By now, I’m not asking what Pedro Sánchez knew, but what an honest president, oblivious to all this, would do in the face of the institutional destruction caused in his name. You know that this column is very fond of paradoxes, here’s today’s: if Sánchez is guilty, I understand why he doesn’t resign. But if he is innocent, his behavior is much more difficult to explain. The innocent person is the first to be interested in getting away from the stench and in having an investigation “fall whoever may fall,” as the naive say.
It is also paradoxical that Leire Díez did not believe in the innocence of the people she was trying to protect. Among the known recordings, there isn’t one where she says “this is a fabrication,” “this is the work of the ‘fachosfera’,” “they are the pseudo-media and the mud.” Leire was more sincere in private than the PSOE in public, where every investigation was attributed to a conspiracy. In private, the sewer recognized that they were the conspiracy. And although who gave the order is yet to be determined, for whom it was given is clear: “My priority is the president,” said the plumber.
The attempts to discredit journalists, judges, and prosecutors; the attempts to extort magistrates, to stop the UCO, the maneuvers to intervene in procedures, everything was done, Leire dixit, to protect the president. I am not stating that Pedro Sánchez is guilty of anything, but that he should resign precisely to endorse his innocence. Because he has been the main beneficiary of a network that acted in his name.
An innocent president could say, “I believe that the open cases against my wife and my brother are unfounded, but I trust in Justice. I would never tolerate illegal operations to boycott them.” An innocent president would have already dismissed his Minister of the Interior. An innocent president could step aside. The only thing an innocent president cannot do is behave like a guilty president. Precisely, what I suspect at this hour is how a leader behaves when he is convinced that the truth favors him. And after the resignation of the Director General of the Civil Guard, I suspect that the truth does not favor anyone in his circle.
The career of Mercedes González is curious. She was appointed Director General of the Civil Guard in March 2023 and left the position a few months later to run in the general elections. In September 2024, her replacement, Leonardo Marcos (whom Koldo pointed out as the author of the leak), resigned “for personal reasons.”
González then left her seat in Congress to once again assume the General Directorate of the Civil Guard. But what attracts my attention most are her origins. She shares a generation and federation with Óscar López, Antonio Hernando… and Pedro Sánchez. Perhaps this explains nothing. Or perhaps it explains why a director general who has been disproven by the facts continues to enjoy the president’s confidence.
Let’s remember that López and Hernando were at the head of the Presidency Cabinet when Leire began to operate, and that it is in Moncloa where the trace of the leak about Ayuso‘s boyfriend is lost. A leak, by the way, that occurred to counteract the first information about Begoña Gómez. In perspective, one begins to wonder what other black waters emanated from there.
The president’s position is compromised. If he is innocent, everyone betrayed him. But if he is guilty, he owes them a favor. We are left to wonder which hypothesis better explains his conduct.