Hostility towards immigrants culminates in a controversial CIS survey

Alberto Núñez Feijóo is clear about what to talk about when talking about immigration. What worries him is security. “For those who arrive, because they risk their lives, but also for those of us who are here, because Spaniards have the right to go out safely on the street,” he said in July as if there was a cause-effect relationship. His parliamentary spokesman, Miguel Tellado, reproached Pedro Sánchez for not asking for deportations of undocumented foreigners, “while Germany and Italy are talking about mass deportations,” which on the other hand they are not doing either. The increase in arrivals to the Canary Islands has convinced the Popular Party that immigration is the best issue to address Vox voters and attract their support.

This week, The CIS survey has given another push The concern that Spaniards feel about the issue. In three months, immigration has gone from being the ninth concern to the first. The sum of those who choose it as their first, second or third problem has gone from 11.2% in June to 30.4% in September. It is impossible to separate this jump from the PP’s political offensive, from the hostility against immigrants that is an essential part of Vox’s ideology and from the media coverage.