President of the Spanish Senate

The president of the Senate is the presiding officer of the Spanish Senate, the upper house of Spain's Cortes Generales. It is the fourth authority of the country after the Monarch (Head of State), the Prime Minister (Head of Government) and the President of the Congress of Deputies (Speaker of the Lower House). The president is elected among and by the incumbent senators. When the president is unable to exercise power, vice presidents of the Senate exercise the powers of the Senate president. Although it shares the representation of the Cortes Generales with the President of the Congress, the constitutional preponderance granted to the latter due to the asymmetry of the Spanish bicameralism, allows the President of the Congress to assume the leadership of the Cortes, leaving the President of the Senate in background. The current office was established by the 1978 Constitution, however, the position has a tradition of almost 200 years, since its creation in 1834 when it was called President of the House of Peers. As of the 15th term of the Cortes Generales, the current officeholder is Pedro Rollán, a member of the Popular Parliamentary Group representing Madrid.