votes, followed by Junts' 1.4%. CUP would see 0.6% of the votes.

The survey asked 8,798 people between July 10 and 12, just after the one-to-one debate between Socialist candidate Pedro Sánchez and conservative Alberto Núñez Feijóo.