Feijóo vows to repeal Spain's trans law: 15,818 people have changed their legal sex since 2023

Alberto Núñez Feijóo said on Monday that a People's Party government would repeal Spain's 2023 transgender law. The pledge puts the end of legal gender self-identification into the PP platform he presents this week, three weeks before the November 29 general election. He spoke in an interview on the Cuatro television channel, as reported by La Vanguardia. "This business of declaring yourself a man or a woman at a civil registry is a frivolity that I leave to sanchismo," he said. Sanchismo is the opposition's term for Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez's style of government.

The pledge is not new for the PP, but it is now a campaign commitment rather than a parliamentary motion. It also puts the PP alongside Vox, which backs outright repeal. Polls suggest Feijóo may need Vox's votes to govern. Supporters of the law, including Sumar and the main LGBT federations, say repeal would push transgender people back under medical gatekeeping. The government's own figures show the stakes in numbers: more than 15,800 people changed the sex recorded in the civil registry between March 2023 and spring 2026.

What Feijóo promised and what he would change#

According to La Vanguardia's account of the interview, Feijóo framed repeal as a matter of "respect for women" and said the law "does not respect women." He added that "biological sex has to determine sports competitions." He said the measure would appear in the PP's electoral program, which he was due to present a day later.

He paired it with changes to the 2022 sexual-freedom law known as "only yes means yes." He said a PP government would restore the reviewable life sentence, Spain's harshest penalty, for child sexual abuse, repeated rape and sexual assault. It would also extend it to murders in which the killer hides the victim's body. In the same interview he promised to repeal the current housing law, an issue covered in the fight over Sánchez's defeated housing decrees.

The commitment builds on a March 2026 initiative. On March 10 the PP registered a non-binding motion in the Congress of Deputies. It called for a law that would "substantially reform articles 43 and 44" of the trans law, "putting an end to self-determination of registered sex without requirements," according to Europa Press. The motion also asked that a registry change produce no "automatic" effects harmful to women's rights in areas "in which consideration of biological sex is necessary." A few days earlier, at a PP event in Congress, Feijóo had said that "being a woman cannot be a mere declaratory procedure," El Plural reported.

Monday's wording goes further than the March motion. "Reform" of two articles has become "repeal" of the law. Feijóo did not say in the reported remarks whether a PP government would scrap the whole statute or only its registry chapter. The statute also contains anti-discrimination provisions for lesbian, gay and bisexual people that sit outside that chapter. That detail should be clearer once the full program is published.

What the 2023 law does#

Law 4/2023 was passed in February 2023 under the PSOE and Unidas Podemos coalition. Its full title is "for the real and effective equality of trans people and for the guarantee of the rights of LGTBI people." Its registry provisions, in articles 43 to 47 of the consolidated text in the Boletín Oficial del Estado, set out who may change the sex recorded at birth and how.

Article 44 bars making the change conditional on "a medical or psychological report" or on any prior "modification of the appearance or function" of the body. The applicant states their disagreement with the recorded sex before the registrar, and the government's written answer to Vox in April 2026 described the procedure as two such appearances. Article 47 lets a person revert after six months.

The law also contains limits that the PP's criticism tends to leave out. Article 46.3 says a registry change does not alter the legal regime that applied before the change for purposes of Spain's gender-violence law. That provision is at the center of claims that a man could avoid the specialized courts by changing his recorded sex. Article 46.4 says a person who changes from male to female can benefit from positive-action measures for women only for situations arising after the change. Whether those safeguards are sufficient is the core of the dispute. A 2023 instruction from the Justice Ministry's registry directorate also tells registrars to ensure there is no "fraud of law or abuse of right," according to the government's March 2026 answer reported by Europa Press.

How many people have used it#

The government has released registry figures only in response to written questions, most of them from Vox. In a February 2025 answer published by the Congress of Deputies, it reported 10,670 people whose recorded sex changed between January 1, 2023 and December 31, 2024, drawn from the Inforeg and Dicireg registry databases. A later answer put the 2025 total at 5,148, and an April 2026 answer gave 15,818 since the law took effect in March 2023.

Madrid

1,931

Catalonia

1,887

Andalusia

1,582

Valencian Community

869

Galicia

783

País Vasco

554

Murcia

535

Canarias

504

Castilla y León

422

Castilla-La Mancha

343

Source: Government written answer 184/18189, Congress of Deputies

Show the numbers

Region	Changes
Madrid	1,931
Catalonia	1,887
Andalusia	1,582
Valencian Community	869
Galicia	783
País Vasco	554
Murcia	535
Canarias	504
Castilla y León	422
Castilla-La Mancha	343

The counts track population size more than anything else; Madrid, Catalonia and Andalusia are Spain's three largest regions by population. The government has said it does not record how many applications registrars refused, because refusals "are not collected in the computer application." It has also not answered Vox's questions about how many applicants had criminal records. Vox's March 2026 question cited a press count of "more than a hundred cases" involving people accused or convicted of sexual offenses. That figure comes from an association's tally of published news reports, not from official data, and the government's reply did not confirm or dispute it.

The case for repeal#

The PP and Vox make overlapping but distinct arguments. Feijóo stated his case in March and again on Monday. He argues that sex is a biological fact that law should recognize in sensitive areas, including women's sports, changing rooms and the specialized gender-violence courts. Allowing a change by declaration alone, he says, "leads to the erasure of women." That phrase echoes a strand of Spanish feminism that opposed the bill in 2022 and 2023. El Mundo reported at the time that the bill raised "significant misgivings within the PSOE itself".

Vox, which proposes repealing the law outright, has focused on sport and on alleged misuse. In an October 2025 motion in the Valencian regional parliament, Vox argued that society "cannot endorse that people whose physiology developed along male parameters compete on equal terms with women." On the 567politics party spectrum for Spain, the People's Party sits at +2 on the social axis and Vox at +5, the most traditional placement among the national parties profiled. Those placements are dated editorial estimates reviewed on November 5, not measured scores.

The case for keeping the law#

Before 2023, the 2007 gender identity law generally required a diagnosis of gender dysphoria and two years of medical treatment before a registry change. Defenders of the 2023 law see its removal of those conditions as its central achievement. Mar Cambrollé, president of the Federación Plataforma Trans, said in March that removing self-determination would mean "pathologizing" transgender people and would "collide directly" with European human-rights doctrine, El Plural reported. Paula Iglesias, president of the LGBT federation FELGTBI+, accused the PP of adopting "the ultraconservative discourse of other world leaders that points to vulnerable groups as a threat."

Sumar's parliamentary spokesperson, Verónica Martínez Barbero, said in March that "it is the PP and Vox who erase us women." She argued the PP had "supported or approved eight regional laws" recognizing gender self-determination before changing course. That claim about regional laws is Sumar's; this story did not independently verify the count.

No statement from the PSOE or the Equality Ministry responding to Monday's interview had been published when this story was written. The Socialists' broader campaign message on equality and the PP's alliances is covered in Feijóo's red lines on a deal with Vox.

What Spaniards think, and how old that evidence is#

Recent representative polling on the law is thin. The most detailed survey found for this story predates the law's passage. A Sigma Dos poll for El Mundo published in October 2022 found that 63 percent supported being able to choose one's gender freely and have it recorded officially even when it does not match biological sex. Support reached 78.8 percent among PSOE voters and 84.5 percent among Unidas Podemos voters. In the same poll, about two-thirds said limits should be placed on changes by minors, and 56.5 percent disagreed that self-identification threatens women's rights, against 32.7 percent who agreed. The article does not give the sample size or field dates, and opinion may have moved since. No comparable national poll from 2025 or 2026 on repealing the law was located.

Why it matters for November 29#

Repeal would need a majority in the 350-seat Congress. The latest surveys, summarized in the 567politics report on the 40dB poll, show the PP leading but short of a majority on its own. Several polls project the PP and Vox together at roughly 190 to 200 seats. That makes this one of the issues on which a PP government could count on Vox. It also gives the left a concrete pledge to campaign against as the official campaign opens on November 12. The full PP program, expected this week, should show whether Feijóo means a full repeal or a rewrite of the registry chapter alone.

Differing perspectives

Should Spain keep, rewrite or repeal its 2023 law allowing legal sex changes by self-declaration?

Each position is summarized as its supporters make it, with equal weight and in alphabetical order. A summary is not an endorsement; the evidence for each is weighed in the story above.

• End self-declaration and add objective requirements

  Who holds it: The People's Party and its leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo

  The PP argues that being a woman cannot be a mere declaratory procedure and that registry changes by statement alone erode protections built for women. Feijóo says biological sex should govern sports competitions and sensitive spaces, and that a change in recorded sex must not have automatic effects on women's rights. The party says it will repeal the current law and restore objective legal guarantees for any change of registered sex.

  In their words: La Vanguardia, reporting Feijóo's Cuatro interview ↗

• Keep gender self-determination

  Who holds it: Sumar, FELGTBI+, Federación Plataforma Trans, Arcópoli and other LGBT groups

  Supporters argue that self-determination ended years of requiring diagnoses and medical treatment before transgender people could get documents matching their lives. They say removing it would pathologize transgender people and conflict with European human-rights doctrine. Sumar says the PP once backed regional laws recognizing the same right and is now using women's rights to attack another vulnerable group, while the law already limits effects under gender-violence rules.

  In their words: Europa Press, reporting Sumar spokesperson Verónica Martínez Barbero ↗

• Repeal the law outright

  Who holds it: Vox and its leader Santiago Abascal

  Vox argues that the 2023 law ignores physical differences between the sexes and has become a tool that divides men and women. It says women's sport is the clearest example: people whose bodies developed along male lines should not compete against women on the basis of a later legal change. Vox wants the whole statute repealed, not amended, and has pressed the government for data on refused applications and applicants with criminal records.

  In their words: Vox ↗

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