This article describes and analyzes the image which the Spanish press disseminated of the 8,298 Spanish workers who participated in the building of the Panama Canal between 1906 and 1909. Our investigation is based on the hypothesis that the Spanish workers in Panama were the subject of a fiery controversy between the different political parties and journalistic enterprises in Spain in that period. In fact, the newspapers were a forum for important debates about the advantages and disadvantages of the recruitment of operatives, above all those from Galicia, to work in Panama under the orders of the United States government. While the conservative press wrote about the more technical aspects of the project, those which spoke for the left and workers´ movements openly criticized the way that the U.S. government treated the Spanish workers. In general, the press had a very critical attitude towards the conditions they worked in at the Canal and the treatment of Spanish laborers, but it depended on the circumstances of Spanish politics and the pressures of the government of the United States.