Housing defeat aftermath Sánchez weighs early polls

Oct 2

Maldonado and Claudia Cid report Sánchez clearing his weekend agenda to consider an early general election after the defeat of two housing decrees and the demonstrations. Cid previews an online meeting of Comuns, IU, Más Madrid and Movimiento Sumar the following day, with Mónica García being floated as a possible leader. The report says PP, Vox and Junts voted against the decrees. Ana Redondo criticizes the right; Salvador Illa expresses disappointment and accuses Junts of opposing tenant protection. Junts says the measures would worsen housing conditions, and Jordi Turull accuses Sánchez of electoral demagoguery. The government avoids a position on early elections. Bustinduy says an election would be a housing referendum; Feijóo calls for elections and promises a housing plan, describing the crisis as government failure. Vox's Figaredo calls the decrees a smokescreen for other crises, with Ceuta briefly mentioned. IU's Enrique Santiago calls for the people's voice to be heard; Irene Montero demands an end to housing profiteering before elections. These remain attributed and differing political positions. Neither an election call nor the planned left-wing meeting has occurred in this account.

On October 2, 2026, Spain's Congress of Deputies rejected Royal Decree-Law 26/2026 of September 29, the main package of urgent housing measures, by 178 votes against to 172 in favour, with no abstentions among 350 votes cast. President Francina Armengol announced that it was repealed after a public roll-call vote. This is the narrow defeat reported by ARD, whose brief identifies eviction protection in specified cases and tighter short-term-rental rules without supplying an identifier or tally. In the plenary debate, Isabel Rodríguez defended the package as a negotiated balance of tenant protection, support for small landlords and affordable-housing measures and offered urgent processing as a bill after ratification. PSOE, Sumar, ERC, EH Bildu, BNG, Podemos and Compromís backed it; PNV and Coalición Canaria expressed reservations but supported this first decree. PP, Vox, Junts and UPN opposed it, arguing that the government's approach failed on supply or harmed legal certainty and small owners. Those policy predictions and accusations remain the speakers' positions. The separate vote on decree 27/2026 is a different occurrence. Later RTVE and Tagesschau reports recap the same first-package defeat. RTVE’s legal account explains lost eviction, rent-cap, tax, short-term-rental and existing-contract-extension protections and retains uncertainty over judges’ treatment of extensions requested during brief validity. Mercedes’s complete personal follow-up describes a threatened existing lease and her pledge to stay, without a court outcome. Other RTVE political, camp and regional reactions refer to both defeats together and remain shared accounts of two distinct votes; predictions about elections and mobilization are not completed outcomes. RTVE's October 3 complete political report in show 295 retrospectively describes both defeats together and includes Redondo's criticism, Illa's disappointment, Junts's contrary policy assessment and Turull's electoral-interest allegation, with the other parties' housing/electoral responses. Retain these as a shared response to two separately identified votes, not a new combined vote or a called election.