White House blasts Spanish government as thousands of migrants surge from Morocco, emergency request denied

The White House bashed Spain's left-wing government after the border between Spain's North African enclave of Ceuta and Morocco collapsed Thursday.

"President Trump has long warned Europe what would happen if they continue to implement far-left, globalist policies, including enabling mass migration," White House principal deputy press secretary Anna Kelly told Fox News in a statement.

"Spain and other countries who have adopted this destructive philosophy should immediately reverse course or risk their own demise."

Ceuta's president formally requested a national emergency declaration Thursday after more than 2,000 migrants crossed the border from Morocco in the past 10 days. Videos showed chaotic scenes of migrants pouring into the Spanish territory.

Video shows hordes of apparently military-aged men smiling and posing for cameras, some carrying swimming flippers, and sprinting through the streets as authorities struggle to corral the unruly masses.

Ceuta President Juan Jesus Vivas formally requested that Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez declare a national emergency to help respond to the border crisis, Spanish media outlets reported. Madrid, however, denied the request.

"The declaration of a national emergency is part of the state civil protection regulations, which do not consider migratory flows as a risk to the National Civil Protection System, nor do they establish special plans, basic guidelines, or specific civil protection instruments for their management. Therefore, it is not possible to activate this mechanism, as requested by the president of the Government of Ceuta, Juan Jesus Vivas," Spain's Ministry of the Interior said in a statement, according to Spanish outlet El Pais.

Ceuta's government, in its request for a national emergency declaration, noted that immigration from Morocco is always a problem for the Spanish enclave but claimed the last 10 days represented a peak "of particular intensity." That peak has seen more than 2,000 migrants cross the border in the past 10 days, Ceuta officials said, according to El Pais.

"The Government of Spain is fully committed to providing an immediate response to the situation in Ceuta. We are mobilizing all necessary resources, working with Moroccan and international authorities, and preparing the necessary measures to restore normalcy as soon as possible," Sanchez wrote in a Thursday post on X.

"When they cross the border as minors, you cannot send them back to Morocco," Javier Negre, a conservative Spanish journalist and owner of La Derecha Diario and UHN Plus, told Fox News Digital.

"The Spanish state has to take care of them and pay money to NGOs to care for these minors until they turn 18," Negre continued.

"It's proof that Europe and Spain are on the verge of becoming a failed continent because of the future policies and promotion of this illegal invasion under Pedro Sanchez."

Sanchez, for his part, has claimed that accepting migrants is necessary to keep Spain's economy alive, arguing the country's low birth rates necessitate accepting immigrants.

"The West needs people. Currently, few of its countries have a rising population growth rate," Sanchez wrote in a February op-ed in The New York Times.

"Unless they embrace migration, they will experience a sharp demographic decline that will prevent them from keeping their economies and public services afloat. Their gross domestic product will stagnate. Their public healthcare and pension systems will suffer."