Spain's government faces no-confidence vote brought by Vox

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Spain’s leftist coalition government faces a no-confidence vote brought by the nation's far-right Vox party as lawmakers on Tuesday debated the motion, which has little chance of succeeding.

The vote will be held in the 348-member lower chamber on Wednesday. No other party said that it would support the attempt by Vox's 52 lawmakers to topple the Socialist-led government of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.

In a move that has been widely panned by other political parties and Spanish media, Vox leader Santiago Abascal has broken with custom and isn't presenting himself as an alternative prime minister. Instead, in an attempt to lure votes from centrist and leftist legislators, Vox convinced a former communist party member and university professor to lead the no-confidence measure.

Ramón Tamames, 89, who was a lawmaker in the 1970s and 1980s, has pledged that if the vote were to succeed, his only act as prime minister would be to immediately call for a national election to coincide with a local election already scheduled for May 28.

While Tamames has said that he doesn't agree with many of Vox’s positions, which include its negation of climate change, unfounded charges that migrants are linked to more violent crimes, and its attacks on feminism. But he said that he does share the party’s concerns regarding Catalan and Basque separatism.

Vox announced its intention to bring the no-confidence motion after Sánchez’s government reformed laws on sedition and embezzlement to relieve the legal pressure on Catalan separatists last December.

“Señor Abascal, the candidate that you have presented is simply a decoy for you to hide behind and for you to hide your despicable political agenda,” Sánchez said to the organizer of the vote.

“Should I apologize?"...