Spanish elections and politics

[Former President tack50]

D-Day is here people. Today is the date for the unilateral Catalan independence referendum. I will say that it's being a sh**tshow on both sides.

The referendum has only barely more credibilty than a North Korean election. There's no functioning census even though the pro-independence side illegally used one, many polling places have been closed, the telecommunications system to count the votes is down, in many places people are voting without envelopes, etc. Even the 2014 one was better organized.

On the other hand the Spanish government's repression has just made things worse. Why they didn't just allow them to vote I won't understand. Just say that the referendum is illegal and boycott it and that's it. They already did that in 2014, they could just have done it again!

My only guess is that Rajoy wanted to look "tough on Catalonia" and that there are a lot of critics from his right asking for a tougher response, but still.

What more do they want Rajoy to do? They aren't actually advocating for killing people right?

No, of course not. I think the people asking for a harsher response basically want Rajoy to openly activate article 155 and essencially dissolve Catalonia's autonomous government, and maybe send Puigdemont and his cabinet to prison while they are at it.

[Former President tack50]

Is the whole situation as bad as the Catalan government says it is? From what I can tell, it is, but since I don’t live in Spain, I’m not 100% sure.

http://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-europe-41459688/police-use-batons-on-crowd-in-barcelona

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-41461032

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2017/oct/01/catalan-independence-referendum-spain-catalonia-vote-live

Ok thank you

This whole situation is horrible, and at this point, I find it hard to see how the Catalans won’t vote against secession from the federal government.

Well, they won't vote. This referendum is basically worthless and the Spanish government won't give them one. (unless Podemos+nationalists somehow get an absolute majority, but lol)

But yeah, this will just embolden the pro-independence side. I wouldn't be surprised if independence support increases quite a bit after this.

[Former President tack50]

Official (provisional) results from the referendum:

Yes 2,020,144(90 %)
No 176,566 (7,8 %)
Turnout: 2,262,464 (no official data but using the 2015 regional elections as a benchmark it implies 41% turnout)

There are still like 50000 votes not counted.

[Former President tack50]

Official (provisional) results from the referendum:

Yes 2,020,144(90 %)
No 176,566 (7,8 %)
Turnout: 2,262,464 (no official data but using the 2015 regional elections as a benchmark it implies 41% turnout)

There are still like 50000 votes not counted.

Where are they published?

There was a press conference reciently. They were also published on the official twitter page for the catalan government

https://twitter.com/govern/status/914618211164934144
https://twitter.com/govern/status/914618004582879232

[Former President tack50]

Is the whole situation as bad as the Catalan government says it is? From what I can tell, it is, but since I don’t live in Spain, I’m not 100% sure.

http://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-europe-41459688/police-use-batons-on-crowd-in-barcelona

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-41461032

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2017/oct/01/catalan-independence-referendum-spain-catalonia-vote-live

Ok thank you

This whole situation is horrible, and at this point, I find it hard to see how the Catalans won’t vote against secession from the federal government.

Well, they won't vote. This referendum is basically worthless and the Spanish government won't give them one. (unless Podemos+nationalists somehow get an absolute majority, but lol)

But yeah, this will just embolden the pro-independence side. I wouldn't be surprised if independence support increases quite a bit after this.

This referendum is totally legitimate. Let Catalonia be free.

Come on. I am not completely against a proper referendum (though I'd try to make it only a last chance compromise, ideally a federal Spain, fiscal autonomy or more self governance should be the preferred options), but this was far from a proper referendum. Even North Korean elections are more reliable.

There was no proper census, people were able to vote more than once, the police closed several polling places, there was an organized unionist boycott, etc.

If this had been a perfectly organized and legal referendum, I'd be the first to support Catalan independence, but this is not the way forward.

[Former President tack50]

The king spoke today on a special speech on national TV. This is actually very unprecedented as the king has only spoken on national TV outside christmas 3 times before: during the 1981 coup, right after the 2004 Madrid bombings and when he anounced his resignation in 2014.

The speech itself was quite uninteresting, just talking about "unadmisible unloyalty" by the Catalan government, guaranteeing Spain's unity and the like. Nothing that he hasn't said before.

It's less about the speech itself and more about the fact that he made a speech on TV.

Also, Rajoy met yesterday with both PSOE leader Pedro Sánchez and Cs leader Albert Rivera, with completely opposite results. Sánchez asked Rajoy to talk with Puigdemont while Rivera asked him to use article 155. Meanwhile Podemos wants PSOE to drop support for Rajoy and call a no confidence vote (which would pass if he got PNV and the Catalan nationalists).

[Former President tack50]

As part of the most recient CIS poll (which also said that Catalonia and terrorism have spiked as worries for Spaniards), there was apparently a question about centralism and federalism (which is always there) that I think could be interesting considering the current situation in Catalonia:

Please tell with which of these proposals for Spain's territorial organization do you agree with the most:

A state without autonomous communities: 18.9%
A state where autonomous communities have less powers than currently: 10.5%
A state with autonomous communities like we currently have: 36.8%
A state where autonomous communities have more powers than as of now: 15.8%
A state where autonomous communities would have the chance to become independent: 9.6%

Joining options 1 and 2 and 4 and 5 you probably get something like this:

Centralism: 29.4%
Status Quo: 36.8%
Federalism/Independence: 25.4%

As for party crosstabs, PP voters prefer centralism in general (47.6-38.5-7). PSOE prefers the status quo. Interestingly centralism beats federalism even though PSOE is the only party that explicitly calls for a federal state (23.9-49.4-19.2). Podemos voters prefer federalism/independence (25.3-32.5-41.3) and finally Cs voters also prefer centralism (44.5-32.5-17.5) though are slighly more moderate than PP ones as they prefer less autonomy over no autonomies at all.

And obviously those that voted for Catalan nationalist parties want independence. PNV voters want the status quo or more (4.5-54.5-40.9)

http://datos.cis.es/pdf/Es3187rei_A.pdf

Other crosstabs are available as well (by gender, by age, etc)

http://www.cis.es/cis/opencms/ES/NoticiasNovedades/InfoCIS/2017/Documentacion_3187.html

Interestingly these numbers show a drop in support for the status quo and those who want independence. Those who want more central government have been increasing. Federalists have stayed flat. 

[Former President tack50]

Well, it's official guys, Puigdemont actually did it! The absolute madman! He declared independence for all of 8 seconds before going back on his word and suspending the independence declaration for the sake of dialog (because of course Rajoy has been so open to it).

So now apparently an independent Catalonia has the somewhat dubious honor of being the shortest lived state and third shortest lived state in history respectively.



Now seriously, Puigdemont basically went to the Catalan parliament, implicitly declared independence (though he didn't say "I declare the independence of the Catalan Republic" or anything like that, he just hinted at it) and he inmediately suspended it.

I'm not sure if I should be disappointed or relieved. Tomorrow Rajoy will speak in the Congress of Deputies. Also tomorrow everyone expects the Constitutional Court to declare the indepependence declaration illegal.

https://elpais.com/elpais/2017/10/10/inenglish/1507620922_401849.html

As for reactions, the unionists (PSC, PP, Cs) are obviously unhappy with this. CUP is also unhappy, they wanted an explicit independence declaration that was effective inmediately. Maybe they'll break their deal, leading to an early election? Surprisingly, Podemos has been quite positive that they haven't declared independence outright and went for more talks.

[Former President tack50]

Yesterday's weird "non declaration of independence" has been responded with an equally weird "non activation of article 155". Rajoy has asked the Catalan government if they have actually declared independence or not.

More interestingly, PSOE has said that they have reached an agreement with PP. They will support activating article 155, in exchange for a constitutional reform in 6 months. However that constitutional reform won't include a referendum.

I can see the reform making no one happy, with Podemos and nationalists voting against it since it lacks a referendum and Cs voting against it as they've been moving to the right of PP reciently.

PSOE+PP has the numbers for a light constitutional reform, but not for a large one. And it would require a referendum

Depending on how ambitious they want to be they might have to talk with Cs and Podemos or not.

[Former President tack50]

All ultimatums given by the Spanish government before they activate article 155 have expired. So article 155 will be activated and the government in Madrid will take back control of certain competences for a while.

However, this won't happen until Saturday, when the government will go to the Senate and vote a proposal for applying article 155 which requires an absolute majority (not a problem, PP alone already has one, and they also have PSOE and Cs support, meaning that 80% of the Senate is in favour)

In the mean time Puigdemont has threatened to vote the declaration of independence and actually do it for real this time.

As for how this is affecting parties, Podemos seems to be stuck at 17-18%. PP and PSOE have dropped and Cs has dramatically increased to the point where it's now tied with Podemos for third place. I guess Podemos is getting their base of people who want a soft response but nobody else, while Cs is getting hardliners from PSOE and PP. That poll is not an outlier.

[Former President tack50]

We finally have details about how article 155 will work. The government will basically fire Puidemont and his entire cabinet, taking control of Catalonia's institutions temporarily (the generalitat won't be dissolved technically, but it will become an empty puppet). The government will call a snap election in 6 months or less.

Puigdemont still has some time to react as the Senate won't vote on this until the 27th. In fact many are saying that he should call a parliamentary vote and declare independence on Monday.

As for the Senate vote, it will get roughly 80% of the Senate in favour. The expected result is this:

Yea (216): PP*+PSOE+Cs

Nay (46): Podemos+ERC+PDECat+PNV+Bildu+Compromís

Unsure (4): ASG (party of a "cacique" in La Gomera)+CC+NCa

* PP includes the senators from UPN in Navarra, Foro in Asturias and PAR in Aragon.

[Former President tack50]

Nobody really knows. I guess the current Catalan government stays in place. It would be a bad outcome though, as they would likely keep pushing for independence, which would lead to article 155 being activated again, new elections again, etc

[Former President tack50]

Yesterday we thought that Puigdemont actually might surrender and call a snap election but in the end he refused because Rajoy wouldn't give amnesty to the leaders of the 2 largest civil society lobbying groups for independence and immunity to Puigdemont and his cabinet or something like that. What a shame

Anyways today 2 important things regarding Catalonia happened.

First, the Catalan parliament declared independence, for real this time, not just 8 seconds. The vote went as expected, civil servants saying it was illegal, unionists boycotting the vote, etc. The final result was:

Yes: 70
No: 10
Blank: 2

The vote was by secret ballot, so we can't really know for sure how many defectors there were on either side. JxSí+CUP have 72 MPs while CQSP has 11 so we can assume that there were a few defectors on both sides.

The other weird thing is that the actual independence declaration was not in the law itself but on the preamble, which almost never has actual effects, but it's still part of the law. Not much difference


Shortly after, the Spanish senate finally passed article 155. The end result was as follows:

Yes: 214 (PP+PSOE+Cs+CC-AHI+Foro+UPN)
No: 47 (Podemos+PDECat+ERC+PNV+Bildu+Compromís)
Abstaining: 1 (NCa)

And right as I write this, Rajoy has activated article 155 for real. This means the Puigdemont and his cabinet have been fired, the Catalan devolved police placed under direct control from the Spanish ministry of the interior, and the Catalan government are basically puppets of the Spanish government. A snap election in Catalonia has been called for the 21st of December, the earliest date allowed by the law (a snap election needs to be called at least 2 months in advance).

Terrible situation all around, literally the worst case "trains crashing" scenario. Today is a sad day in Spain's history

[Former President tack50]

I have to imagine the recent events would push PSOE support to both Podemos and PP/C in non-Catalonia Spain.  Would be eager to see post-Oct 27 polls.

Well, we finally have some Catalan polls for the December 21st election after everything that has happened (we have actually had them for a while but they were outdated the moment they came out). The first poll taken after Puigdemont left to Belgium has this result:


 
Secessionists still have a bare majority of 1 (68-67). Interestingly, PDECat's candidate might not be in favour of unilateral independence, but instead switching back to the positions of CiU before 2012, while defending a referendum with approval from Spain like Podemos!

The only declared candidate thus far, is Santi Vila, former regional minister of business (2017), culture (2016-2017) and territory and sustainability (2012-2016) has those positions. In fact he actually resigned shortly before the declaration of independence. Then again he might not remain as the only candidate for long, or maybe he'll run unopposed, who knows?

In fact PDECat is not the only party with an internal schism. Pablo Iglesias has "article 155-ed" his party's branch in Catalonia and forced a referendum on whether they should go in coalition with only Ada Colau's party and allies. This is because their regional leader there, Dante Fachín, is actually in favour of independence and wanted an alliance with ERC

And of course it's still not clear whether CUP will contest the election or not. They say that it will be decided by the party membership.

As for general election polls, not many yet though the general direction seems to be Cs up, everyone else going down a bit.

Also, just realized that if Catalonia actually goes out to vote on December 21st, the election will actually be held on a Thursday instead of a Sunday! This might depress turnout though I think workers are allowed by law to have at least 2 hours free at work to be able to go out and vote.

Now, there have been elections held on workdays, but they aren't common, especially not in our recient history. The first 3 general elections (1977, 1979, 1982) were indeed held on workdays (Wednesday for the first 2, Thursday for 1982). And the 1976, 1978 and 1986 referendums were also held on a workday. And even Catalonia's first regional election (1980) was held on a Thirsday indeed

But outside Spain's early democratic history there aren't many examples. The 2006 Catalan election was held on a Wednesday, but that was a public holiday (November 1st, all saints day) so it doesn't really count.

Seems like an odd move but apparently Rajoy preferred to call the election on a workday rather than wait a little longer.

[Former President tack50]

Hmm, I wonder if a PSOE-C's coalition with Podemos supply is at all possible.

1. C's and Podemos are fundamentally opposed over the Catalan issue. C's probably prefers Article 155 to the current events, while Podemos is fine with the Catalan govt holding a referendum. If the unstable Spanish government is brought down over Catalonia, this government won't come into being.

2. The poll posted with seat projections had PP+C's having a confident majority, far removed from the troubles of the current government. That would be the government forming in the event of new elections.

If only Susana Diaz had won...

If Susana Diaz won, the three major parties would be PP, C and Podemos. C does already have the centrist centralist electorate and electors usually prefer the original.

And the current leader is pretty much a Podemos rep.

^wtf

On a side note we had a host of Catalan mayors march into the European Quarter to hold some speeches, and Addidas have released the Spain World Cup kit with the Republican flag on it, triggering the entire Spanish Right-wig twittersphere, and according to the Spanish football federation "people right from the top".




Also apparently Vox is given a seat in some nationwide polls? I thought they faded to irrelevance? Who is leading them these days?

Yeah, the reaction to the Spanish shirt on the world cup has been pretty funny.

And here's the actual poll where VOX gets a seat:



I personally think it's an outlier (not just VOX getting a seat out of nowhere but also Cs breaking 20%), but maybe its findings will be confirmed later who knows.

As for who is leading them, shortly after narrowly failing to get seats in the 2014 EU elections, their leader, was replaced with former MP in the Basque regional parliament Santiago Abascal. He has also tried to steer the party in a different direction, making it more of a Spanish AfD or PVV, adopting very harsh rethoric against muslim inmigration and terrorism. They also want to completely abolish the comunidades autonomas and are extremely hardline on Catalonia.

While they did indeed fade to irrelevance for the most part, for all what's worth they have a large following in Spain's largest forum board: Forocoches. Of course, Forocoches is basically the Spanish 4chan so it's no surprise they win big there. For all what's worth their latest horrible poll has:

Cs: 32.9%
VOX: 21.3%
PP: 9.0%
PSOE: 3.8%

So yeah, definitely nothing remotely reliable. In fact VOX used one of their polls as proof that they were doing good in the 2016 election and got mocked in the internet.

For all what's worth though the "others" category has been slowly rising in most polls so maybe they are indeed right, but we can't really know who is in there. It could have also been PACMA or even UPyD (another outlier gave them like 3% this August but no other polls confirmed that so I guess it was a junk poll).

If a new non nationalist party wants to get a seat, their number 1 priority should be to get at least 3% of the vote in either Madrid or Barcelona provinces, which basically guarantees that they'll get a seat. The lowest percentage with which a national party has received seats was UPyD in 2008 who got 1 seat with 1.19% of the vote nationally (3.7% in Madrid). And the highest with no seats was CDS in 1993, which got 1.76% of the vote nationally but narrowly missed the theshold in Madrid (got 2.99% of the vote, missing the threshold by 440 votes).

So depending on how well concentrated VOX's vote is, they might be able to get 1 seat with as low as 1.6% of the vote (what they got in the 2014 EU election).

[Former President tack50]

Is the threshold 2%?

On paper: 3% at the constituency level.

In practice the threshold only really applies to Madrid and Barcelona provinces as every other place doesn't have enough seats for a party with 3% to get in. After Madrid and Barcelona (with more than 30 seats each) the next largest would be Valencia but that one only has 15 seats so to get a seat there you would need to be at around 5% or so.

The seats are distributed accorging to constituencies, not all of Spain. So in theory you could have a party winning the popular vote but getting less seats. That was a possibility between Podemos and PSOE in the run up to the 2016 election, some thought PSOE would get more seats but a lower popular vote percentage than Podemos. In the end they ended up winning both.

And as for PACMA, they got their best result in Barcelona (1.8% while they were at 1.2% nationally). In theory a good campaign could mean a seat for PACMA in Barcelona but it's highly unlikely.

[Former President tack50]

If PSOE and Citizens combined got over 175 seats (or close enough they could do a deal with some regional parties) - could they forma  government together and dispense with the need to accommodate PP and Podemos altogether? 

No regional party would ever want to support a government with Citizens in.

The Canarian parties would but they will almost certainly only get 1 seat from CC. NCa ran alongside PSOE last time so in any PSOE led coalition they'll support that

[Former President tack50]

For all what's worth, while the Metroscopia poll is 100% real and from a decent polling company, Metroscopia has consistently overpolled Cs. I do believe that Cs has increased quite a lot and has overtaken Podemos, but they are probably still at 20% or lower, with PSOE ahead of them by a couple points.

Also, notice the increase in "others". It's at 13.8% while on the general election of 2016 it was at  10.1%. This makes me think that maybe that poll that gave VOX a seat was not an outlier after all or that PACMA might be able to get a seat.

[Former President tack50]

The time to register as a party to be able to take part in the Catalan election has ended. The following parties will present candidates. The ones with a chance to get seats appear in a colour other than black.

All of Catalonia

PARTIT DELS SOCIALISTES DE CATALUNYA (PSC-PSOE)
PARTIT POPULAR / PARTIDO POPULAR (PP)
ESQUERRA REPUBLICANA-CATALUNYA SÍ (ERC-CatSÍ)
CIUTADANS-PARTIDO DE LA CIUDADANIA (C’s)
CANDIDATURA D’UNITAT POPULAR (CUP)
CATALUNYA EN COMÚ-PODEM (CatComú-Podem)
JUNTS PER CATALUNYA (JUNTSxCAT)
RECORTES CERO-GRUPO VERDE (RECORTES CERO-GRUPO VERDE)
PARTIT ANIMALISTA CONTRA EL MALTRACTAMENT ANIMAL (PACMA)
PER UN MON MES JUST (PUM+J)
DIÀLEG REPUBLICÀ (DIÀLEG)

Barcelona only

LA FAMILIA PAZ Y LIBERTAD (La Familia)
DEMOCRACIA NACIONAL (DN)
PARTIT FAMILIA i VIDA (PFiV)
CONVERGENTS (CNV)
UNIDOS y SOCIALISTAS+por la Democracia

Tarragona only
CIUDADANOS LIBRES UNIDOS (CLIUS)

Party leaders and candidates

PSC-PSOE: Miquel Iceta
PP: Xavier García Albiol
ERC: Oriol Junqueras is the number 1 in the list but he is in jail. The de facto leader is Marta Rovira
Cs: Ines Arrimadas
CUP: Carles Riera. CUP has a strict one term policy for their leaders so their former leaders, Anna Gabriel and Antonio Baños are nowhere in the lists.
En Comú Podem: Xavier Domenech
Junts x Catalunya: Carles Puigdemont. He is in Belgium and I have no idea who the actual leader is. This is PDECat but under another name basically. Though the list includes a lot of independents (including the 2 Jordis that are in jail) and very few who are actually from PDECat.

https://www.boe.es/boe/dias/2017/11/19/pdfs/BOE-A-2017-13305.pdf


Of the minor lists, I'd say the only interesting ones are PACMA (who has a very small chance of getting seats, the threshold seems to be 3%), Convergents (founded by a corrupt regional minister, trying to be like the former Unió, as in nationalist but not secessionist) and maaaybe Recortes Cero (far left, even more than Podemos, but hardline unionist) and Democracia Nacional (the only far right party that is contesting the election). Also, apparently Dialeg República was an ERC list they registered in case the party was illegalized but they weren't able to drop out.

[Former President tack50]

What is PACMA's stance on the union?

Surprisingly, they don't have one! They seem to just ignore the issue and pretend it doesn't exist. None of their manifestos even had a single reference to the whole independence process.

[Former President tack50]

Slightly less than 1 month before the Catalan election, the polling average seems to be this:



Secesionists win 45.5-42.9-9.1 and they also win in seat count 67-57-11. They seem to have lost the psychologic barrier of 68 seats (a majority) but honestly that's still a toss up.

I personally hope they lose their majority, that way someone can at least hit the brakes and slow down things.

Also, it seems that the lists of candidates I posted before were temporary, and some of them apparently won't be able to run. In fact other than the ones that will get seats only PACMA, PUM+J, Recortes Cero and Dialeg Republica (idk why ERC didn't drop this list in the end) were allowed to run.

[Former President tack50]

Yeah, a tripartit 2.0 seems like an unlikely possibility given how much ERC and PSC hate each other. If Catalonia's independence wasn't on the table it would easily happen but I think independence is too big of an obstacle.

If secessionsists lose their majority it's one of the more realistic possibilities though. Maybe there's some variant of that like say, an ERC-Podemos minority government supported by JxCat, CUP or PSC depending on the votes

Of course, if secessionists keep their majority that option won't be considered.

[Former President tack50]

Tonight at midnight will officially begin the electoral campaign for the Catalan regional election. And just in time for that, Cs gets its first polling lead ever!

CIS

ERC: 32 (20,8%)
JxCatalunya: 25-26 (16,9%)
CUP: 9 (6,7%)

Cs: 31-32 (22,5%)
PSC: 21 (16%)
PP: 7 (5,8%)

Catalunya En Comú-Podem: 9 (8,6%)

Secessionists: 44,4%
Unionists: 47,1%
Mixed: 8,6%

PP becomes even more irrelevant in Catalonia and gets its worst result since 1991. It would also be a bad election for Podemos as they would get their worst result since 2003 (as ICV-EUiA)

Also, no government seems viable with those numbers IMO. A tripartit 2.0; a pure unionist and a pure secessionist government all lack a majority. I guess either Catalonia goes to a 2nd election or Podemos actually picks a side (most likely secessionists via abstaining).

http://cadenaser.com/ser/2017/12/04/politica/1512382472_552688.html

Though it's not the only recient poll. Here's another one.

Sociométrica/El Español

[Former President tack50]

If PP were to somehow drop out of the Catalan parliament entirely (lmao) could you get a C's-PSOE-Podemos alliance, or are C's too right for Podemos?

Well, PP falling short and getting 0 seats is almost unimaginable. To get seats you need at least 3% in one province. Of course in practice the 3% threshold only applies to Barcelona, everywhere else it's higher. And PP seems to be stronger than average in Barcelona (as expected for a unionist party), so they might need to drop even lower, to like 2.7% or so, in order to lose all their seats.

For reference, Cs entered the Catalan parliament in 2006 with exactly 3% of the vote (3.5% in Barcelona) and the Andalusian Socialist Party (an Andalusian nationalist party which bizarrely contested the 1980 Catalan election) managed to get a seat with 2.7% of the vote (3% in Barcelona)

I don't think it's possible at all for PP to lose all their seats. Even in a worst case scenario they'd drop all the way to 4 or so (losing all their non-Barcelona seats in the process), but not completely drop out. Same with CUP and Podemos.

Still, if it somehow happened a Cs-PSC-Podemos deal would be too right wing for Podemos. Remember we already saw the same scenario happen at the national level right after the 2015 election and Podemos voted against the PSOE-Cs deal (and with PSOE on top in fact!). Granted, Catalonia's circumstances make it different but even then if Arrimadas is the candidate I don't see it. Maybe they could support a minority PSC government if PSC somehow became the largest unionist force (or Cs allowed them to be regional president even if they are far from being the largest party, kind of like Cantabria 2003) but I'm not sure if that might happen.

[Former President tack50]

Here are some posters from the campaign:



No permission for being free, nor apologizing for actually being free



Democracy always wins



Puigdemont, our president



We have a lot in common (kind of a pun with the party name: "Catalunya en comú"



Now yes, we will vote (reference to "we will vote", which secessionists used during the illegal 1st of October referendum)



Solutions! Now Iceta!



Spain is the solution.

Seems like PSC and JxCat are running a presidential style campaign. That seems to be working in both cases, particularly JxCat, who seems to be rising a lot. Seems like they've been having the best campaign so far. Interestingly their posters seem to have copied Podemos