For years, José María Aznar has been warning of the negative consequences he attributes to the decision to first pardon and then amnesty the pro-independence leaders who drove the Process. It is known that, in his view, the so-called policy of "institutional, political, and social normalization in Catalonia" launched by the PSOE from the Spanish government has posed a "risk" to "the continuity of Spain as a nation" and an "attack" against the Spanish Constitution. This Wednesday, at the inauguration of this year's FAES Campus, the former president of the Spanish executive added one more consequence in the Catalan context.

"Who can expect much from this individual when he should have resigned on October 30, 31, or November 1, 2024?" With these low expectations, the relatives of the DANA victims approached Carlos Mazón's second appearance before Congress, gathered at the doors of the lower house to demand answers from the former president of the Valencian Generalitat. The result was as expected, with a Mazón who once again shrugged off responsibility and refused to provide new explanations, with an impassive demeanor, in the face of questions and attacks from the spokespersons of the parties of the plurinational majority in the investigation commission.

Since July 30, everything surrounding Spanish politics has been viewed through the prism of the crisis in Ceuta. The social and humanitarian deadlock has become a primary political battle between the government, led by the PSOE, and the PP, which heads the Ceuta executive with Juan Jesús Vivas. For this reason, Pedro Sánchez's trip to the 81st edition of the United Nations General Assembly starting this Monday in New York comes at a perfect time for La Moncloa to broaden the focus and also introduce other issues into the political debate. Although executive sources note that Ceuta will be included in the speeches—their intention is to defend their management and the regularization—Sánchez wants to turn New York into a showcase for his model of regulating AI in his discursive fight against tech oligarchs and in a defense of multilateralism and his economic recipe against the rise of the far-right.

"The image of the Community of Madrid government is Formula 1 this past weekend." With these words, Isabel Díaz Ayuso made clear how important the Grand Prix of motoring, dubbed Madring, is for her political project. The Madrid president has fully committed to the event and has turned it into a showcase for her management model, ignoring the criticisms it has generated among residents, the opposition, and even pilots who participated in the urban circuit. The leader of the Madrid PP has defended it by contrasting a supposed defeatism of the left, which would want a diminished capital, with the spectacular nature and "resounding success" of Madrid, which hosts major events and demonstrates to the world an "extraordinary organizational capacity." The F1 arrives at a delicate moment for Ayuso: the luxury penthouse scandal is not fading, and this very Friday she admitted that she went to see the property without the intention of living in it, and the judge has already taken a step to investigate the matter.

No one wanted to buy Isabel Díaz Ayuso's luxury penthouse. The auction of the property remained deserted, according to the documentation from Planifica Madrid, which was finally made known this Thursday. That the attempt to sell the controversial penthouse has been, for the moment, frustrated, became known a few minutes before the Minister of the Presidency, Miguel Ángel García Martín, who is the president of Planifica Madrid –the public company that acquired the property for 6.3 million euros and subsequently put it up for sale for almost 6.8–, appeared at the plenary session of the Madrid Assembly. It was a highly anticipated appearance to clarify the unknowns about the operation and it did not convince the opposition. What the minister did respond is that they will put the property up for auction again because they are determined to sell it.

The management of the Ceuta crisis is crossed by judicial decisions. The National Court has halted the installation of the immigrant camp at the port of Ceuta. An initiative by the Spanish government to house a thousand people temporarily, which had clashed with the Ceutan executive. However, it was a police union, the Unified Police Union (SUP), that caused it to be stopped with a very urgent precautionary request. The contentious-administrative chamber of the National Court has agreed to this, at the request of the SUP, until it can study the documentation from the Ministry of Transport and resolve the precautionary measure.

A month and a half after the massive arrival of immigrants in Ceuta, the crisis in the autonomous city continues to shape the agenda and the attacks in Spanish politics. However, as has happened in previous major catastrophes that Pedro Sánchez's executive has had to manage in coordination with PP-led regions, such as the DANA in the Valencian Community or the summer fires in Madrid and Castile and León, the debate is turning into a clash of competencies. A clear example is the situation of the immigrant minors who are still in Ceuta, of whom there are currently 2,084 registered and between 700 and 1,000 wandering the streets. Regarding the delicate situation a month and a half later, Sánchez was blunt: "Ask [Juan Jesús] Vivas about it," he said in statements upon leaving the Congress hemicycle. In other words, the Spanish president is pointing directly at the government of Ceuta.

"Giving away Spanish passports? [...] That is over" and "The passport must be earned". The phrases were spoken this July by Alberto Núñez Feijóo during his assessment of the year as leader of the opposition. Amid the controversy over the amnesty lawof the Spanish government, and immersed in a competition with Vox over the toughness of the rhetoric on immigration, the president of the PP was already proposing a tightening of the conditions for accessing Spanish nationality. Just two months later, and in the midst of a crisis in Ceuta, the Popular Party goes a step further: they are now proposing to withdraw nationality from Spaniards of foreign origin who commit serious crimes.

Catalonia 40, Madrid 0. This is the claim made by Isabel Díaz Ayuso and the PP of the Community of Madrid regarding the public money costs of Formula 1. While the Madrid president's team wields this controversial comparison in millions of euros, the Madrid left, associations of residents affected by the Madrid Grand Prix, and environmental organizations, such as Greenpeace, have questioned the narrative of the Popular Party and reject the claim that the organization of this major event will not be to the detriment of the public treasury.

The day after Isabel Díaz Ayuso appeared for more than two hours in the Madrid Assembly without giving explanations about the luxury penthouse, the opposition's attacks provoked a reaction from the Madrid president after they accused her of "corruption".The penthouse and the chao, pescao will be the epitaph of her political life," declared this Friday the spokesperson for Más Madrid in the regional chamber, Manuela Bergerot. The opposition leader argued that the purchase of the 6.3 million euro property is "the definitive proof" that Ayuso "is corrupt". In the same vein, the PSOE denounced that the leader of the Madrid PP "has thought herself God and has become drunk on power". "The penthouse is a before and after. Her bargain is over, and her political career too," asserted the socialist spokesperson, Mar Espinar.

First resignation after the declassification of the documents on the Ceuta crisis. According to sources from the Spanish government confirming to ARA, the chief of staff to the government delegate in the autonomous city, Carlos Sanz, has resigned after it became known that he spoke with the CNI the day before the massive entry of immigrants into Ceuta. Messages in which he was warned of massive calls to cross the border. According to the Ceuta government delegate, Miguel Ángel Pérez Triano, Sanz did not inform him of this conversation with the Spanish intelligence services and has ruled out leaving his post. In a statement following Sanz's resignation, the government delegation insisted that it "knew nothing" about the messages alerting of a massive arrival of migrants.

After a summer haunted by the luxury penthouse scandal, in what has been the most compromising episode of her political career, Isabel Díaz Ayuso has tried to turn the page on the crisis by claiming that both she and her executive are in top form and have "more desire than ever." That is the message and energy she wanted to convey this Thursday in a two-hour appearance at the Madrid Assembly, which is holding the debate on the state of the region, in which the Madrid president offered no further explanations regarding the controversial purchase of the property. "Let's talk about issues that really matter" with "optimism and enthusiasm," claim sources from the PP of Madrid. The popular bench gave a standing ovation to Ayuso's intervention, whom even internal voices had questioned over the management of the luxury penthouse controversy, and their leader boasted about her project without making any self-criticism and focusing her speech on reeling off a cascade of announcements –"100 new measures" in various areas– and on attacking Pedro Sánchez.

A few hours before the Spanish government declassifies the reports on Ceuta, Pedro Sánchez defended himself against the attacks from the PP and Vox in Congress regarding the management of the migration crisis. "We have nothing to hide," the Spanish Prime Minister defended during the first control session after the summer break. Sánchez assured that his executive "does not accept blackmail from any party, any country, or any power." "I may be a dog, but I have no master," retorted the socialist leader, referring to the nickname Perro Sanxe, with which they tried to discredit him in the past, even though he has managed to end up making it a badge of honor.Conversely, he accused the PP and Vox of wearing a "leash" from Israel and the United States.

Juan Jesús Vivas (Ceuta, 1953) has become a daily media presence since July 30. The massive influx of immigrants into Ceuta, the territory he presides over, is the cause. Vivas has been a tireless spokesperson for the unease this has generated among the population of the autonomous city and has put a face to the PP's political offensive against the management of Pedro Sánchez's executive. The appearances of this popular baron, one of the most veteran in the State, have increased in intensity as normality has not been restored with the passing of the days. Although within the PP Vivas is one of the so-called moderates, on this occasion he has become a battering ram against the Spanish government for its management of the migration crisis.

That Vox returns to govern in four autonomous communities, in coalition with the PP, is one of the novelties of this political year. After the elections in Extremadura, Aragon, Castilla y León, and Andalusia, the balance for the far-right is that it has obtained four vice-presidencies of autonomous executives, to which five more ministries must be added. This has meant a new strategic turn for Santiago Abascal's party after the decision to abandon governmental responsibilities two years ago. The opposition stage to the Popular Party, which has seen Vox's electoral growth, has given way to a new phase in which the party is committed to governing. The possibility now opens up for them to apply their policies in the areas they have secured from negotiations with the PP, such as agriculture, livestock, forest management, social services, family, tourism, culture, and, newly created applying their own framework, deregulation.

The exchange of recriminations is not an anomaly in Spanish politics. And Ceuta, which has been experiencing a humanitarian emergency for weeks, is no exception. Pedro Sánchez's government now accuses the PP of going to Ceuta to "further strain" the situation, while the Popular Party raises its tone against the central executive and its crisis management. This is being done by the PP leadership, with Alberto Núñez Feijóo at the helm, but also by the president of Ceuta, Juan Jesús Vivas (PP), who, a day after meeting with government spokesperson Elma Saiz, stated that they feel "abandoned" by the central executive, in statements to the media on Tuesday afternoon. Hours earlier, Feijóo also criticized that Pedro Sánchez's executive is "absent" and "indifferent" to the situation in Ceuta.

It has been twenty days since the scandal of Isabel Díaz Ayuso's luxury penthouse came to light, and the controversy continues to haunt the Madrid president. The political and media brawl is intrinsic to the way the leader of the PP of Madrid operates, but the type of operation and the communication management carried out by the Community of Madrid in recent weeks has turned this episode into the one that could most harm the popular leader, just ten months before the regional elections.

The political clash over the situation in Ceuta escalates as the humanitarian crisis remains evident in the city. The tension between the government of Ceuta and Pedro Sánchez's executive has increased in volume after the president of the autonomous city, Juan Jesús Vivas (PP), threatened to go to court if Moncloa does not "solve" the crisis within 30 days. A path, currently unspecified, which has the support of Gènova, that has found in the migratory crisis a new vein to wear down Pedro Sánchez. Meanwhile, the Spanish government avoids a head-on confrontation, defending its actions and the "collaboration" between institutions, in the words of the government spokesperson and Minister of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, Elma Saiz, who this Monday traveled to Ceuta for the first time since the entry of thousands of people on July 30, even though her responsibilities include ensuring a reception network for asylum seekers.

The resumption of parliamentary activity in Congress, in September, will have as one of its pending tasks to unblock the approval of the conclusions on the attacks of August 17 in Barcelona and Cambrils. Two and a half years after the investigation commission on 17-A was established, the parliamentary groups have already drafted their final proposals, but have not yet submitted them for a vote. The differences between the parties of the plurinational majority, which have been noted in the registered documents and during the sessions, have led them to negotiate in an attempt to approve a consensual text. For now, according to various parliamentary sources consulted by ARA, there is no definitive agreement, although the parties have agreed to try again after the holidays. The main obstacle is for PSOE and Junts to agree, as they are the ones with the most opposed positions.

Almaraz nuclear power plant gains time. The Spanish government authorized this Friday the extension of the lifespan of its two reactors after the favorable report of the Nuclear Safety Council a month ago. Thus, as published in the Official State Gazette (BOE), the Ministry for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge has renewed the operating authorization for units I and II of the plant until June 8, 2030. It should be remembered that, until now, the Extremaduran nuclear power plant had permission to operate one reactor until 2027 and another until 2028, and was the first in the State to be shut down.