"We must activate the change counter now": Feijóo brings forward the PP congress

MadridAlberto Núñez Feijóo's People's Party (PP) has been proclaiming for weeks with even greater intensity that Pedro Sánchez's government "is already in the countdown." The massive power outage, the railway chaos, and the latest judicial moves against the Spanish president's entourage have given the PP leader ammunition, who has decided to put the internal machinery in motion to face the next electoral cycle with his homework done. This entails convening the party's state congress, which was scheduled for April 2026, but which Feijóo has decided to move up to July of this year, among other reasons, given the possibility that the socialist leader will not last until the end of his term and end up bringing forward the elections. "I don't trust Sánchez," the PP president stated this Monday at the meeting of the party's national executive committee, during which he announced that the extraordinary convening of the PP congress, about which there had been speculation for days, will be held on the weekend of July 5 and 6 in Madrid.

"We must activate the change counter now with a strengthened team, an exciting project, and the determination to serve Spain," Feijóo proclaimed, jokingly adding, "We are moving from the Pope's conclave to the PP's conclave." The PP leader will run for reelection, and within the party, it is assumed that there will be a closing of ranks around the current president, who will be given a second chance at reaching the Moncloa Palace. However, the decision carries the risk of staging internal divisions and diverting focus from the problems plaguing Sánchez. In the coming months, Feijóo will not be able to prevent his internal affairs, such as the foreseeable changes in the team that has accompanied him until now as leader, from taking center stage over attacks on the PSOE.

The future of Mazón

PP sources disassociate the course of the congress from the debate on Carlos Mazón and his permanence as leader of the Valencian PP after his management of the DANA. "[Feijóo] hasn't decided anything in this regard," they affirm. Although in Génova they minimize the impact of facing the congress with the Valencian president's file still open, it is one of the main hot potatoes for the PP president.

The convening of the state congress should activate the calendar for convening the pending regional congresses. Among them, two of the most thorny for Feijóo, the Valencian and Catalan, which have been postponed for years. Sources from the PP leadership avoid linking the July convening with the debate on the leadership of Mazón in the Valencian Community and Alejandro Fernández in Catalonia. The Valencian also defended this Monday that in his autonomous region, it is not the time for organic debates in response to the challenge of former President Francisco Camps.

What it will allow, they say in Genoa, is to facilitate the reinforcement of the leadership of Alfonso Fernández Mañueco in Castilla y León and Juanma Moreno in Andalusia, since both face regional elections in 2026. It will bring forward the electoral distancing of the regional camps in these two territories.

The pending ideological debate

The last PP congress was in 2022. However, it was an extraordinary one that limited itself to proclaiming Feijóo as the new leader, replacing Pablo Casado. For the moment, the PP leader has avoided addressing internal ideological debates. The last time these issues were addressed at a congress was in 2017, when Mariano Rajoy was still in power. Although the July congress will be extraordinary because it will not yet be four years since the previous one, Feijóo has announced that this time a political report "defining the priorities" of the PP will be debated, as well as another on the statutes governing its internal functioning.

Among the debates he will face are alliances with Vox and the position on abortion and euthanasia, which are among the most complicated and where internal disagreements may be evident. He also considers his relationship with parties such as the PNV and Junts. Sources in Genoa deny that these debates "make them uncomfortable" and affirm that Feijóo's determination to finally address the ideological debate despite the extraordinary nature of the meeting demonstrates this.

Ayuso's pressure

While at the entrance of the national executive committee the regional presidents and men of the party who attended have remained cautious and have stressed that the decision rests exclusively with the party president, hours before Isabel Díaz Ayuso had made it clear at a breakfast briefing that she was leaning towards what Feijóo finally announced. At a breakfast briefing, the Madrid president opted to "speed up" the party congress in the face of the "rumor" of an early meeting, "because if not, everyone will have an opinion except the protagonists." Upon leaving the briefing, Ayuso hurriedly escaped from the press because, among other things, she said she had some pending calls.

Sources from Génova have explained that Feijóo has called throughout the morning to the men to inform them of the decision before announcing it publicly during the national executive committee meeting. Ayuso did not participate in the meeting due to scheduling reasons, but she reacted to the announcement by closing ranks with Feijóo. Those who knew even further in advance of the decision the PP president would make are former presidents Mariano Rajoy and José María Aznar, who had been informed for days. The PP leader had been considering it for months, and in March, the space where it will be held was already rented in case it was necessary.