2011 Spanish general election
The 2011 Spanish general election was held on Sunday, 20 November 2011, to elect the 10th Cortes Generales of the Kingdom of Spain. All 350 seats in the Congress of Deputies were up for election, as well as 208 of 266 seats in the Senate. An election had not been due until April 2012 at latest, but a call by Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero for a snap election five months ahead of schedule was announced on 29 July 2011. Zapatero would not be seeking a third term in office, and with political pressure mounting, a deteriorating economic situation and his political project exhausted, an early election was perceived as the only way out.
Image: Mariano Rajoy 2012b (cropped)
Image: Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba 2012b (cropped)
Image: Josep Antoni Duran i Lleida 2015b (cropped)
Image: Cayo Lara IU2
The Congress of Deputies is the lower house of the Cortes Generales, Spain's legislative branch, the upper house being the Senate. The Congress meets in the Palace of the Parliament in Madrid.
Congress of Deputies
Congreso de los Diputados (built 1850): Palacio de las Cortes. Seat of the Spanish Parliament in Madrid (2016)
The allegorical front of the building