Five diplomats and one official told POLITICO's Brussels Playbook that Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez is expected to arrive at the European Council ready to fight over migration. “Of course” there will be a clash, said a senior EU diplomat, who added that it could turn “quite bloody.” Another said they wouldn’t be surprised by an “intense” debate. All spoke anonymously.
The target is Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. Two diplomats said a confrontation would play well with each leader’s domestic voters. The timing is hardly accidental. Sánchez is behind in the polls ahead of a snap election on Nov. 29, about six weeks away. Meloni faces a tough election next year as far-right challenger Roberto Vannacci gains momentum, one diplomat said. “It will be helpful for Sánchez to pick a fight,” another EU diplomat said. “And it might be helpful for Meloni too.”
A Government Out of Step With the Bloc
EU leaders and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen are pushing for faster returns and tighter border controls. Sánchez’s government has backed more liberal migration policies, leaving Madrid at odds with the direction the Union is taking.
Sánchez arrives under fire already. Meloni and other EU leaders criticised him after mass arrivals in Ceuta, Spain’s exclave in North Africa. BBC reporting cited in the base article says Ceuta is still dealing with the aftermath of an influx of 70,000 people from Morocco in July, about three months ago. King Felipe VI visited Ceuta yesterday and is due in Melilla today.
Madrid’s Defence
Two Spanish government officials told Madrid Playbook’s Ángel Villarino Perez that Sánchez has received briefings through meetings, weekend crisis sessions and ministerial discussions. He will point to results on returns, border management and arrivals. Chief among those results is a 74% fall in arrivals on the Atlantic route, which Madrid attributes in part to cooperation with Mauritania and Senegal.
That figure deserves scrutiny. The Ceuta episode sits awkwardly beside it. A sharp drop on one route doesn’t answer what happened at another border, where 70,000 people crossed in a single month.
The June Precedent
The fight has a rehearsal. At the June European Council, about four months ago, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen steered discussion toward the EU’s new returns rules. Sánchez criticised the bloc’s hard-line approach. Meloni backed Frederiksen and attacked Spain’s decision to regularise undocumented migrants.
Diplomats expect little tangible change this time, either. “They’ll say lots of things to each other, and then probably go for a drink after,” one said. The EU official said a lot of work has gone into getting leaders on the same page on the migration pact, so the broader agreement isn’t expected to be derailed.
Why This Matters:
The summit shows how far migration has moved from technical policy into the core of national electoral politics. Two leaders, each under domestic pressure, have an incentive to perform a dispute that diplomats themselves expect to change little. For the Union, the practical test is narrower and more important: whether the migration pact survives the theatre and is implemented firmly, with faster returns and tighter external border control. Spain’s regularisation decision and the Ceuta arrivals feed a wider argument about whether member states with liberal policies can be trusted to protect a shared border. Public confidence in the bloc’s ability to manage its frontiers depends on enforcement, not dramatic exchanges in Brussels.