Vox is diluted in Congress: without weighty references and without its opposition weapons

If there is no electoral repetition to remedy it, Vox is looking at a legislature in which it will see its role in Congress diluted. Santiago Abascal's party deflated on 23-J and left 19 seats, enough to limit his great opposition weapons through motions of censure -he presented two in the last four years-, since 35 deputies are needed to lead these types of initiatives. Nor will he be able to use the trick of fighting the laws of a future Executive in the Constitutional Court, for which 50 representatives are needed. The departure of Iván Espinosa de los Monteros, the main asset in the Lower House, fills his parliamentary future with unknowns and poses a half-speed legislature in the event that Pedro Sánchez or Alberto Núñez Feijóo achieve the necessary support to save an investiture session.

Vox did not touch ground on 23-J -it broke into the first convocation of April 2019 with 24 deputies-, but the polls sent an important notice to Santiago Abascal, who must now focus on reorganizing the distribution of roles in the Chamber to minimize the impact of the departure of its parliamentary spokesman. The party already suffered in Congress a little over a year ago, when the leadership of the party sent Macarena Olona to Andalusia and she later resigned from politics. The formation gave stripes to other deputies with less focus, such as Inés Cañizares or José María Figaredo, but it was Espinosa de los Monteros who filled practically all the gap left free by the State lawyer.

The businessman not only became the voice of Vox in the Lower House, but also performed the function of economic spokesman for the formation. He assumed a leading role in the battle against the Executive for his economic agenda, and responded to Nadia Calviño in each government control session, from which Santiago Abascal was frequently absent.. The resignation of Espinosa de los Monteros, motivated not only by family issues, but also by the organic rise of the fundamentalist wing headed by Jorge Buxadé, forces Abascal to do a bobbin lace to maintain the political pulse within Congress with hardly any weight references..

Vox's slip at the polls left important faces of the formation, such as Carla Toscano or Inés Cañizares, out of the Chamber. The party also removed from the lists representatives of the liberal wing, which also included Espinosa de los Monteros, such as Víctor Sánchez del Real. In fact, the decision of the electoral team to eliminate a part of the parliamentary spokesperson's trusted staff from the lists was one of the reasons that dynamited the businessman's confidence in the leadership of the formation, and distanced him from Santiago Abascal. His resignation causes the Madrid list to run and Juan Luis Steegman, the Vox doctor who was the voice of the formation during the pandemic, to enter the Lower House.

The most immediate task is to find a replacement in the spokesperson for Congress. In the leadership of the party, they deny that this position will fall to Ignacio Hoces, from Badajoz, who has strengthened his organic role as institutional deputy secretary and Buxadé's second in command, although party sources assume that he will have a relevant role in coordinating the parliamentary group as a link with the national leadership.

Some well-known faces continue in the Lower House, such as Rocío de Meer, who repeated as head of the list for Almería; Reyes Romero, who is part of the leadership as third vice president of the formation; Manuel Mariscal, responsible for communication, or Ignacio Gil Lázaro, fourth vice president of the Congress Table, in which the party will request a quota to maintain its representativeness. Deputy María Ruiz, who took over from Javier Ortega Smith's right-hand man at the top, Tomás Fernández Ríos, occupying the vice-secretary for Organization, can also win stripes in Congress. The spokesman in the Madrid City Council will also have a seat in the Lower House, although he has been losing organic weight after being removed from the general secretariat in favor of Ignacio Garriga, also close to Buxadé.

The former Cs and PP deputy, Carina Mejías, also won a seat on 23-J for Barcelona, and several territorial leaders will enter Congress, such as the former leader of the party in the Valencian Community Carlos Flores Juberías, whose former conviction for psychological abuse of his ex-partner forced his replacement in the vice presidency of the region chaired by Carlos Mazón.