At eight in the morning, twenty PP deputies were already queuing to enter the Congress of Deputies. On days when there is a joint session with the Senate, the hemicycle becomes small and it is difficult to fit. And this Monday, which was a historic day in Madrid, some were afraid of not finding a seat. The Pope's visit is an exceptional mobilization of resources and organization, even for those accustomed to dealing with state and international authorities. To give the reader an idea: while Leo XIV arrived at 10:30 at the Carrera de San Jerónimo, Congress opened its doors at 7:30 so that both parliamentarians and journalists could enter and have the necessary credentials (to reach today, considerable paperwork has been required). In addition, although the press normally moves up and down with some freedom around the hemicycle and the courtyard of Congress, this Monday the place to follow the event had to be chosen: the courtyard to see the arrival accompanied by music; the tribune inside the hemicycle or from the usual press facilities. What's more: at the end of the event, the deputies had to wait a few minutes inside the plenary until the Pope's entourage dispersed and they could circulate normally.

Iván Redondo (Sant Sebastià, 1981) has already become a legend of political communication in Spain. He was the power behind the scenes at Moncloa from 2018 to 2021 as chief of staff for Pedro Sánchez, and previously began in Badalona with Xavier García Albiol and in Extremadura with the government of José Antonio Monago. Five years after leaving the Spanish government, he explains why he left and the keys to winning elections in El manual (2026, Contraluz).

If any impartial observer were to land in Madrid and review what has happened in the last six months, they would ask themselves a question: considering the regional election results, the polls, and the proliferation of alleged corruption cases, why doesn't Pedro Sánchez face an internal revolt within the PSOE? Is there currently too much criticism within the socialist ranks to launch an internal challenge and force, for example, an election? The answer is that the probability is almost zero. Although there are some voices raising a finger, the opposition, infinitesimal, is not articulated, has no visible face, nor support within the party's organic structures, which are dominated by Sánchez's allies. For what reason?

The motion of no confidence weighs heavily on the political debate since the indictment of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, almost two weeks ago. Although the PP resists presenting it, Alberto Núñez Feijóo has taken a further step in the strategy of pressuring Pedro Sánchez's investiture allies and this Monday he offered himself, especially to Junts and the PNB, to put an end to the legislature. In an interview on Telecinco, and after the Spanish president vowed this weekend to resist in Moncloa, the PP leader has called for efforts to be united for an instrumental motion of no confidence. The objective would be to bring down the PSOE government, besieged by cases of alleged corruption, and call for immediate elections. "Decency and elections," he summarized.

Upon entering the UGT headquarters in Madrid, it was difficult to tell if it was the closing of the Congress of the Spanish Socialist Youth or a nightclub. The machine version of Pedro by Raffaella Carrà was playing at full blast while the leaders waited for the Spanish president, Pedro Sánchez, to enter the hall. A militant stood with a raised rose and two books by the PSOE leader in his hand –Manual de resistencia and Tierra firme–, which Sánchez dutifully signed as he passed by amidst shouts and applause. It is the staging of what the PSOE wants to do after fifteen days of judicial earthquake: counterattack.

The Zapatero case has opened a parallel debate: what do former presidents do? Do they have any limits in the private sector? One of the arguments used by those around the PSOE to respond to the ruling of Judge José Luis Calama is that Zapatero – president from 2004 to 2011 – has used his contact list to carry out consulting or lobbying tasks, as other former Spanish presidents have done. This, they emphasize, is legal, although the experts consulted warn that there is a legal vacuum regarding the activities that former heads of state can undertake and that there is also no specific regulation for lobbying because it is stalled in Congress.

The only thing José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero has said since Tuesday, May 19th transcended his indictment at the National Court

After a week stunned by the Zapatero case and the investigation pointing to a plot within the PSOE, the socialists are counterattacking. The Spanish Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, has requested to appear before Congress to inform about "the political situation related to the latest known judicial investigations." That is to say, to talk about the scandals surrounding his party. This is reported by sources from the Spanish government, who assure that they have "nothing to hide" and no problem discussing, if the PP wishes, the cases affecting the PSOE and also those of the PP, such as Kitchen, which is on trial. The PSOE has vowed to resist at Moncloa. The appearance has no date yet, but it will be after June 19, when the next European Council will take place, which Sánchez also wants to account for.

It was April 24, 2024, on the eve of the campaign for the Catalan Parliament elections, when Pedro Sánchez dropped a bombshell on social media. A letter to the citizens in which he confessed to being "deeply in love with his wife" and wondered if it was worth going forward after learning that proceedings had been opened against Begoña Gómez in a court. He took five days to reflect, during which many assumed he would resign... but he stayed. He decided to resist. The reader may wonder why this episode is being brought up now, but there is an explanation: it was during this period of reflection that Judge Santiago Pedraz places the beginning of the new judicial front that since this Wednesday the PSOE faces.

A paranoia runs through the PSOE. This is the feeling that this Wednesday socialist deputies who attended Congress early to attend the control session had, and who were surprised by a news item from El Confidencial that pointed to a search at the PSOE headquarters for an alleged irregular financing scheme. The shock was immense: they didn't know what was happening and the feeling of being completely exposed to the succession of events, in the midst of a storm over the Zapatero case, was absolute. After the initial shock, there was, in quotation marks, a kind of relief despite the seriousness of the accusations: from the party they indicated that the Civil Guard had appeared at the headquarters (it was there for twelve hours) to request information about a new case related to Leire Díez: the National Court is now investigating whether she and former PSOE leaders tried to obstruct judicial proceedings affecting the party or the Spanish government. That is to say, a case that directly points to the structure of the socialist party and which has led to a new indictment of Santos Cerdán and the party manager, Ana Fuentes, among others.

The name of Delcy Rodríguez rose to prominence in Spanish politics long before Donald Trump's intervention in Venezuela and before she became the country's new leader following the arrest and imprisonment of Nicolás Maduro. It was in January 2020, when she landed at Barajas airport and had a meeting (formal or informal, depending on the version) with the then Minister of Transport, José Luis Ábalos, now in pre-trial detention for the Koldo case. That contact was highly controversial, as Rodríguez was prohibited from entering European Union territory as part of the sanctions agreed by Brussels against Maduro's government. Now, the so-called Delcygate is back in the spotlight: there is a thread connecting those events with the summary of the Zapatero case, which has shaken Spanish politics. This thread has a name, and it is Commissioner Jesús María Gómez Martín.

News on active retirement. The Spanish government has approved a royal decree this Tuesday, which will come into effect in three months, establishing a new modality for self-employed workers and employees, both part-time and full-time, to combine their work and collect their pension simultaneously. The objective, as explained by the Minister of Security and Migrations, Elma Saiz, is to facilitate retired individuals to return to work without losing their pension, with the idea of contributing to an "active aging".

José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero will testify as an investigated party before the National Court two weeks later than planned. Judge José Luis Calama has accepted the former Spanish president's defense's request for an adjournment and summons him for June 17 and 18. Initially, he was scheduled for next week, Tuesday the 2nd. In an order, Calama deems it appropriate to postpone the declaration due to the complexity of the case, as requested by the former socialist leader's lawyer, Víctor Moreno Catena, since he did not have access to it until this Monday. In parallel, the former PSOE leader has already begun to publicly defend himself against the accusations.

8:17 AM, May 19. The police arrive with a court order at number 35 Ferraz street, first floor left. It is the office of former president José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. He is not there, they are opened by "doña Gertrudis" –his secretary, Gertrudis Alcázar–, who is the person who will be present during the entire search. She collaborates with the officers, whom she voluntarily lets in, and they begin to search all the premises: five offices, three empty rooms, two bathrooms, a meeting room, and an office. This is according to the report included in the Plus Ultra case file, which ARA has accessed, which describes the former president's office as an “operational management center” and a “nerve center for receiving and sending instructions” from Zapatero. However, according to the police, when it came to "sensitive" operations, there was another center: the former president's own home.

All macro-cases, as Zapatero's case is pointed out, have their concrete origin in a key character. There is usually an individual who allows the investigating judge to turn the investigation around, a kind of patient zero. In the case affecting the former Spanish president, this figure is the Venezuelan Rodolfo Reyes Rojas and the lever necessary for Judge José Luis Calama to reach him has been the United States, as is evident from the report by the UDEF of the National Police. That is to say, the investigation into Zapatero did not begin with a complaint from Manos Limpias –as the Spanish government initially stated–, but rather the evidence now in the hands of the National High Court comes from the agency Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), still during the Biden administration. Calama has issued an international arrest warrant against Reyes and his wife, Aurora López, for crimes of influence peddling, misappropriation, membership in a criminal organization, and money laundering.

Santos Cerdán sitting in his seat in Congress, engrossed, reading the UCO report. This is an image etched in the minds of many socialist leaders just a year ago. At that moment, they became aware that what had been published about Pedro Sánchez's right-hand man had indications of truth, and the catastrophe for many party leaders was total. The indictment on Monday of former Spanish president José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero generated an even greater effect: Zapatero is a moral reference for the PSOE, and the judge's order pointing him out as the "leader" of a scheme organized to obtain money in exchange for political favors has been a "nuclear bomb" among the membership. "Stupefaction," socialist sources report, although also "full confidence in the former Spanish president and with the hope of still recovering." The problem is that even the shadow of suspicion means the fall of a totem: the pain is the process, and at the headquarters on Ferraz street, they know it.

Anyone looking for a rental home in Figueres has a hard time. The reader can check this firsthand: if they go to a real estate portal like Idealista, they will find only two apartments for rent in the entire city and at a high price: 1,100 euros per month for a villa in the center or 1,800 in the Oliva Gran neighborhood. It's not because it's a luxury city, but simply because there is no supply. This is just one example of the challenges that the capital of Alt Empordà has been facing for some time, along with population growth, the perception of insecurity, the saturation of public services, or the loss of purchasing power. A cocktail that in the last parliamentary elections translated as follows: the far-right garnered up to 21.92% of the votes. Vox was the third force, with 11.87%, and Aliança the fourth with 10.05%, in elections won by Junts (25.80%), followed by the PSC (23.18%). The result differs from the 2023 municipal elections, when Jordi Masquef (Junts) achieved an absolute majority with a leadership that generates many followers in the municipality – he obtained 49.81% of the votes – versus detractors who accuse him of adopting the far-right agenda.

After the indictment on Tuesday of former Spanish president José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, a new move from the National Court. Judge José Luis Calama has ordered to block 490,780 euros from the accounts of the former socialist leader, the amount he received from the company at the epicenter of the investigation, Análisis Relevante, owned by his friend Julio Martínez Martínez. The magistrate, according to tribunal sources, has also ordered the blocking of all accounts of the other companies investigated in the case.

Gabriel Rufián takes another step. The ERC leader in Madrid, who has become a phenomenon for the Spanish left, has shown himself "willing" this Wednesday to lead a new space for the Spanish elections of 2027. In a conference at the Club Siglo XXI in Madrid, reported by Europa Press, the Republican leader ignores the parties' refusal to join this option and insists on his path: the unity of the left in the upcoming elections. Until now, he had not opened himself to directly heading this eventual new space, which the Esquerra leadership in Barcelona completely rejects.

The imputation of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero before the National Court is an earthquake of still incalculable scope for Spanish politics. News that has shaken the PSOE and given the PP a new reason to attack the Spanish government and ask the Socialists to leave Moncloa. That is why all eyes were on Congress at first, where the first reaction of the Spanish president, Pedro Sánchez, to the issue was expected. And the script has not changed: "All my support for President Zapatero," he said. "If you want to look at corruption, look in the mirror," he even snapped at the leader of the opposition, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, whom he accused of having privileged information from the judiciary and using it politically. "Elections are won with votes, not shortcuts. There will be elections in 2027," Sánchez continued, who also defended Zapatero's legacy. "He did not put us in an illegal war, he advanced rights such as same-sex marriage and ended ETA," he summarized.