Rubén Viñuales: Would Vox and Aliança be okay with letting irregular immigrants starve to death?

BarcelonaRubén Viñuales (Tarragona, 1983) left Ciutadans six years ago for the PSC, with whom he reached the mayoralty of Tarragona in 2023. Since then, he has governed in minority, but has been able to approve, with relative ease, the budgets by closing pacts with different parties. In this interview conducted at the Diari ARA newsroom, he talks about his city, but also about the far-right, judges, and the use of Catalan.

How do you see Junts' move to leave the Girona government a year before the elections?

— I can understand the situation the mayor of Girona is going through and what I wish him is luck and success. I don't know if these kinds of tactical moves are appropriate. The city's interests must always be put first and losing this stability, I don't know if it's the best for Girona.

What is it like to govern in minority?

— It depends. I can explain my experience to you. For us it is fine. It was not my intention. I tried to expand the government with Junts and with En Comú Podem actively and passively and it was not possible, but it is true that we have had stability in Tarragona. Three budgets approved in November. But this also speaks very highly of the opposition in Tarragona, especially Junts and Comuns, and also of the non-attached, who have put the interests of Tarragona above all else.

Bet on socio-convergence?

— I don't know if the En Comú Podem colleague would be very pleased to call him that, but I'm thinking more about the fact that it's a pact for Tarragona. I really like municipal politics because sometimes it can overcome certain lines that are very complex at supramunicipal levels. The feeling is that with Junts and, obviously, with En Comú Podem, there is a good relationship. The idea is to get along with everyone, except with Vox.

And Catalan Alliance?

— No, we will not understand each other with racist, xenophobic parties, who understand the world in a way that is false, that is wrong, and, moreover, is contrary to the humanist principles that have made the era of greatest prosperity and peace in the history of humanity. It is impossible.

Therefore, he did not understand that his now former colleagues from Ripoll facilitated the approval of Sílvia Orriols' budgets.

— I don't understand it and, furthermore, sometimes there are things that don't depend on you, but there are other things that do depend on you. And I believe that you can't give air to parties that defend things that are, if you'll allow me the term, bar conversations. There are people who are not aware of how dangerous it is and that, not too many years ago, people lived in a dictatorship here, that fascism was on the verge of winning the war in Europe and the world. And that was only yesterday. It doesn't cease to surprise me.

During the Process, the PSC also demonstrated alongside Vox.

— I am convinced of the moral principles of the PSC and President Illa in particular. What I do know is that we all have to learn lessons. None of us is in possession of the absolute truth and we all make mistakes, myself included.

Prescription sanitary cord, therefore?

— Absolutely, in all institutions. And the sanitary cordon does not mean pretending they don't exist. It means not making deals with them. I do nothing with you, I go nowhere. But this does not mean that we should not fight them ideologically. This has been the mistake, I believe, of the previous sanitary cordon.

One of the flags of the extreme right is corruption. In Reus, the Innova case has been judged, the Inipro case will be judged in Tarragona very soon. There is the conviction of the brother of the president of the Spanish government, the Zapatero case... Should parties be tougher in the face of these cases?

— I always remember that the only party that has been convicted of organized crime is the People's Party [it was convicted in the Gürtel case as a profiteer]. Corruption must always be fought and no party, not even mine, is exempt from this constant struggle. But to pretend that all those people who are dedicated to public service, through politics, are corrupt or corruptible, is false. Tremendously false. If someone has done something wrong, they must pay. That said, and I speak to you as a lawyer, some recent decisions have left me very surprised. The one from the Attorney General of the State left me perplexed. When I was starting out as a lawyer, there was a very veteran colleague who told me that justice is not blind, it is cross-eyed and from the left eye, from the right eye it sees very well. Some judicial movements against President Sánchez and his entourage do not cease to surprise.

Is there an organization to bring down the government?

— I strongly believe in the independence of judges. In those of first instance or provincial courts, I don't see this bias, but it's another matter when you move up and sometimes you see strange things.

In the case of the president of the government's brother, it is a provincial court that condemns him.

— It can be reviewed in a second instance.

David Sánchez or the attorney general have been condemned more for indications than for evidence, but that is not the case for José Luis Ábalos.

— What I also don't think is a correct correlation of ideas is to say that, because there is a case where there may have been evidence, the rest cannot be lawfare or some type of invention. People must perceive justice in an absolutely impartial way.

Do you think the independence movement also paid for this way of understanding justice?

— Perhaps in something yes. Perhaps in some way he suffered it.

You, who were a member of Ciutadans during the Process, consider the amnesty necessary to turn the page?

— Yes, I do think so and I firmly defend it, and furthermore, I believe they do no favor to coexistence by prolonging the amnesty law in a way that I believe is artificial. We must understand that societies have to learn to coexist. I am not an independentist and I never will be, but I must not tell someone who is an independentist that they should not be. And I also ask that it be applied because it was the will of the Congress of Deputies, that is, of the people's representatives.

Security and immigration are two of the issues that will be protagonists in the next elections and that the far-right brings to the table.

— Offer solutions, always, but these discourses must be combated because it is false that immigration is related to crime. Many decades ago it was already invented that they could provide magical solutions to sometimes unreal problems and where they make you see that you are a collective and that the other is different from you, and that he is to blame for all your ills. In Tarragona, crime figures have been decreasing every year, now 4.5% less than the previous year. The other thing is perception. Obviously, crime must be combated, not the origin of people, a person who commits a crime is not a Moroccan, a Spaniard or a Belgian, it is a person who commits a crime.

Has asked Junts or the PP to act on the municipal register?

— They asked for it and we already told them no. Together he made a motion of the kind they present everywhere. The registry is necessary for many reasons, but the first of all is to know how many people really live in your municipality. How do I know, otherwise, how many police officers I need? How many nurseries? How many doctors and female doctors? How many schools?

One thing is the register and another is the rights of these people.

— But that's not something they can decide. When you register, you access certain rights. Obviously, our healthcare system, which is the envy of the world, despite having many things to improve. You also have the right, obviously, to educate your sons and daughters. Or do we not educate children because their parents do not have a regular administrative residence in Spain? Or are we going to let them starve? I ask. Would that seem good to you?

With national priority, PP and Vox say they will withdraw all aid even from entities that collaborate with illegal immigration.

— With Open Arms we have an agreement in which we give 50,000 euros a year and every year they come to port and we make visits there so that their work can be understood. What they do is save human lives. The far-right dehumanizes the opposite, if it exists on this issue. In such a way that, since he is not a man, I can do things without having a clear conscience. They are ideas so old, so absurd, so historically refuted, with such hateful consequences for the human being as a species, that I only recommend them to read a little history.

Is this speech taking hold in Tarragona?

— I believe much less than elsewhere. First, because we are a people who understand mixture. Second, because it is a city where people truly coexist. And third, because we understand that the world is as it is, not as others say it should be. And we see people.

From his former political space he has been criticized for having added Tarragona to the National Pact for Language. Is Spanish, as they say, persecuted in Catalonia?

— Castilian is not persecuted.

In public administration, for example?

— In public administration, you can address it in the language you consider among the co-official ones. Another thing is that the language we want to use as a main character is Catalan for a logical reason. Where will we speak Catalan, if not? In La Rioja? It is undeniable that the language suffering a regression is Catalan. I always explain that Goku, Arale, and Musculman did more for Catalan than any other policy. Furthermore, current content creators are all in Spanish. And this is a problem that we must also consider, right? Listen, defending Catalan is not going against Spanish. Spanish is also my mother's language. My grandfather, who was from Sigüenza, and arrived at Santa Oliva at 24 years old, I never heard him speak Spanish. We must promote Catalan because if not, there is a serious risk. Languages disappear from the world every year.

But, therefore, has this controversy been artificial?

— The Process was an era of extreme tension. And in times of tension, perhaps things can be said, by both sides, that should not have been said.

Do you regret things you said when you were in Ciutadans?

— I have always tried not to say things I didn't believe. And that caused me a lot of problems at that time. They called me the little red one. I have always been a moderate person and I hope to die that way.