Spain issues decree allowing undocumented migrants to apply for temporary residency

The Spanish government on Tuesday unexpectedly issued a decree that gives hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants already living in Spain a path out of legal limbo by allowing them to apply for temporary residency permits, the government said. Under the decree, applicants must prove they arrived before December 2025 and have lived in Spain for at least five months; people with criminal records will be excluded.

Applications will be accepted only between April and June, the permits will last one year, be renewable and will allow holders to work. Spain’s Socialist-led government said the measure is crucial given the role of migrant labor in agriculture, tourism and other sectors, and Elma Saiz Delgado, the minister for migration, said it would affect “our social cohesion, well-being, and also on the economy.” The decree was approved by the Council of Ministers after Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s government struck a last-minute deal with Unidas Podemos to secure parliamentary support for a measure that had been stalled in Parliament since April 2024.

Spain does not publish official figures on undocumented migrants, but think-tank estimates put the number between half a million and a million.