The electoral cataclysm that Andalusia experienced in December 2018 seems destined to leave deep and, above all, lasting marks. The figures for the elections four years ago are extremely eloquent: the left lost almost 700,000 voters compared to the 2015 elections. And of these, 400,000 were lost by the PSOE, while the radical left lost nearly 300,000. A complete catastrophe. Instead, the right added less than 200,000 ballots; enough, however, to beat his 2012 record (nearly 1,800,000 votes), when the popular Javier Arenas seemed to have the Andalusian government at his fingertips.
The 2018 correlation was not explained only by the demobilization of the left, since the abstention with respect to the previous elections only grew by slightly more than 326,000 voters. Therefore, and in light of the pre-election polls and the results themselves, Ciudadanos and Vox would have distributed more than 200,000 votes from the left.
Specifically, in the case of Vox, voters from the classic right would have converged, but also from popular sectors in contact with immigration that until then voted for the PSOE or Podemos (or did not vote). And in this sense, the results of the left-wing parties in 2018, in areas with a high migratory presence, were generally below the average (and those of Vox, above).
Current surveys suggest that this transfer has not only been consolidated but could even be accentuated. Abstention is usually the prelude to a change of sign in the voters' vote. And an increase in participation in the June 19 elections would not necessarily mean that the left would recover those votes submerged in electoral absenteeism, but rather that those ballots would reappear in the saddlebags of the right.
Such an inversion of the vote is astonishing in a community in which, until four years ago, the vote for the left-wing forces was between 51% and 61%. However, the past is never a guarantee in traditionally left-wing regions that are governed by the center-right. In fact, historical experience reveals that the territories that move from the right to the left tend to soon return to the hands of the conservatives (with Galicia as a paradigmatic example). On the other hand, the opposite path can be practically irreversible.
In 1995, the Valencian Community, Madrid and Murcia ceased to be governed by the PSOE and passed into the hands of the PP. The first took twenty years to have a leftist government again. The other two have not ceased to be governed by the popular. And in the case of Murcia, the investment has been as exceptional as it could be in Andalusia.
Until 1991, the Murcian region gave the left-wing forces a contingent of votes that ranged between 57% and 62%. But as of 1995, the Conservative vote never fell below 55% of the vote, with points above 60% or even 70% between 2003 and 2011.
Exceptions exist and Castilla La Mancha and Extremadura are a good example of this. Both came to be governed by the PP in 2011, but returned to the hands of the PSOE in 2015. However, this return was favored by two key factors: the wear and tear that the central government's adjustment policy caused for the Popular Party and the good evaluation of the socialist candidates. For example, the Extremaduran Guillermo Fernández Vara was the best valued regional president when he was evicted from the Board.
Current expectations do not go in that direction. The PP is experiencing a phase of recovery of the votes that went to Ciudadanos, and the extreme right of Vox remains on the rise, with a state vote share above 15%. And as regards the leaders, the popular Moreno Bonilla has capitalized on the presidency of the Andalusian Board and today he is the best valued candidate and the only one who approves, according to the Andalusian CIS. In addition, Bonilla is twenty points ahead of the socialist candidate, Juan Espadas, as the preferred president.
Finally, the estimation of the vote, always debatable, leaves the PP almost 10 points ahead of the PSOE. And the most relevant: the sum of the conservative suffrage exceeds 57% (seven points more than the 2018 calculation).
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