A regional election was held in Andalusia on 17 May 2026 to elect the 13th Parliament of the autonomous community. All 109 seats in the Parliament were up for election.
The People's Party (PP) under regional president Juanma Moreno secured an overall majority in the 2022 election, the first time in history this happened in an autonomous community which had been uninterruptedly ruled by the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party of Andalusia (PSOE–A) from 1978 to 2019. In an attempt to revitalize the party, María Jesús Montero—the national first deputy prime minister and finance minister—was appointed as new PSOE–A leader in February 2025, replacing Juan Espadas. Meanwhile, Moreno's government, which had enjoyed relative political stability for years, was rocked in October 2025 by a healthcare scandal stemming from a mishandling of breast cancer screening protocols by the Andalusian Health Service, the management of which by the PP sparked widespread public outrage.
Amid the largest voter turnout since 2015, the election saw the ruling PP losing its absolute majority, despite previous expectations that it could hold onto it. The opposition PSOE lost two additional seats to score its worst historical result in the region, but narrowly avoided the worst predictions of a collapse in support. Far-right Vox saw modest gains, whereas the left-wing Forward Andalusia party secured a surprise breakthrough with 8 seats and almost 10% of the vote. The United Left-led For Andalusia alliance remained stagnant at five seats. The outcome also saw the right-wing bloc losing support overall compared to the previous election, the first time in several years of elections in Spain that this happened.
Background The 2022 regional election saw the People's Party (PP) under regional president Juanma Moreno securing an absolute majority in the regional parliament for the first time in history, which allowed him to form a majority government. Conversely, the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party of Andalusia (PSOE–A) under regional leader Juan Espadas obtained its worst historical result, a blow for a party which had uninterruptedly held power in the region from 1978 to 2019. Espadas, who since December 2021 had held a Senate seat, was appointed as the PSOE's spokesperson in that chamber in November 2023, paving the way for the national first deputy prime minister and minister of Finance, María Jesús Montero, to become the PSOE–A's new leader in February 2025.
In October 2025, the Andalusian government became embroiled in a healthcare scandal stemming from a mishandling of breast cancer screening protocols by the Andalusian Health Service (SAS), with at least 2,000 women having suffered unjustified delays in breast cancer diagnoses (traced to a faulty outsourcing of the notification system to an external company) that could significantly reduce their survival rate. It saw several resignations in an attempt to contain political backlash, including those of the regional Health minister, Rocío Hernández Soto, and two officials at the Virgen del Rocío University Hospital in Seville—the head of radiodiagnosis and the coordinator of the breast imaging unit—where most of the cases were traced. On 21 October, the crisis escalated after a breast cancer awareness organization filed a legal complaint against an alleged manipulation and disappearance of some cancer patients' medical records, which Moreno's government blamed on a "computer failure" caused by the victims' creating a "beastly social alarm" that collapsed their systems. Public outrage at the PP's management of the crisis, which added up to those of the October 2024 floods in the Valencian Community and the August 2025 wildfires in Castile and León, weakened the party's standing and eroded its narrative as a good manager.
Overview Under the 2007 Statute of Autonomy, the Parliament of Andalusia was the unicameral legislature of the homonymous autonomous community, having legislative power in devolved matters, as well as the ability to grant or withdraw confidence from a regional president.. The electoral and procedural rules were supplemented by national law provisions..
Date The term of the Parliament of Andalusia expired four years after the date of its previous election, unless it was dissolved earlier. The election decree was required to be issued no later than 25 days before the scheduled expiration date of parliament and published on the following day in the Official Gazette of the Regional Government of Andalusia (BOJA), with election day taking place 54 days after the decree's publication (barring any date within from 1 July to 31 August).; ( by ). The previous election was held on 19 June 2022, which meant that the chamber's term would have expired on 19 June 2026. Due to the ban on summer elections, the latest possible date for election day was 30 June 2026, meaning the election decree was required to be published in the BOJA no later than 7 May 2026.
The regional president had the prerogative to dissolve the Parliament of Andalusia at any given time and call a snap election, provided that no motion of no confidence was in process and that dissolution did not occur before one year after a previous one.; . In the event of an investiture process failing to elect a regional president within a two-month period from the first ballot, the Parliament was to be automatically dissolved and a fresh election called..
Speculation emerged in September 2025 that the national leadership of the People's Party (PP) was planning to advance the elections in Aragon and Extremadura to make them take place near or concurrently with the Castilian-Leonese election scheduled for early 2026, in an electoral "Super Sunday". While the alleged justification would be the regional governments' failure in getting their 2026 budgets passed through parliament, the true motive was attributed to PP plans—not without risk—to turn the simultaneous election call into a referendum on the national government of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez. While an advancement of the Andalusian election (scheduled for no later than June 2026) was commented within such plans, regional president Juanma Moreno dismissed this possibility except in the event of Sánchez calling a snap general election before that date. The possibility of an election postponement until September 2026, in order to circumvent the ban on summer elections imposed by the Andalusian electoral law, was also ruled out by Moreno over political and legal concerns on its feasibility. The breast cancer screening scandal in October 2025 was said to have affected Moreno's electoral plans, with doubts existing on the opportunity of fostering a concerted "Super Sunday" action by several PP-controlled regions.
President Moreno confirmed on 26 February 2026 that the Parliament would be dissolved in April, which narrowed the possibilities for election day as being one of the following Sundays: 31 May, 7, 14 or 21 June. Several of them were commented as presenting difficulties: 31 May would overlap with the Romería de El Rocío pilgrimage; 7 June would coincide with Pope Leo XIV's scheduled visit to Spain; and 21 June was commented as being too close to the high temperature season. On 23 March 2026, Moreno announced the election for 17 May.
The Parliament of Andalusia was officially dissolved on 24 March 2026 with the publication of the corresponding decree in the BOJA, setting election day for 17 May and scheduling for the chamber to reconvene on 11 June..
Electoral system Voting for the Parliament was based on universal suffrage, comprising all Spanish nationals over 18 years of age, registered in Andalusia and with full political rights, provided that they had not been deprived of the right to vote by a final sentence.; ( by ). Amendments in 2022 abolished the "begged" voting system (), under which non-resident citizens were required to apply for voting. The begged vote system was attributed responsibility for a major decrease in the turnout of Spaniards abroad during the years it was in force.
The Parliament of Andalusia had a minimum of 109 seats, with electoral provisions fixing its size at that number. All were elected in eight multi-member constituencies—corresponding to the provinces of Almería, Cádiz, Córdoba, Granada, Huelva, Jaén, Málaga and Seville, each of which was assigned an initial minimum of eight seats and the remaining 45 distributed in proportion to population (with the number of seats in each province not exceeding two times that of any other)—using the D'Hondt method and closed-list proportional voting, with a three percent-threshold of valid votes (including blank ballots) in each constituency.; . The use of this electoral method resulted in a higher effective threshold depending on district magnitude and vote distribution.
As a result of the aforementioned allocation, each Parliament constituency was entitled the following seats:.
Seats Constituencies 18 Seville 17 Málaga 15 Cádiz 13 Granada 12 Almería, Córdoba 11 Huelva, Jaén
The law did not provide for by-elections to fill vacant seats; instead, any vacancies arising after the proclamation of candidates and during the legislative term were filled by the next candidates on the party lists or, when required, by designated substitutes. ( by ).
Outgoing parliament The table below shows the composition of the parliamentary groups in the chamber at the time of dissolution.
+ Parliamentary composition in March 2026 Groups Parties Legislators Seats Total Andalusian People's Parliamentary Group PP 58 58 Socialist Parliamentary Group PSOE–A 30 30 Vox Parliamentary Group in Andalusia Vox 14 14 For Andalusia Parliamentary Group Podemos 3 5 IULV–CA 1 SMR 1 Mixed Group AA 2 2
Parties and candidates The electoral law allows for parties and federations registered in the interior ministry, alliances and groupings of electors to present lists of candidates. Parties and federations intending to form an alliance are required to inform the relevant electoral commission within 10 days of the election call, whereas groupings of electors need to secure the signature of at least one percent of the electorate in the constituencies for which they seek election, disallowing electors from signing for more than one list. ( by ). Additionally, a balanced composition of men and women is required in the electoral lists through the use of a zipper system..
Below is a list of the main parties and alliances which will likely contest the election:
Candidacy Parties andalliances Leading candidate Ideology Previous result Vote % Seats PP Juanma Moreno ConservatismChristian democracy 43.1% PSOE–A María Jesús Montero Social democracy 24.1% Vox Manuel Gavira Right-wing populismUltranationalismNational conservatism 13.5% PorA Antonio Maíllo Left-wing populismGreen politics 7.7% AdelanteAndalucía José Ignacio García Andalusian nationalismLeft-wing populismAnti-capitalism 4.6%
Campaign Timetable The key dates are listed below (all times are CET):
23 March: The election decree is issued with the countersign of the president, after deliberation in the Council of Government. 24 March: Formal dissolution of parliament and start of prohibition period on the inauguration of public works, services or projects. 27 March: Initial constitution of provincial and zone electoral commissions with judicial members. 30 March: Division of constituencies into polling sections and stations. 3 April: Deadline for parties and federations to report on their electoral alliances. 6 April: Deadline for electoral register consultation for the purpose of possible corrections. 13 April: Deadline for parties, federations, alliances, and groupings of electors to present electoral lists. 15 April: Publication of submitted electoral lists in the Official Gazette of the Regional Government of Andalusia (BOJA). 20 April: Official proclamation of validly submitted electoral lists.