Juan is 72 years old and walks among the tents pitched at Puerta del Sol. He has just taken a photo and shows it: it is the diamond-shaped plaque beneath the sign that gives this Madrid square its name, which was placed by Manuela Carmena's city council in homage to the 15-M movement. "We were sleeping and we woke up," he says. Juan looks at it and recites it out loud, only to then explain that he has two children aged 37 and 39 who only managed to move out three years ago. "We thought that with a progressive government everything was already done, and in reality, nothing was done," he laments. This is a sentiment shared among the protesters who are in Puerta del Solin the state capital: it is palpable in the conversations, on the banners, and in the public statements of the Tenants' Union. Are we facing Pedro Sánchez's 15-M?

The eviction of Maricarmen Abascal has triggered a wave of indignation that was visible on Wednesday in the streets of Madrid, Barcelona, and various cities across the State, and it was repeated this Saturday in a demonstration in the center of the Spanish capital that ended in an encampment. Under the slogan Not one more Maricarmen, thousands of people gathered at the Puerta del Sol, where the seat of the government of the Community of Madrid is located, to walk to the Madrid City Hall and finish at the Congress of Deputies. In total, 25,000 people took to the streets, according to the Spanish government delegation – 300,000 according to the organizers. The Madrid Tenants' Union ended the demonstration by calling for an encampment at the Puerta del Sol, and tents spread across this square in the center of Madrid throughout the night.

In recent days, a new torpedo has emerged that the PP is using to fire against Pedro Sánchez and the Spanish government. Last week, Beatriz Biedma, the judge from Badajoz who investigated and sent the brother of the PSOE leader to the dock, asked to appear as a private prosecutor at the National Court in the case regarding Leire Díez. The reason? The alleged maneuvers to remove her from the investigation of the David Sánchez case. Since then, news has been appearing in a cascade speaking of an alleged relationship between the Los Rochos drug trafficking clan and those christened politically and media-wise as the sewers of the PSOE. And the PP has clung to it during the control session in Congress to pounce on the Moncloa.

The PSOE is losing support, but it is holding firm and would win the elections again, according to the first CIS poll after the crisis in Ceuta. The September barometer, published this Monday, gives the socialists 31% of the votes, two points less than in the July survey, and sees how the PP narrows the gap, which stands at just 5.5 points of difference – in the previous one it was almost eight –. The popular party, however, only rises half a point in vote estimation, from 25% to 25.5%. The far-right Vox party, which is focusing a large part of its discourse on the migration crisis, obtains limited growth of 1.3 points (from 15.3% to 16.6%), while Se Acabó la Fiesta, the party of the ultra Alvise Pérez, falls from 2.6% to 1.8%. "The real poll will take place at the ballot box," said PSOE spokesperson Montse Mínguez on Monday regarding this, even though this survey is much more favorable than the polls published last week. From the newspaper El País to La Razón and Abc, they gave a clear victory to the right-wing vote against the support for the left. For this reason, the PP has described the CIS forecast as a "joke" and a "bad taste prank", reports Andrea Zamorano.

The PSOE maintains unchanged the script it has established since the Leire Díez case broke out and continues to build a wall between Ferraz and the woman known as the socialist plumber. Now it has been the turn of Ana María Fuentes, the current party manager, who has testified at the National Court as under investigation for forgery of commercial documents. The Civil Guard and Judge Santiago Pedraz suspect that she falsified invoices and engagement letters to get money to Leire Díez and, in turn, conceal the payments. Sources present at the statement explain to ARA that Ana María Fuentes has shifted the blame onto Santos Cerdán, who at that time was the party's organization secretary and is also under investigation, alleging that he was the one who made the decisions and who ordered and gave the go-ahead to the engagement orders, invoices, and payments. She defended that she did what he told her, that she limited herself to paying and that she "did not control" expressly and specifically what the money was spent on.

The week ends with the hangover from yesterday's debate in Congress. Just 24 hours later, what we anticipated yesterday on the fly is already being confirmed: Sánchez's explanations arrived late, remain overshadowed by the reality of the thousands of people who are still wandering through Ceuta and, therefore, the Spanish president is doomed. Neither the opposition nor the investiture partners believe that Morocco had nothing to do with it (it is impossible for the illegal displacement of seventy thousand people to go unnoticed by a regime like Morocco) and therefore Sánchez moves between the figure of someone who, for the sake of state, does not want to antagonize a neighbor with the capacity to complicate your life and that of a president who is a victim of blackmail by Morocco. The fact that Sánchez is sentenced is a metaphor, but for the PP and Vox it is a wish. Feijóo said yesterday that “Sánchez will pay for his management, at the polls and in the courts”. And the fact is that Vox has long been reminding that Sánchez can be tried for treason, a procedure that is regulated in article 102 of the Constitution and which would be handled by the criminal chamber of the Supreme Court and which consists of an initiative by a quarter of the members of the Congress of Deputies and requires the approval of half plus one of the deputies (this would be 176), and the PP and Vox alone do not reach it, they are 169.Beyond when and how the legislative term ends, the case has other equally serious dimensions. For example, the power of Morocco, an ally of the United States, with a good relationship with Israel, and which receives money from the EU to regulate migratory flows. This gives it great bargaining power. As our head of International, Francesc Millan, explains today, in this column in which he draws the contrast between how the EU stands together when Russia attacks, but when the problem has been at its southern border, the problem was Spanish, not European. Mind you, while we talk about geopolitics, yesterday more than 80 people appeared dead on a migrant boat that arrived in the Canary Islands. The boat had left Gambia 26 days ago. After decades of apparently predictable life, we have entered the era of life under threat, a hybrid, indirect, disruptive threat that prevents making plans and living under the impression (more or less based on real events) that life depends on us and not on external, geopolitical factors.Speaking of violent disruptions, yesterday the film Cronos, about the attacks on La Rambla and Cambrils in July 2017.I had the opportunity to watch it and I recommend it to you. You start watching it with a knot in your stomach and you finish it the same way.The pace set by the director is very high and sustained, the script is clear, the acting is competent, and the production is well-resourced. The story is told, above all, from within the Mossos, from Trapero to the commanders who led the capture of the terrorists, which lasted four days, passing through the Mossos' communication director, Patrícia Plaja, and her impeccable crisis communication during those days. The political dispute between the Spanish government and the Generalitat over the management and information regarding the attack is noted, as well as the regrettable leak of The Mossos-The note to make the Mossos and the Generalitat look bad. What is not provided as context is that there was only a month and a half left until October 1st. And the state of shock in Ripoll is also well noted. Not so much the story of boys who were apparently integrated but were ripe for radicalization. But since we are talking about a two-hour film and not a six-part series, many narrative threads come to mind that remain to be unfolded.

Ceuta is calling into question the Spanish government and also the PSOE. The management that Moncloa is carrying out of the crisis has managed to bring together the partners and the opposition, as they all agree that the executive has reacted late and badly to the crisis. The government avoids self-criticism – even Sumar questions the action of ministries dependent on the socialists – and critical voices begin to emerge within the PSOE itself. The trigger is the rally that this Wednesday, September 2, the Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provinces, chaired by the PP, has called in various cities of the State, including Ceuta, Madrid, Barcelona and dozens of municipalities coinciding with Ceuta Day. The PSOE leadership has called not to attend, but not all socialist groups are listening to them. The federation of Ceuta, as well as some municipalities in Andalusia, for example, support it, and the mayor of León, José Antonio Díez, will attend a call from civil society in solidarity with the city. The PSOE deputy and vice-president of the Ceuta Assembly, Melchor León, has also been very critical of Sánchez's executive.

Ceuta is, like Melilla, a Spanish autonomous city located in North Africa that represents a constant thorn in the side of relations between the State and Morocco, with sovereignty in dispute. The Kings of Spain have avoided it as much as they could and only Joan Carles I visited it in 2007, which caused a diplomatic crisis with Morocco. Although it has been talked about for the last month, Felipe VI has not gone there, not even in these moments of crisis. And a very similar dynamic has been followed by the presidents of the Spanish government.

The criticisms of the Minister of Transport, Óscar Puente, towards King Felipe VI for having taken a photograph with the far-right agitator Javier Negre are unusual because the PSOE's usual stance is not to question the monarchy. Pedro Sánchez's government has never wanted to open the Pandora's box of the monarchy or republic debate, and it has been more than ten years since the Sociological Research Center (CIS) – chaired for eight years by the socialist José Félix Tezanos – has asked about the institution.

Since there has been a coalition government in Spain, criticisms from Sumar ministers against the king have occurred to the point where they are now part of normality, as are walkouts at official royal house events. However, this is not the case with socialist ministers. In fact, the socialist part of the state government has always staunchly defended the head of state, even against criticisms from the right and far-right regarding certain speeches or actions, taking into account that everything Felipe VI does must be endorsed by the Spanish government. Nevertheless, this week a sudden crisis has emerged between the Spanish government and the Crown that represents a plot twist, following a harsh criticism from a socialist minister like Óscar Puente, one of the main escorts of the Spanish president, Pedro Sánchez, over a recent photograph of the king with the far-right agitator Javier Negre in Colombia, within the framework of the investiture of the new leader, Abelardo de la Espriella.

From Navaluenga, in Àvila, one of the provinces where fire has been burning uncontrollably in recent days, the Spanish Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, insisted this Thursday on political unity "in response, prevention, and reconstruction" of the areas affected by the fires, and once again offered "the extended hand of the Spanish government" to reach "a country agreement" on climate emergency matters, an issue he considers paramount right now. That is to say, as he has done in his recent public interventions, Sánchez once again brought to the table the "State Pact against the Climate Emergency": a plan presented in September 2025 and expanded in December with 15 axes and 80 measures that has not yet seen the light of day due to a lack of political consensus.

There has been much talk of an alliance to the left of the PSOE, of everything that the Sumar space represents with the possibility of extending it to Podem and, even, to Gabriel Rufián. However, for now, this option is not materializing. Faced with this, within the PSOE there are already those who are thinking of other scenarios if the other left-wing parties finally run divided again. This is because there is a demographic reality that is difficult to appeal: if the PSOE does not currently have options to stay in Moncloa, it is not because it is collapsing, but because of the generalized decline of Sumar, Podem and the rest of the partners of the plurinational majority. It is enough to compare the 31 seats that Sumar won in 2023 with what the polls now predict for them: the latest CIS places them at just over 6% of the votes, half the support they had three years ago.

The Catalan socialists deny any relationship with the media Crónica Libre, the supposed informative "instrument" of Leire Díez's plot in the PSOE. The collaborator and shareholder of the newspaper directed by the late Patricia López, operated under the leadership of the then organization secretary Santos Cerdán, according to the Central Operational Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard. There is no trace in the summary of a relationship between the PSC and the plot – although the UCO does not rule it out – and only a specific link with a town hall governed by the socialists. The municipal government of Salou, headed by the PSC-Sumem coalition, paid for an advertising campaign to Crónica Libre.

Describing the PSOE's life these days is equivalent to writing the chronicle of a desolation. If it was already difficult to give full credit to the merely exculpatory initial statements of former government president José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, followed by more than two months of silence, his television appearance to give explanations has only worsened the situation, especially in the political arena. In the judicial sphere, it may be different, because there are other rules of the game. The defense will play the card of requesting the nullity of the proceedings strongly, based on procedural problems and guarantees of fundamental rights. Nor is it an easy battle, but Zapatero has an experienced lawyer in this regard, Víctor Moreno Catena. He is a professor of procedural law who, for six years (1988-1994), held high positions in the Ministry of the Interior, first as technical secretary general and later as undersecretary.

Sumar announced this Wednesday that it has agreed with the PSOE on the extension of rents until 2028 through a new housing decree that will also include tax incentives for owners, an indispensable measure to achieve the text to be finally approved with the favorable vote of Junts in Congress.

Is it normal for the PSOE to set up an office for José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero? Is it normal for you not to know what Leire Díez told Santos Cerdán? Is it normal for you to receive a PSOE militant? These are just some of the questions that the senators of the Koldo case investigation committee have asked the PSOE president, Cristina Narbona. An interrogation of more than three hours that has turned out to be completely sterile, without any new conclusions —she has not provided any new element and has tried to answer briefly— and where, rather than questions, the right-wing senators have shown indignation about the Leire case, Zapatero, or the three rulings already made in the case of the Attorney General, Ábalos, and the brother of the Spanish president, Pedro Sánchez. And it is that more than questions about the relationship between Narbona and Leire Díez, accused of orchestrating a war against judges and prosecutors at the behest of Santos Cerdán, the senators have used the committee to talk about the jewels of the former Spanish president, how Julio Martínez points to him, or the behavior of the already convicted José Luis Ábalos.

"The rule of law must reward with the instruments provided for in the legislation those relevant behaviors that affect the discovery and accreditation of crimes of gravity for the democratic system." This fragment of the Supreme Court ruling that sentenced José Luis Ábalos to 24 years in prison was much more than a reduction of the penalty for Víctor Aldama for his collaboration with justice. It was a call to defendants who might find themselves in a similar situation to "sing La traviata"; to speak in favor of the investigation in exchange for the main prize.

Almost every week a new indictment appears related – more directly or indirectly – to the PSOE. The latest name to emerge is Juan Manuel Serrano, who was president of Correos from 2018 to 2023 and director of Pedro Sánchez's cabinet at Ferraz. His name joins a long list of people – with different levels of responsibility – allegedly involved in fourteen open lines of investigation. The first convicted person was the State Attorney General, Álvaro García Ortiz, but there are a total of 50 officials related to the Spanish government or the PSOE, members of the Civil Guard, and men who were of Sánchez's utmost confidence who have ended up before a judge. That's up to 109 if we also count the 59 businessmen, family members, and lawyers – and other profiles – indicted in the different open cases.

Don't think of an elephant... Did you think of one? Probably, yes. Now you must be wondering why this article starts like this, asking about an elephant, but the answer is simple: to show how the A-B-C of any electoral campaign operates and that it is key to winning elections. As George Lakoff theorized in his reference book Don't Think of an Elephant! (2004, Chelsea Green Publishing), whoever sets the framework for the debate and manages to talk about what they want and in the language they choose, has a high chance of taking victory at the polls. And this is the underlying battle that the PP and the PSOE have been fighting for months in Madrid, as whoever manages to impose the terms of public discussion is the one who comes out with an advantage for the next general elections. The confrontation is between two visions: those who brandish the ghost of corruption (the PP) against those who threaten with the ghost of neo-fascism (the PSOE).

Cristina Narbona has completely dissociated herself from the maneuvers that Leire Díez allegedly instigated to destabilize judicial cases around Pedro Sánchez. The president of the PSOE, who exchanged WhatsApp messages with the then socialist militant on the day the Spanish president began the five days of reflection, has made it clear that “he had no knowledge whatsoever” of the alleged plot being investigated by the National Court. He said this when questioned by journalists after a declaration as a witness under half an hour before Judge Santiago Pedraz. Leire Díez told him that she "knew facts that could be important" and she referred her to Santos Cerdán because he, as the party's organization secretary, was in charge of communication policy. According to what ARA has been able to learn, behind closed doors she said that Díez called her because she "wanted to collaborate and help" and had "useful information for the party." "I'm referring to information, not sewage," she clarified. Of course, she acknowledged that the Civil Guard's reports describe "worrying indications."