As restrictive and anti-migration policies continue to spread across Europe, Spain has taken a decisive step in the opposite direction. The Spanish government has announced plans to regularise up to 500,000 undocumented people, openly challenging narratives that frame migration primarily through deportation, deterrence, and securitisation.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has explicitly questioned the direction of European debates on migration, asking:
“When did recognising rights become something radical? When did empathy become something exceptional?”
Legal, safe, inclusive, and stable migration pathways are essential tools for preventing vulnerability. Living in a legal limbo leaves people not only unable to access their rights, but also exposed to extreme precarity. Without legal status, individuals are often excluded from healthcare, housing, social protection, and formal employment, forcing them into invisibility.
Human trafficking and exploitation thrive on vulnerability. When people lack access to legal residence, decent work, and basic protections, the risk of labour exploitation, abuse, and human trafficking increases. The absence of accessible regularisation pathways does not stop migration, it rather pushes people into informal, unsafe, and exploitative situations.
This initiative follows sustained pressure from civil society, in particular the #RegularizaciónYa campaign, which has long called for the regularisation of 500,000 undocumented people living in Spain since before 1 November 2021. The initiative has gathered over 700,000 signatures and is supported by more than 900 civil society organisations, demonstrating broad social backing for rights-based migration policies.
Launched in 2021, #RegularizaciónYa is driven by a coalition including Fundación para la Ciudadanía Global, Fundación Por Causa, Red de Entidades para el Desarrollo Solidario (REDES), Alianza para la Solidaridad, and the Por un Mundo Más Justo party. The campaign was launched with a nationwide mobilisation to collect signatures across Spain, placing regularisation firmly on the political agenda.
Spain’s decision sends a clear signal: rights-based migration policies are possible, even in a challenging political climate.