The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has endorsed the amnesty law, and did so without concessions on the essential points. It ruled out that the rule breaches the anti-terrorism directive and denied that it harms the Union’s financial interests: the two flanks on which a minority of the Spanish judiciary had tried to suspend it. It only raised concerns about two ancillary aspects that are already resolved. On paper, it is the most unequivocal legal victory the Pedro Sánchez government has achieved in the entire legislature.
What is interesting, however, lies in what the ruling shows in political terms. In that sense, there appear three layers that barely dialogue with each other in the breaking-news chronicles, but together they sketch a much richer — and more ironic — photograph than the headline of “European endorsement”.
The Cement of the Legislature
The amnesty is the agreement that the independence movement achieved in exchange for Sánchez’s investiture in November 2023 and, therefore, the piece upon which the arithmetic of the entire legislature rests. Put differently: it is the price of a pact without which there would be no progressive coalition government.
This has a consequence. Each time the rule has run into a court — and it has run into several — the solidity of the scaffolding that keeps the Executive standing was questioned. The amnesty has functioned for two years as a judicial Sword of Damocles : while it hung over a ruling, it hung with it the stability of the legislature. The opposition understood it quickly, and that is why it turned the European challenge into one of its most persistent bets. The framework was effective as long as it was possible and credible: claiming that it was “a law that Europe will end up overturning” allowed to delegitimize the pact without needing to win in the polls.
“The amnesty is the piece on which the arithmetic of the entire legislature rests: it is the price of a pact without which there would be no progressive coalition government”
For this reason, Luxembourg’s ruling is worth much more than its literal legal description. This politically shields the central asset of the legislature. Now, with the CJEU on its side, the framework according to which Europe would overturn the law has fallen, and the Government can present the rule as a decision validated by the Union’s highest judicial body rather than as a concession made reluctantly. In terms of a narrative, Sánchez turns his most pointed vulnerability into a credential. This is no small feat for a president who has been reproached throughout the legislature for governing against the sentiment of a portion of the bloc of judges.
The Catalan Paradox: the reward arrives late and to someone else
The reward materializes at the worst possible moment for the one who negotiated it. The latest barometer from the Centre d’Estudis d’Opinió (CEO), with fieldwork between May 21 and June 25, sketches for Junts an unprecedented collapse in recent times: from the 35 deputies obtained in 2024 it would fall to a range of between 16 and 18, a bleeding that approaches 46% of its representation. The ripple effect of Aliança Catalana, the party of Sílvia Orriols, is taking shape: the ultras would move between 23 and 25 seats, with almost twelve percentage points of vote drawn directly from Junts. The post-convergence brand, which for a decade monopolized the representation of the independence movement most resistance-minded, is now overwhelmed by its identity flank, by a rival who disputes space with a more rupture-oriented discourse and less committed to institutional management.
“The Executive can present the norm as a decision validated by the Union’s highest judicial body, rather than as a concession made reluctantly”
The photo has something of cruel irony. The great counterpart of the investiture — the asset that Junts sold to its own as proof that the pact with Sánchez had been worth it — becomes legally consolidated exactly when the party that demanded it is undergoing a crisis that threatens the party’s very survival. And there is yet another twist, because not even that concession is guaranteed for its symbolic beneficiary.
The definitive return of Carles Puigdemont is not guaranteed by this ruling, because the Supreme Court sought its own route to deny him amnesty — it held that embezzlement is not amnestiable for having entailed personal enrichment — and that door Luxembourg has not closed. It now depends on the Constitutional Court correcting the Supreme Court via the remedy of amparo, something that, if it happens, will not occur before autumn.
So, who has ultimately benefited from the whole operation? Esquerra Republicana recovers slightly in the same projections. The overall independence movement achieves the judicial normalization it sought and sees support for independence rebound to 45%, the highest level in six years. The brand that led the negotiation is precisely the one that bears the wear. The amnesty may eventually be remembered not as a victory for independence, but as the cause of a defeat for Junts as a party. There is no greater irony: they negotiated the reward and others are getting it.
“The whole independence movement obtains the judicial normalization it sought and sees support for independence rebound to 45%”
One can widen the question to include one of the most unexpected beneficiaries of all: the Popular Party (PP). Because the grande adversary of the amnesty, the party that fought it in the streets, in the courts, and in Brussels, which labeled it as a coup and pledged to repeal it from La Moncloa, is also the one who has the most to gain from the political normalization that the law inaugurates. In Catalonia, a large part of the outcome of general elections is decided, and a PP that aspires to govern will need, sooner rather than later, to understand with the Catalan right — as it will need to understand with the Basque right as well. That calculation has already begun to operate. Feijóo, who has moved from the chant “Puigdemont to prison” to “turn the page,” closed his party’s congress in Catalonia by calling to overcome the procés and has decided not to amplify the ruling of this Thursday, whatever its reading. The thaw with Junts — whose votes he would need for a hypothetical motion of no confidence —, though cautious, hovers over Madrid and Barcelona offices. Consequently, the party that blocked coexistence the most will, over time, be one of those who rely most on it. The amnesty that the PP vowed to fight opens the terrain it will need to tread.
The power struggle between powers does not close: it moves
Institutionally, it is tempting to read the ruling as the affirmation that the legislative power has prevailed over the judiciary. In a sense, one might think that Parliament passed a law, part of the judiciary resisted applying it, and a higher instance ended up giving the law its due. However, this is an incomplete and, strictly speaking, inaccurate assessment.
What the CJEU has done is not to subjugate the Spanish judiciary — among other things because the CJEU is also a judiciary — but to deactivate the concrete path by which a minority of judges sought to halt the rule, leaving the Supreme Court isolated in its most maximalist interpretation. The high court avoided consulting Luxembourg and, instead, built a particular argument — criticized from within by two of its own magistrates — to exclude embezzlement from the amnesty’s scope. But now the Supreme Court has been left in a delicate position, bearing a doctrine of which Europe has distanced itself.
“What the CJEU has done is not to subjugate the Spanish judiciary, but to deactivate the concrete path by which a minority of judges sought to halt the rule”
With no clear victor of the ‘punch’, this has shifted. The decisive stage moves from Luxembourg to the Constitutional Court, which will be the one to rule in autumn on whether it corrects the Supreme Court. That is a wholly Spanish clash, between the constitutional interpreter and the apex of the ordinary judiciary, with no European arbiter to deactivate it. Therefore, the power tension will finally enter its most delicate phase.
The Luxembourg ruling, in the end, solves a lot and closes little. It solidifies the amnesty as a political asset of a legislature, redistributes its beneficiaries in Catalonia in an unexpected way, and leaves the institutional conflict pending a final act. What, for Sánchez, is a triumph and for the independence movement a validation, is a late reward (and with the wrong recipient) for Junts. Rarely does a single resolution mean such different things to those who, not long ago, celebrated it together.
