Sánchez lays election trap: Beat him at his own game!

10 October—Following the powerful mass mobilization for housing across Spain, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has been forced to call snap elections. This is a cynical maneuver. Sánchez, head of the Socialist Party (PSOE), is trying to shore up his declining popularity by riding the housing movement. His method is that of blackmail: Vote for me, or else you will get the far right. But the problem is that Sánchez has refused to confront the vulture funds, and under his rule housing and living conditions have only gotten worse. In turn, this is precisely what is fueling the far right!

Most on the left and far left who have been in the vanguard of the mass demonstrations are rightly denouncing this maneuver. They call for the mobilization to stay on the streets and to build for a general strike. Yes, we must continue the fight. However, the terrain has shifted. The elections will grip the country’s attention, with the right wing polling first.

This is why the working class urgently needs a revolutionary challenge to Sánchez and his partners at the ballot box. Calls to stay on the streets are not enough. These elections might be a trap, but we can’t ignore them. The task now is to build an electoral option that can defend the demands of the Tenants Union, put forward a revolutionary alternative to Sánchez's liberal and hypocritical campaign, and undermine workers' support for the right. We need a revolutionary candidacy!

The greatest danger for the housing movement is becoming co-opted into the PSOE’s cynical election bid. This would only make the housing movement look like a defender of the status quo and push more working-class people into the arms of the People’s Party and Vox. Furthermore, we know that Sánchez will never confront the vulture funds that are hoarding housing and evicting dozens every day. And the election campaign will last for nearly two months. It will go beyond the housing question and become a referendum on Sánchez’s rule. Thus, the urgent need for a revolutionary option!

Many leftists, from the Revolutionary Communist International to the Current for Permanent Revolution, are calling to build a general strike, to stay on the streets, etc. Indeed, the union bureaucrats of the CCOO and UGT, after dragging their feet for weeks (and sitting on their hands for years), have been forced to call for a general strike…for 24 hours…in one month! Crucially, those bureaucrats will try to turn the general strike into a rally in support of Sánchez! Yet again, the election question now dominates everything.

Of course, we must support the general strike and build for it. However, if there isn’t a clear political alternative to the PSOE now, one that gives voice to the most radical sections of the housing movement and that can expose Sánchez and the right wing, then we risk becoming pawns of the PSOE.

As we write from abroad, we call on revolutionaries, communists and true socialists to do the utmost to build such a revolutionary option. This must be built in complete independence from the PSOE and opposed to any collaboration with it in government. This element is particularly important as left-wing parties like Podemos, Sumar and Izquierda Unida have spent years in and around Sánchez’s government. At a minimum, only those who refuse collaboration with Sánchez and pledge to fight for the demands of the tenants unions can be considered for support.

The movement in Spain has been heroic and inspiring throughout Europe and beyond. Revolutionaries must leverage this movement to build an organized political force that can impose a true working-class voice on the political scene.