A personal essay titled “I’m an American Living in Madrid. This Week, I Felt Closer to Home Than Ever” describes what it is like to follow a U.S. election from thousands of miles away. The author, an American who lives in the Spanish capital, writes about hope and pride, and also about distance.

A moment in a Madrid workout class

The writer says the gap between life in Spain and events in the United States became clear on November 3. During a workout class made up entirely of Spaniards, the author said in Spanish that people in New York are not supporters of Donald Trump. The author was explaining that an absentee ballot had not arrived in time, though this mattered little because New York is not a swing state. The writer notes that the idea of a swing state is hard to explain in a parliamentary democracy.

Why the family moved

The family moved to Madrid in August 2025, according to the essay. The writer stresses that the move was not an escape. Visas, house rentals and school visits had been in the works long before Trump’s second term began. The stated reasons were a change of pace, exposure to a different culture and Spanish immersion for their son.

The author acknowledges that there was plenty to leave behind, whether real or imagined. The essay lists the dismantling of USAID, immigration enforcement actions by ICE, gun violence and vaccine hesitancy in schools, and several political figures. From Madrid, the family watched with a mix of shock, relief and guilt. The writer contrasts this with what they saw in Spain, including Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s move to naturalize 500,000 undocumented migrants.

Waking up to the results

The writer says they woke repeatedly through the night as polls closed across the United States, then slept for about an hour before dawn in Madrid. They woke to a map dominated by blue and to news of several firsts. These included the first Black woman governor of Georgia, the first Native American governor, the first Native American woman senator and the first openly gay senator. The writer also mentions the result in Texas with evident astonishment.

The author describes being overjoyed and feeling hopeful about what they call a renewed American promise, one built on solidarity rather than the erasure of Native Americans, Black people and other groups. The writer imagines the end of ICE, renewed climate commitments and meaningful gun control. They also describe a sense of “disbelonging”: having had no hand in the result, they feel they cannot fully share in the celebration.

Hard to translate

The essay says it is difficult to convey to the Spanish women the author meets for daily coffee how much the election matters. The writer adds that they lack the words, in either language, to describe how the result changes their view of their child’s future. The piece ends with the author, who was making a ham bocadillo for their son at the time, feeling American pride for the first time in a long while.

Source: vogue.com

Image: Dmitry Dzhus from London / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)