Born in 1975 in a mining and trade union family in Sallent de Llobregat, a working-class town located 70 km north of Barcelona, Gabriel worked as a street educator before studying law and taking up a part-time teaching position at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, where she taught history of law. She became involved in political activities at the age of 16, when she joined an platform. She graduated in social education and then graduated in law and completed a master's degree in social-labor rights at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. She has been a part-time instructor at the College of Law of the same university and has worked as a technician of the General Direction of Attention to Children of the Generalitat de Catalunya and the town councils of Manresa and Gironella. After studying social education, she worked in different city councils and organizations as a street educator and participated in the foundation of the Coordinator of Associations for the Catalan Language. She is a member of the General Confederation of Labour and is a member of Endavant. She has been member of CUP since 2002, where she defends feminism as one of the fundamental pillars of education, she commits to equality plans for the municipalities, as well as a shock plan against feminicide.
Political career
She was spokeswoman for the Catalan pro-Independence campaign "Independència per canviar-ho tot" and councilor of the City Council of Sallent between the years 2003 and 2011. She presented herself with the CUP to the European Parliament elections in 2004 as number three. During the 2012–2015 legislature in Catalonia, she worked as coordinator of the parliamentary group of the CUP. In the elections to the Parliament of Catalonia of 2015, she was elected deputy for Barcelona. From 2015 to 2017 she was the Parliament's spokesperson of the CUP. In 2017 she published, with David Fernàndez, the book Al principi de tot hi ha la guerra, based on August Gil Matamala's biography. After the holding in 2017 of the Catalan independence referendum, called by the Generalitat de Catalunya, and declared illegal by the Constitutional Court of Spain, Gabriel was called to appear in front of the Spanish Supreme Court to give evidence about her participation in those events. On 20 February 2018, she stated in an interview to Le Temps that she would not show up for her court hearing, while in a self-exile in Switzerland. On March 21st 2018 the magistrate of the Supreme CourtPablo Llarena finally decided to reduce the accusation to disobedience, an offense that does not entail prison sentences. According to an investigation by Citizen Lab, her phone phone was hacked using the Pegasus software from the NSO Group.
