Isabel Díaz Ayuso uses several recurring first names in her speeches, including that of Alberto Núñez Feijóo, the head of her party. He does not do so even when he mentions general elections or refers to national issues. The president of Madrid is one and three, different in nature from all her colleagues in the PP. It feeds on itself in a way nothing else has a place for. It’s her, alone, against everything and everyone.
That clash, in reality, can be reduced to just one person: Pedro Sánchez Pérez-Castejón. Much of national politics revolves around the attacks on the president of Madrid and the president of the central government. Ayuso discovered very early that his political nature makes sense as it contrasts with that of the socialist leader. He knows well that his parents get hives when they see Sánchez. Behind, the left paints Ayuso as the symbol of privatizations and the deterioration of public services.
It is not surprising that the main political confrontation in Spain takes place in Madrid. With mayor José Luis Martínez-Almeida and Feijóo overshadowed, removed from that equation, the political and cultural battle between PP and PSOE has taken root here. The trial in which the State Attorney General, Álvaro García Ortiz, was convicted of revealing secrets, was a brutal clash between two irreconcilable positions. A story of tax fraud, robberies and conspiracies that shook the foundations of the state.
The Attorney General’s case does not describe reality, but rather what can be said about reality. And in that territory it is difficult to twist Ayuso’s arm. The president and her main advisor, Miguel Ángel Rodríguez, MAR, learned that it was about to be announced that her partner, Alberto González Amador, had been accused of two tax crimes which, together, exceeded 300,000 euros. MAR leaked to trusted media that the prosecution had offered González Amador a deal that was later withdrawn “by order from above.” He implied, not very subtly, that this was a political operation against the president.
This information was not true, as MAR acknowledged in his testimony as a witness before the Supreme Court. But it helped generate a story of boyfriend stalking that took hold. The email from González Amador’s lawyer confessing to the crimes that came to light was, according to Ayuso and MAR, part of a conspiracy against her and they pointed the finger at the prosecutor. There is no hard evidence, no evidence that proves, without a doubt, that he was the author of that leak. This has been overlooked. Ayuso’s story has expired, pending an appeal and the case ends up in the Constitutional Court. In any case, for the first time in the history of Spain he managed to obtain the conviction of an attorney general.
Sánchez knows that the stakes are high in Madrid. And that’s why he chose someone like Óscar López, a PSOE heavyweight, to face Ayuso in the next elections. He has been head of cabinet and is now a minister, so he has a platform from which to engage with the president, currently one of the most important figures in the PP. And the most polarizing. López responded with the same arsenal a few hours after the sentence was announced: “This sentence sends a devastating message: don’t you dare touch Ayuso, don’t you dare…” Faced with the more sober tone of the Minister of Justice, Félix Bolaños, La Moncloa appointed López in charge of the Government to disseminate the Government’s most critical messages against the Supreme Court ruling.
Ayuso does not shy away from tension, on the contrary, he intensifies it. This time was no different. On Friday he showed up at the government headquarters in Madrid with a sober appearance. People imagined him opening a bottle of champagne when he heard the news, but, according to his team, he received it calmly, without much fuss. He concluded the meeting he was at, in the institutional room of the Puerta del Sol, and locked himself in his office to read the news and exchange WhatsApp.
He showed the same restraint in front of journalists. (It must be peace that leads to success.) He didn’t raise an eyebrow as he read in a teleprompter a speech that he “personally prepared”, his parents say. Ayuso presented him with an absolutist opinion: “It is not the Attorney General of the State, but Pedro Sánchez who sat in the dock. (…) These facts are typical of a dictatorship.” After a few lines, he used a phrase, almost copied, from a PSOE legend: “Spain does not deserve a government that lies.” It was pronounced by Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba on March 13, 2004, two days after the Madrid attacks, to highlight the lies of José María Aznar’s government. In the days that followed, this was a key element in the PP losing the general election. Ayuso, according to his team, appropriated those words with intention, because he wants the same thing to happen to Sánchez, for him to fall as soon as possible.
The discussion on the sentence has not yet stopped and will not stop in the coming weeks. The Sánchez government doesn’t entirely believe it. They accept defeat reluctantly. They feared a conviction, but the lack of evidence led them to think that common sense would prevail. “When I heard the sentence I felt desolation, fed up, disbelief,” Óscar López told the SER network. “If they can convict someone without evidence, what happens next?”
Ayuso confirmed that he is an evader, that he has a thousand lives. There is a precedent. In 2022, the then head of his party, Pablo Casado, was about to reveal that his brother had taken a commission of 240,000 euros for the sale of masks at the most difficult moment of the pandemic. MAR went ahead and considered it a case of espionage against Ayuso hatched within his own party. Sposato ended up walking out the door of Genoa. What happened now takes on a much greater dimension. What was initially an investigation into her boyfriend ends up becoming a scandal for an attorney general, who has no choice but to walk away. Even today, in the realm of confusion, he considers his battles triumphs.
