Pablo Iglesias settles scores: from the "narcissistic" Yolanda Díaz to the "enfant terrible" Pedro Vallín

Barcelona"A minister has much less power than the owner of a television station, the director of a newspaper, or the owner of a social network." Pablo Iglesias's latest book, Intimate enemies (Navona), edited by journalist and Iglesias collaborator Irene Zugasti, basically has one common thread: to demonstrate Spain's progressive "rightward shift" and to point the finger at those he considers to be the culprits. With the media—and journalists—in his crosshairs, but also politicians, the former Podemos leader, now focused on continuing his political career through Canal Red, settles scores with many of those who have been his allies at one point or another.

"I loved Yolanda very much. She was a personal friend, not just a colleague." It's no surprise, then, that perhaps the most heartbreaking chapter of the book is dedicated to the woman he designated as his successor, who today makes no secret of the fact that she's an enemy in the political trenches. "Yolanda fell in love with fame and changed her way of acting," opines Iglesias, who sees the Spanish vice president "in a cloud of narcissism from which she hasn't been able to come down." She, and also Íñigo Errejón, considers Iglesias to have been two "media constructions" to try to put an end to Podemos. What is the origin of the enmity? According to Iglesias, it was the event in Valencia in November 2021 that Díaz held with Ada Colau, Mónica García, and Mónica Oltra—and without Ione Belarra or Irene Montero. And her "lies." "I don't see Yolanda Díaz continuing in politics after everything that happened," he concludes.

Iglesias is aware that he won't make "friends" with the book, but rather he is responsible for remembering people who have ceased to be friends. In the section on journalists, the former editor of The Vanguard Pedro Vallín has a special chapter. Iglesias recalls that when Vallín began following Podemos, they hit it off, and at one point he even consulted him on decisions the party made. "He came to our house, we had a very close relationship... that's why what happened was painful." According to Iglesias, Vallín "fell in love with his own social media persona," a "enfant terrible", and resorted to lying against Podemos, the party "that gave him fame and a position that he didn't know how to manage."

The Spanish Prime Minister is "impeccable" in his manner, despite being "impenetrable," and has a "sharp political survival instinct" that he puts above any ideological considerations. For Iglesias, Sánchez "has never been a leftist" and, despite disputes with the old guard of the PSOE, "deep down, he agrees with Felipe González on many things."

What are Pablo Iglesias's worst political decisions? He has already publicly stated that he regrets having trusted Yolanda Díaz as his successor, and in the book he adds that he also rejects alliances with people like Manuela Carmena, who once became mayor of Madrid. "One of our biggest political mistakes was our alliances," he reflects. Regarding Carmena, he says her legacy will be "having further strengthened the PSOE."

Not all of Iglesias's criticisms are directed at his former traveling companions. He also directs it at political rivals, such as Madrid's president, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, who "has turned Madrid into the epicenter of the Spanish far right and herself into its best representative." He lies without a guilty conscience, says Iglesias, and the strategy of showering far-right media outlets with money is working for him. And yet, when they first met ten years ago at La Tuerka, "she was charming and tried not to seem too right-wing."

"If Ayuso is the political Trumpist, Ana Rosa is the icon of journalistic Trumpism, of embracing lies as the raw material of her work." The longtime leader of morning television programs is an example, according to Iglesias, that the media right must be fought with its weapons, and that's why he has joined Canal Red.

"Ana Rosa and Ferreras are complementary political operators," reflects Iglesias, who remembers how the La Sexta presenter explained to him one day that he was "Florentino (Pérez's) son": "Ferreras is the master of puppets [puppet master], the guy who probably best understood how powerful a journalist can be in Spain. To be "Florentino's son" is to be a Real Madrid man, with all that this entails.

This isn't the first time he's said this, but in the book, Iglesias insists that he feels "much more identified with José María Aznar than with Felipe González," even though he has barely spoken to either of them in his life. He appreciates that Aznar has never stopped participating in politics and trying to influence the debate, for example, through the FAES foundation. In contrast, he thinks González is a "tired" figure who generates headlines, but who today "is no longer in the game." "I think he hates me politically," Iglesias says of the former Socialist president, to whom he attributes much of the "rightward shift" of the PSOE. "The Transition ended in 1982 because González wanted it to, because with 202 deputies, the Transition should have begun then."

"Felipe VI is more right-wing than his father," but both have been driven, according to Iglesias, by the same logic: "That the monarchy survives as an institution." Regarding the king, beyond insisting that he is very right-wing and that the monarchy is a form of corruption, Iglesias asserts that he has often challenged the Spanish government, assuming a role beyond the symbolic role reserved for him by the Constitution. "The Spanish monarchy often challenges the government. I can't explain it in detail because I respect the confidentiality of the deliberations, but they have often challenged us."

Of Pablo Motos, he says that if anything broke his ego, "it wasn't the jokes about his height, nor the television critics, nor his long-silenced internal enemies: it was feminism." From the director ofEldiario.esIgnacio Escolar highlights his intelligence, which leads him to "evaluate the spaces of power and how he can establish himself." The Escolar case serves Iglesias to affirm that journalistic independence "is a huge lie." "You can't create a left-wing newspaper with journalists," he concludes.

The book also singles out Josep Borrell, Carmen Calvo, Victoria Prego, Juan Luis Cebrián, Santiago Abascal, Ciudadanos, and Judge Manuel García-Castellón, the investigator, among others, in the case against Pablo Iglesias himself, which the National Court eventually dismissed. "Judges are irremovable and look out for each other. They are key political operators who work to promote Spain's shift to the right."