The appointment of the members of the Constitutional Court (TC), whose mandate expires at the end of this week, threatens to lead to a considerable political and judicial conflict.
Court sources warn the Government that if it appoints the two magistrates that correspond to it without waiting for the other two that the General Council of the Judiciary must set, it will put the TC in a complicated situation.
The next day 12 ends the mandate of four of the twelve magistrates that make up the full Court.
According to the Constitution itself, the composition of the plenary must be renewed by thirds, that is, four by four. This has always been the case, but this year the Government finds itself in a delicate situation.
The four magistrates who have to renew are the two chosen by the Executive and another two proposed by the General Council of the Judiciary.
However, as a result of the blockade for the renewal of the body of judges, whose mandate has already been extended for three and a half years, PSOE and Podemos promoted a reform of the law of the Judicial Power to prevent the Council from making appointments while it is in office. .
The Government approved this reform to force the PP to sit down to negotiate the renewal, but the previous popular leader, Pablo Casado, refused to close the agreement.
In theory, after the arrival of Alberto Núñez Feijóo to the presidency of the PP in April, it was taken for granted that negotiations would be opened for the renewal of the Council.
But the announcement of the Andalusian elections has changed the entire calendar. The PP is not going to sit down to negotiate the renewal until it sees what the political map looks like in Andalusia.
Just yesterday, the general secretary of the PP, Cuca Gamarra, blamed the Government for the blockade in the TC.
Thus, the disagreement will keep the body chaired by Carlos Lesmes even longer, which means that he cannot appoint the two magistrates that would correspond to him. Result: the TC could veto the appointment of the two that correspond to the Government, considering that the four –those awarded by the Executive and the two appointed by the Council– are inseparable.
The Executive does not see it the same way. Last week, the Minister of the Presidency, Félix Bolaños, announced that the Government could carry out its two appointments without waiting for the other two from the CGPJ. For the Executive, placing the two new magistrates could mean changing the direction of the Court from a conservative majority to a progressive one.
For these two magistrates to become part of the court they have to overcome the plácet of their colleagues, currently a conservative majority. TC sources explain that if the two magistrates are appointed in the Council of Ministers, the full Court will meet and will presumably reject their entry into the body, considering that they violate the Constitution.
Progressive magistrates of the TC consider that they could be appointed. They are based on a precedent, on the first composition of the TC, which was made without the magistrates appointed by the CGPJ because the body had not yet been constituted. But the conservative majority, a priori, rejects this option. For this reason, and given the forecast of what is going to happen, the court trusts that the Government will wait for Núñez Feijóo to give his arm to twist and renew the CGPJ.
The other option is that the Constitutional Court itself overturns the reform that limits appointments. However, sources from the court of guarantees maintain that there is no forecast that the paper will be studied in the coming months.
Given this scenario, various sources in the body believe that the best solution is that after the Andalusian elections, PSOE and PP bury the hatchet, renew the CGPJ and then the four magistrates of the TC and thus avoid a serious constitutional problem.
