CHA and Frente Amplio renounce presenting themselves to Congress on 29N for Teruel "out of responsibility" and to "avoid vote dispersion"

CHA-Frente Amplio Aragón will not present a candidacy for Congress for Teruel in the elections on November 29. The president of Chunta Aragonesista, Jorge Pueyo, announced this Wednesday the decision and justified it by the need to "avoid the dispersion of the vote" and do everything possible to achieve a progressive majority in both chambers.

The announcement introduces a concrete renunciation to compete in a small province, precisely when the possibility of withdrawing candidacies occupies the left's debate. It comes after 'ElConstitucional.es' reported this afternoon on the PSOE's proposals to incorporate independents from the Frente Amplio into its lists in certain territories. In Teruel, however, no such integration or an agreement to support a specific candidacy for Congress has been announced.

The Aragonese coalition, formed by CHA, Izquierda Unida, Movimiento Sumar, the Green Party and Recortes Cero, will concentrate its efforts for the Lower House in Zaragoza and Huesca. In Teruel, it will maintain its participation in the joint candidacy for the Senate with the PSOE. "In this context of extreme polarization, we have decided to concentrate our efforts for the Congress of Deputies in the constituencies of Zaragoza and Alto Aragón, while in Teruel we will only run for the Senate," Pueyo explained.

A withdrawal in the midst of debate on PSOE's proposals

According to sources from the space consulted by 'ElConstitucional.es', the PSOE has proposed the renunciation of its own candidacies and the incorporation of independents into its lists in Galicia, Euskadi and nine other provinces. These are Cáceres, Badajoz, Huelva, Jaén, León, Salamanca, Albacete, Ciudad Real and La Rioja. The proposals known by this newspaper have met with internal discrepancies and IU's rejection of such integration, without a closed agreement.

The debate became public after Emilio Delgado, candidate for Frente Amplio for Madrid, spoke on Tuesday night on 'La noche en 24 horas', on TVE, about "open conversations trying to maximize and optimize electoral results". The coalition later maintained that he was referring to joint candidacies for the Senate and denied negotiations on the withdrawal of lists for Congress. IU's federal coordinator, Antonio Maíllo, also limited the agreement with the socialists to the Upper House.

Regarding the Teruel case, Pueyo has assured that the decision has been made with his partners and without negotiation with the PSOE. CHA's statement also does not announce the incorporation of candidates into the socialist lists. The renunciation modifies the electoral offer of the province, although it leaves open the choice of its voters among the candidacies that finally run.

The presence of IU in the coalition that adopts this decision shows that the strategy can vary according to the territory and the proposed formula. In Teruel, a separate ballot is renounced; the socialist offer known by this newspaper adds the integration of candidates into its lists. For Frente Amplio, there also remains the question of how to maintain its status as an alternative to the PSOE where it decides not to compete and how to explain to its voters the effect it hopes to achieve with this renunciation.

Three deputies and a distribution that requires looking at the votes

Teruel elects only three deputies, which makes it difficult for small candidacies to obtain representation. In the 2023 general elections, the PP won two seats with 26,586 votes and the PSOE, one with 22,226. Coalición Existe was left out with 11,348 votes, as were the far-right Vox, with 9,932, and Sumar, with 4,126. The withdrawal of a candidacy reduces fragmentation, but its effect depends on where its votes end up.

The official results allow verifying that difference. Adding all of Sumar's support to that of the PSOE would have left the 2023 distribution intact. The joint candidacy would have gathered 26,352 votes, still 234 less than the PP, which would have kept its second deputy. If those same 4,126 votes had been added to Coalición Existe, it would have reached 15,474 and obtained a representative at the expense of the popular party. These are two retrospective exercises that keep the support of the other forces constant, without predicting how voters will vote in November.

The withdrawal of CHA-Frente Amplio leaves more electoral space for the PSOE and Coalición Existe, but does not guarantee a complete transfer to either of them. That Sumar of 2023 also included Podemos, which has been left out of the Aragonese coalition registered for 29N. In Zaragoza, where Sumar won a deputy with 69,925 votes, the alliance maintains its candidacy; it also does so in Huesca, where it obtained 13,774 votes and no seat. Pueyo has argued that concentrating efforts in these two provinces will allow working for the progressive majority it seeks.

In the Senate, PSOE, CHA, and IU have indeed agreed on a joint candidacy in the three Aragonese provinces, with a CHA candidate in second place for Zaragoza and Teruel and an IU candidate for Huesca. That order on the ballot does not guarantee election, because voters vote for names. Chunta will hold an extraordinary National Committee this Friday to choose who will head the list for Congress for Zaragoza and the rest of its candidates. The deadline to submit candidacies ends on Monday, October 26.