Pedro Sánchez, the high-stakes gambler, seeks to defy the odds again
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MADRID — Spain’s right-wing opposition has invented a one-word slogan that supposedly represents everything that is wrong with Pedro Sánchez and his coalition government: Sanchismo.
The newspaper La Razón defined it as “a dictatorial regime … of extremism and populism,” while Federico Jiménez Losantos, a well-known right-wing radio presenter, described Sánchez as “a coup monger” and “a criminal.”
Alberto Núñez Feijóo, leader of the conservative Popular Party (PP), has made it his main priority to “roll back Sanchismo” if he becomes prime minister after the July 23 general election. Polls suggest that could well happen, with Sánchez trailing his conservative rival.
“Sanchismo is the right’s traditional strategy when it’s in opposition,” Sánchez has said in response to such barbs. He added that what he really represents is “Socialism, the transformative force which this country has been lucky enough to have for the last 40 years of democracy.”
Sánchez refused a request for an interview for this piece.
Spain’s economy is growing faster than most of its EU partners, the government has overseen a barrage of social reforms and the suave, handsome Sánchez enjoys international prestige that would be the envy of many of his predecessors. Yet, as the election approaches and Spain takes on the Council of the EU presidency, he is struggling to distance himself from the toxic image half of the country has formed of him.
Sánchez’s fall and rise
This will be Sánchez’s fifth general election as a candidate for the Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE). In 2015 and 2016, he led it to record defeats, as it was squeezed on the left by the newly formed Podemos.
After the 2016 ballot, Sánchez blocked the efforts of the then-prime minister, Mariano Rajoy of the PP, to form a new government by refusing to abstain in an investiture vote. The PSOE old guard, fearful of a lengthy political standoff, rebelled and removed Sánchez as leader.
And yet, within months, he had returned, winning the vote to choose a new party leader. In 2018, he completed his remarkable comeback by becoming prime minister via a daring parliamentary maneuver: the first successful no-confidence motion of the modern era, against Rajoy.
“Sanchez isn’t a great strategist,” said Oriol Bartomeus, a political scientist at Barcelona’s Autonomous University (UAB). “He likes making sudden moves and he rises to the challenge when things are difficult.”
“He’s the kind of politician who thinks: ‘Things are tricky? Well in that case, I’m going to take this on.’”
That proactive impulse has filled Sánchez’s tenure with drama. Eye-catching gestures and decisions have been a constant: Spain’s offer to allow the Aquarius migrant boat to dock on its shores after Italy had refused to take it in; the express-speed agreement on the formation of a coalition government with Unidas Podemos just two days after winning the November 2019 election; and, most surprising of all, his calling of a snap election just hours after his party had suffered defeat in the May 28 regional and municipal ballots.
“It’s not easy to label Sánchez with a specific ideology, vision or values,” said Rubén Amón, a writer and political commentator.
“[He] has a basic characteristic which is an ability to adapt to circumstances, subordinating ideology, strategy and politics itself to his needs in each situation.”
During this legislature, Sánchez has had to adapt to governing alongside Podemos, a partnership that has led to a number of high-profile feuds as well as a raft of reforms on gender equality and identity. The coalition has also introduced new labor and housing laws, minimum wage increases, and a new handout for low-income families.
Economy minister Nadia Calviño insists there is a clear line running through Sánchez’s five years in government, at least with regard to her portfolio.
“We’re very much aligned in our view of what the economic policy of the country should be like, based on fiscal responsibility, social justice and structural reforms to modernize our country,” Calviño, who is one of three deputy prime ministers, told POLITICO.
She added: “He is an honest person who has been forced to take very difficult decisions.”
Reaching out to nationalists
Many of those tough calls have revolved around Sánchez’s engagement with Catalan and Basque nationalists. On taking office, he declared his intention to calm territorial tensions caused by a 2017 failed bid for secession led by Catalan parties.
That aim has been achieved, with Sánchez’s administration having opened slow-moving talks with the moderate pro-independence regional government and relying on the Catalan Republican Left (ERC) for parliamentary support. His decision, in 2021, to pardon the nine Catalan leaders who had been jailed for their role in the thwarted independence drive saw the prime minister in his risk-taking element.
He then went further, introducing changes to the penal code that included eliminating the crime of sedition and modifying the crime of misuse of public funds, thus benefitting a number of Catalan politicians still facing legal action.
The opposition portrayed such moves as cynical survival ploys that both undermined the rule of law and threatened the unity of Spain.
“Sánchez has left the state unprotected in order to protect himself as prime minister,” said PP spokesperson Cuca Gamarra. “The removal of the crime of sedition as a payment to his partners is yet another reason to roll back Sanchismo.”
But the parliamentary support Sánchez has received from the Basque nationalists of EH Bildu, the successor to the political wing of the disbanded terrorist group ETA, has drawn an even more visceral backlash.
Many of the tough decisions Sánchez has made revolved around his engagement with Catalan and Basque nationalists | Josep Lago/AFP via Getty Images
EH Bildu has provoked genuine outrage among many on the right — for example, when it fielded seven candidates in May’s local elections who had been convicted of terrorist murders — but it has also become an effective political weapon with which to bludgeon Sánchez.
Núñez Feijóo has pursued the ETA issue on the campaign trail, describing Sánchez as “a great electoral hope” for “those who used to go around wearing ski masks.”
As the election has neared, Sánchez has at times abandoned his trademark unflappability and hit back at such accusations.
“I hadn’t understood the consequences of all this poison,” he told one interviewer, pointing to a conspiracy designed by the country’s right-wing media and economic and political powers. He added that his government’s achievements “have been overshadowed by this Sanchismo bubble, which is nothing but lies, manipulation and nastiness.”
The criticism has been compounded by accusations that Sánchez manipulates institutions. The CIS national research office is frequently pilloried for publishing polls that appear to inflate support for the PSOE (its June poll showed the PSOE and its leftist allies had a better chance of forming a new government than the right); and Sánchez’s appointment of Justice Minister Dolores Delgado as attorney general drew claims of meddling in the judiciary.
A billboard of Vox far-right party | Thomas Coex/AFP via Getty Images
Bartomeus, of UAB, says that Sánchez’s Socialist prime minister predecessors, Felipe González and José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, received similar treatment.
“It’s the same idea: that Spain’s sovereignty is supposedly being threatened, that the government is radical,” he said, adding that this message seems to have cut through with many voters.
“Back then it was a polarization in the media and between the political parties, but right now what we have is a deep division between ordinary Spaniards.”
International statesman
Yet on the international stage, even Sánchez’s critics concede that he cuts a far more influential and self-assured figure than most of his predecessors. The first Spanish prime minister to have a strong command of English, Sánchez worked as an adviser in the European Parliament and was a member of the Cabinet of the high representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina during the Kosovo war.
His government’s negotiation of €70 billion in coronavirus recovery funds from the EU has helped drive the economy’s growth. Meanwhile, the European Commission’s granting of an “Iberian exception” — capping the price of gas used for electricity generation for Spain and Portugal — was a diplomatic triumph for Sánchez and the Portuguese leader, António Costa.
Spain’s tenure as president of the Council of the EU, which began on July 1, is the ideal platform for Sánchez to flex his international muscles and his government has organized a blizzard of summits over the coming months. However, the general election has created uncertainty as to whether he will be in power for the duration of the revolving presidency.
“It might sound presumptuous,” Sánchez noted in a book of memoirs he published in 2019, “but I realize that I rise to the challenge in difficult situations.”
His incident-packed political career confirms that notion. But this political gambler will need to defy the odds once again if he is to remain Spain’s prime minister.
Source: POLITICO Europe
