Thousands of people are protesting across Spain after authorities evicted Maricarmen Abascal from her home in Madrid.
Maricarmen, who is 87 years old, had been living there for over 70 years. Images of police forcibly removing her from the flat on a stretcher have now turned the legal dispute into a symbolic fight for housing activists.
The protesters marched through Madrid, camped out in Puerta del Sol, and organised demonstrations in other Spanish cities.
They are using Maricarmen’s case to protest the wider housing crisis: rising rents and a shortage of affordable homes, which are fuelling fears that tenants can no longer afford to stay in major cities.
The situation has become a very politicised debate, fuelling several false, misleading, and selectively edited claims.
A legal decision
One of the most prominent claims circulating online is that Maricarmen’s eviction was “illegal”. This is false: courts authorised the eviction after a years-long dispute over a protected rental contract dating back to the 1950s. It was carried out under a valid court order, despite the backlash it received.
Maricarmen’s father originally held the lease, which later passed to her mother and then to Maricarmen herself. The courts ruled that this second transfer could continue for only two years unless Maricarmen had a recognised disability above 65%; authorities recognised hers at 50%.
Spain’s Supreme Court upheld the owner’s position, which meant the old, protected tenancy had legally expired and the company could recover the flat. The eviction was therefore lawful.
The goal of the protests
So, contrary to what some misleading headlines imply, protesters are not arguing whether the eviction was lawful, but whether it was fair.
This is partly because, under Francisco Franco’s dictatorship laws, married women could not legally sign financial contracts or property leases independently.
Maricarmen’s mother could inherit the lease only by subrogation upon her husband’s death. Had she been a co-owner or co-signer from the start, Maricarmen’s inheritance of the lease would have counted as the first subrogation, legally protecting her right to stay in the home for life.
Protesters also point out that Maricarmen is 87, has lived in the property for more than seven decades, and continued paying her protected rent.
After the old tenancy ended, property management company Urbagestión proposed a rent of around €1,650 a month, far above the roughly €440 to €500 she had previously paid. This is higher than her monthly pension of around €1,350, therefore forcing a vulnerable long-term tenant out because she cannot afford the new rent.
Protesters are asking for stronger protections against evictions of vulnerable tenants, longer or automatically renewed rental contracts, and tighter limits on rent increases.
Some groups also want tougher rules on speculative housing practices and greater public intervention in the rental market. They are now pressing parliament to approve new protections for vulnerable tenants and longer lease terms.
Other false and misleading claims
Another disputed claim going around online is that the Sindicato de Inquilinas, Spain’s main union for tenants, prevented Maricarmen from reaching an agreement with the owner before the eviction.
Urbagestión says the union made it hard to contact Maricarmen directly, while Maricarmen’s lawyer says the opposite: that the company had refused repeated attempts to negotiate.
Urbagestión has also accused people involved in the dispute of coercion, extortion and hacking phones and email accounts. However, the company did not provide evidence for these claims in reporting reviewed by fact-checkers like Spain’s Maldita.es.
Another misleading assertion comes from a shortened video of Maricarmen herself. In the clip, she appears to blame left-wing Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez specifically for her situation, but the full interview adds more names: she also criticises Madrid regional president Isabel Díaz Ayuso, Madrid mayor José Luis Martínez-Almeida (both members of the right-wing Popular Party) and Urbagestión itself. The clip therefore uses a genuine quote but removes the wider context of her answer.
A separate false claim involved two protesters called “Irene and Pablo” who spoke to elDiario.es at a protest camp at the Puerta del Sol square in Madrid. Some social-media users suggested they were Pablo Iglesias, former leader of far-left party Podemos, and MEP Irene Montero, from the same party.
However, a quick look at the article itself shows us that they are actually a different 28-year-old woman and 37-year-old man, with no indication that they were the politicians in question.
The next steps
Maricarmen has now accepted an agreement that will allow her to return to the apartment once she leaves hospital. Under the new arrangement, she will pay roughly the same as her previous rent, around €500 a month, capped at 30% of her income. The agreement creates a new tenancy; it does not overturn the court ruling that ended her old, protected lease.
Meanwhile, Spain’s government has proposed measures that would extend some eviction protections and lengthen rental contracts, but parliament still needs to approve them. Protesters are therefore continuing their campaign and pushing politicians to adopt those measures while demanding broader reforms to Spain’s housing system.