Spain, Mexico Defend Progressive Migration Model

Spain and Mexico used the Global Progressive Mobilization event in Barcelona to defend a migration model based on regularization, human rights, and economic integration, arguing that progressive governments must answer far-right narratives with policies that are both humane and workable. Speakers framed Spain’s new regularization push as part of a broader strategy to link legal pathways, labor inclusion, and social cohesion.

Migration is not only a humanitarian issue, but a test of whether progressive governments can deliver policy that is both rights-based and politically durable, said panelists at the Global Progressive Mobilization event held in Barcelona. The discussion came days after Spain’s government approved an extraordinary administrative regularization for migrants already living in the country. According to the Ministry of Inclusion, Social Security, and Migration, the measure is aimed at people already residing in Spain and requires applicants to prove they were in the country before Jan. 1, 2026 and had remained there continuously for at least five months. The government said the application period would open in about two months.

The move would offer “a path to dignity” for an estimated 500,000 people, said Manos Moschopoulos, Executive Director, LeftForward. He argued that Spain’s approach could serve as a progressive alternative to the “punitive and authoritarian migration politics” seen elsewhere. That framing aligned closely with the government’s own presentation of the measure as a way to integrate people who are already in Spain rather than leave them trapped in irregularity. 

Spain Links Regularization to Rights and Economic Need

Elma Saiz, Spain’s Minister of Inclusion, Social Security, and Migration, argued that progressives should speak about migration policy “with pride, with our heads held high.” She said Spain must confront “hate speech, disinformation, racist and xenophobic discourse” directly and defend migration as part of its democratic values.

Saiz insisted the regularization should not be seen as a one-off concession. “This extraordinary regularization process is not an isolated event,” she said. “It is one point within the broader migration policy of the Spanish government.” Her argument matched the ministry’s official framing, which presented the measure as an administrative regularization for migrants already residing in Spain, rather than a border-opening initiative.

Saiz also framed migration as an economic issue. She explained that “the number of people paying into social security multiplied by four annually” since Spain’s earlier regularization effort under former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. Saiz said that the choice was straightforward: “Do we want people in our country without rights, hidden, living in fear, or do we want them to have rights, dignity, and social justice?”

That argument also reflects the official policy logic behind the April 14 decree. The government’s announcement said the process is intended for migrants already in Spain who meet the residency requirements, while the decree itself modified Spain’s foreign nationals regulation to implement the measure. 

Saiz argued that exclusion carries a measurable cost. She cited a study commissioned by her ministry that estimated racism and xenophobia cost Spain €17 billion (US$20 billion) a year in GDP. She also pointed to a projection showing that if migration flows were reduced by 30%, Spain in 2070 would face emptier schools, fewer agricultural operations, and fewer health professionals. “We would have to contribute much more to sustain something that has taken us so much to build, which is our welfare state,” she said.

“We had to choose between being a closed and poor country or an open and prosperous country,” said Saiz.

Mexico Warns Against the Security Framing

Beatriz Paredes, former President of the Directive Board, Mexican Chamber of Deputies, argued that Mexico’s experience shows how distorted migration policy becomes when it is constantly filtered through US domestic politics. She described Mexico as simultaneously a country of emigration, transit, and refuge, recalling its long asylum tradition, from Spanish Republican exiles to South American political refugees.

But she warned that the right has turned migration into a strategy of fear. “The right across the world is summoning xenophobia,” she said, arguing that anti-migrant politics rests on false claims that migrants take jobs, overburden public services, and threaten local populations. Paredes said that Spain’s stance matters because it pushes back against that logic with both ethics and practical reasoning. She called Spain’s approach not only “an ethical position,” but also “a position with economic and demographic rationality.”

Paredes also challenged the broader contradiction in globalization. “We say, restrictively, that the only ones who do not have a right to mobility are human beings,” she said. “That is a failure to understand the historical moment we are living through.”

She also rejected the dominant framing outright: “We on the left cannot allow migration to become a security issue.” Instead, Paredes said, it must be treated as “an issue of respect for human rights, democracy, and recognition of mobility in a global world.”

Paredes added that migration policy must also address trafficking networks. Human smuggling, she said, is “a re-edition of the most brutal slavery of other times” and requires stronger coordination between states because such operations are transnational.

Spain, Mexico, Brazil, and Colombia as a Progressive Countermodel

Marshall Fitz, Managing Director of Immigration, Emerson Collective argued that Spain, Mexico, Brazil, and Colombia are already demonstrating what a more functional migration model looks like. “These four countries are managing migration as well as any other,” he said, calling them “a lab for a new progressive migration management model.”

Fitz explained that the core issue is not whether people will move, but whether governments can manage mobility lawfully and productively. “The question is not whether people will continue to move,” he said. “They will. The question is whether we will build systems that channel movement toward lawful, mutually beneficial outcomes.”

He criticized the way migration is often framed as a choice between moral concern and border control. “For too long this debate has been trapped in a false binary between compassion and control,” he said. “The frame that wins is visible and fair government control in service of shared prosperity.”

Beth Gardiner, Senior Policy Associate, Future Governance Forum, said the left in the United Kingdom has become too quick to concede the debate to the far right. “What we suffer from on the left in the United Kingdom is not a crisis of values but a crisis of imagination,” she said, arguing that progressives should be building credible systems that preserve both public confidence and human dignity.

Gardiner said that visible unauthorized arrivals have fueled far-right narratives across the European Union, but said that abandoning liberal principles is not the answer. “We need the ambition to use our worldview to shape the future,” she said, “through credible and pragmatic use of power rooted in progressive and yes liberal values.”

Frank Sharry, Founder and Executive Director, America's Voice drew the contrast even more sharply. “Joe Biden failed on immigration. Donald Trump is failing on immigration and Pedro Sánchez is succeeding on immigration,” he said. Using a five-part test of “compassion, control, competence, contribution, and community,” Sharry argued that Spain has come closest to balancing all five. “They have revealed that it’s a false choice between order and generosity,” he said. “In fact, order and generosity go together.”

Sharry added that Spain’s model is not just normatively appealing, but politically durable: “It is progressive, it is practical, it is pro-growth and, for me most importantly, it is politically sustainable.”

Migration as a Governance Question

In her closing remarks, Saiz argued that migration often ranks high as an abstract concern, but much lower when people are asked how it affects their own daily lives. That gap, she suggested, shows how much of the debate is driven by rhetoric rather than direct experience.

Saiz said the government’s approach has support from civil society, trade unions, employers, legal associations, and social organizations. Quoting a participant from a recent meeting with Sánchez, she said: “When policies respond to the demands of civil society, they are a success.