🔄 This Week in Spain: Cue the Investiture Waltz (Again)

Also King "Doormat" VI, Spanish cricket and a marrying (or not) mayor.

Oct 05, 2023

By @IanMount and @AdrianBono | October 5, 2023 | Madrid | Issue #31

🎉 Welcome to The Tapa, an English-language, weekly newsletter about all things Spain!

🥜 This Week in a Nutshell: Feijóo’s bid to be elected Prime Minister of Spain is so last month! It’s Sánchez’s time to shine and he knows this. So as he continues to engage in backroom negotiations with Junts to see if he makes it to 176 votes in Parliament, there’s one word he definitely, absolutely, most decidedly will never say: amnesty. Actually another word too: referendum.

👍 Also, last week we had a record number of likes (we’re on fire!) so can we just keep this going please? (I told you that the begging worked).

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Ye olde calm before the storm

How did they get it so wrong?

October brings us the next chapter in the never-ending tale of “Spain forms a government.” King Felipe VI formally asked caretaker Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez of the center-left PSOE socialists to have a go after Alberto Núñez Feijóo of the center-right PP failed in his try. But that try could take a while to start, much less finish:

Parliamentary speaker Francina Armengol (also of the PSOE) said she wouldn’t call for a vote on Sánchez’s candidacy until he’d talked to other parties and it was “sufficiently mature”.
The PSOE and far-left Sumar, its (in theory) close buddy, are saying they are giving themselves all of October to reach a governing agreement (Sánchez apparently wants to claw back some power he’d given to Podemos).
Sánchez and the Catalan separatist parties he needs to repeat as PM haven’t yet agreed exactly what they’re negotiating over to get to ‘yes’ (and the two Catalan parties, Junts and ERC, are as usual fighting among themselves).
Not that all of Sánchez’s PSOE is even eager for an agreement with them. The latest to speak out is the overheated former PSOE head of Extremadura (1983 to 2007) Juan Luis Rodríguez Ibarra, who asked, “How can you tolerate someone raping 40 million Spaniards? Because whoever violates the Constitution is violating me, he is violating my vote," in reference to Carles Puigdemont, the leader of Junts who ran the botched 2017 Catalan independence bid and now lives in self-imposed exile in a suburban McMansion outside of Brussels.

Considering that Spain has until Nov. 27 to form a new government (or dissolve parliament and call new elections), it looks like can expect a movement-free dead zone before we dive back into November Nail Biting 💅. Woo hoo! 🎉

And so, we thought, why not take a pause to look at how we got here—Specifically, how did pollsters get the 23J election results so seriously, massively wrong?
Narciso Michavila, head of GAD3—a pollster that predicted Vox’s rise in Andalucia and the right wing’s rise nationally (and is published in ABC and thus liked by the right)—gave ABC an interview to analyze how GAD3 and almost everyone else fouled up 23J.

Let’s take a step back folks. Running into the 23J elections, pollsters on average had the PP and Vox with enough seats—barely—to form a government. Like, say, 177 (one more than the 176 majority in the 350-seat parliament). But in the end, the PP got 137 and Vox 33 (6 short), while the PSOE got 121 and Sumar 31 (short by 24—but with the small and regional parties…).

Crazy, amirite? Take it away Narciso…

Michavila blames a confluence of factors (beyond, you know, just getting it wrong), but one most of all: Catalonia. Not as in “Catalans bad people!” Rather, as in GAD3 failed to correctly account for several major end-of-campaign Catalan voter shifts that, in retrospect, seem blindingly clear.

First, fear of a Vox planet. A week before the election, Vox head Santiago Abascal made the genius decision to say that if Vox were in government, tensions in Catalonia would be “even worse” than during the lead-up to the illegal 2017 separatist referendum. For most anyone who’s lived in Spain in 2017 (save Abascal)—and especially spent time in Catalonia—that’s about the last thing you’d want.
Michavila reasons that this pushed Catalan voters who didn’t like Sánchez (and there are many) to vote PSOE. “We thought it was noise, and it wasn't noise,” he said. “The Catalan voter was telling us. They were changing their vote and we didn't know how to size it.”
Similarly, Feijóo’s decision not to participate in the second debate encouraged a ‘useful vote’ for the PSOE. According to Michavila, the sight of Sánchez and Sumar leader Yolanda Díaz working together against Abascal—without Feijóo around to defend the center-right—led some voters to vote pragmatically (the voto útil) for a candidate who might win, instead of voting their usual guy. In the end, Michavila says, some 200,000 ERC voters shifted to the PSOE.
Finally, the left didn’t trip over itself, while the right did. Specially, Sumar didn’t push candidates in places it knew it couldn’t win, while Vox did so. Michavila said Vox’s hopeless campaigns in Girona, Pontevedra, La Rioja and Lleida ended up robbing four seats from the PP without scoring any for Vox. The left, he says, was more “strategic” and “didn’t step on the hose” (“No se pisaron la manguera”).

Michavila’s conclusión For 23J, “there was a change in the last three days” that GAD3 failed to see. It was “a reaction from the voter who doesn't like Sánchez—but likes Vox less.”

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💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties this week

1. 🇪🇸 Public Enemy Nº1 of the far right is… King Felipe VI (!?)

Wait, what?!

Yes, you read that right. As it turns out, some people are mad at King Felipe VI. Really mad. As you may recall, the King asked Alberto Núñez Feijóo to form a government back in August, since he was the one that got the most seats. We all knew that him being appointed Prime Minister was a long shot, but the King still did this since in Spain it’s customary for the Head of State to back the most voted candidate.

However, now that Feijóo’s bid was unsuccessful, the King held a new round of consultations and again, as it’s customary, selected the second most voted candidate—who turned out to be caretaker Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.

To the far-right, this was a red line that King Felipe VI should never have crossed (even if this is what he was supposed to do as mandated by the Constitution), because they see Felipe VI as the enabler of a political leader who is allegedly considering an amnesty for treasonous separatists just so he can remain in power. Bad!
Many who until now had been staunch supporters of the Spanish monarchy have suddenly gone from absolute love to absolute hate for the monarch, to the point of giving him a new insulting monicker: King Felpudo VI. (In case you’re not aware, felpudo = doormat).
X, AKA Twitter, showed that Felpudo VI was trending earlier this week, as many angry people took to the microblogging site to say they were done with the King.

“*King Felpudo VI finally proposes Pedro Sánchez as the candidate. I hope he enjoys his Sustainable Development Goals 2030 pin. He doesn’t have much left*.”.

“*To me, the King is dead*,” said the guy in the video above. “*He has betrayed all of Spain. He's no longer my king. To me, he's the prince of chocolate chip cookies*.”

"*Felpudo VI is a freeloader, like all politicians. None of them give a damn about Spain and the well-being of its citizens. They only care about their own interests and continuing to live like kings*,” tweeted the guy above. “*It's clear how they remain silent in the face of the genocide caused by vaccines and chemtrails*,” he added. And let’s face it, you knew vaccines were going to be thrown in the mix sooner or later.

Hell has frozen over.

2. 💍 Madrid Mayor Martínez Almeida is getting married! Maybe.

Millions of hopeful Spanish hearts broke in unison this week after several media outlets decided to report on a rumor that was just too juicy to be passed on: perpetual, self-deprecating bachelor and Madrid mayor José Luis Martínez-Almeida was finally getting married. “He proposed! There was a ring! They’ve already picked a date! And the place!”

It all sounded like a dream come true. And then we woke up. Because as the rumors grew louder, Almeida decided to intervene and tell the media that he’s actually not getting married.

So… which is it? Well, it depends on who you believe.

Journalist Beatriz Cortázar announced Monday on Es la Mañana de Federico that the mayor was marrying his girlfriend Teresa Urquijo (a relationship we’ve covered when it became public a few months ago) in 2024. Since Urquijo is a member of the Borbón family (you know, like the Royal Family) and is 22 years younger than him, this is going to be on the front page of all magazines.
The big fancy wedding would be taking place in Navalagamella, in Madrid, in an estate that belongs to her family, Cortázar reported.

However, listeners of the show were quickly warned that the mayor would deny these rumors, as “traditional customs like the engagement ceremony, in which families gather at a residence, have still not been followed” and “some people were still not informed about these plans”. So much intrigue! It’s just like an episode of Gossip Girl but with worse hair.

Then, just as predicted, the mayor denied it. “I’m not getting married,” he told exclusively to El Confidencial. At the same time, the couple’s inner circle also claimed ignorance, assuring the media that they were “completely unaware” or any wedding taking place.

While attending an event on Monday, he was asked by the newspaper about his plans to get hitched, but he “responded with a categorical ‘no’ and a subsequent laugh”.
Fortunately for us (and you) investigative journalists were hard at work all day and managed to talk to some of their family members, who said “they are doing great and are very much in love” but have not yet “formally discussed marriage, much less an engagement”.
“If there was one, we would know,” they added. "We are not aware of a date, but they will definitely get married, although not yet," they explained.

The couple have been under intense media scrutiny since their decision to make their relationship public back in June (they started dating earlier this year, apparently). This was big news for the mayor, who had repeatedly made fun of his relationship status in the past and said he was probably single because he is a “disaster” at home.

Kudos to both of them, maybe.

3. 😭 Not everyone loves Spain like we do (talkin’ about you, Poshypants)

Friday lunches that start at 2 p.m. and end well after dark, the perfect fishbowl gintonic, a pincho de tortilla oozing with joy…living in Spain ain’t so bad, right?

Well, not everyone agrees. Like, say, Victoria Beckham, aka Posh Spice of the Spice Girls (Can we say Especia Pija? Asking for a friend).

The new Netflix doc about her hubby, Real Madrid galáctico David Beckham (titled BECKHAM because why not ALL CAPS), came out this week, as you ~~might have~~ definitely heard. And that means we all get a chance to get to the bottom (sorta) of his supposed affair with Rebecca Loos, the Dutch-English model/Beckham fam personal assistant who claimed to have had an affair with David after his overnight move to Real Madrid in 2003.

Posh has come out in the Netflix doc with how much she pretty much hated Spain for this very reason. Like, really kinda hated her time here.
She calls the moment the lowest point in their marriage. "100%. It was the hardest period for us [she said choking back tears, sayeth the Brit tabloids]. Because it felt like the world was against us. And here's the thing; we were against each other, if I'm being completely honest. You know, up until Madrid sometimes it felt like us against everybody else. But we were together. We were connected. We had each other..”
Did she “resent” David “Bend It” Beckham for the move? Posh answered that “If I’m being totally honest, yes I did. It was the most unhappy I have ever been in my entire life.”
They of course never really admit there was an affair. But like… anyway.

Hey, this affects us too! Several journalist friends of The Tapa spent an inordinate amount of time trying to prove the affair with Loos; this has got to be the most thankless job in journalism.

By the way, Posh claims she never claimed that Spain ‘smells like garlic’. Which is weird, because it does, and there’s nothing wrong with that, and we really quite like it.

4. 🏏 How Spanish is Spanish enough?

After coming in third at the European Cricket Championship in 2022, Spain’s national cricket team has made it to the finals again at this year’s edition, again played in Cártama (Málaga).

Good! Right?

Yes, in purely sporting terms. Cricket is considered the second most popular sport in the world, so considering that Spain is largely unknown in the sport, this is a major accomplishment.

But, but, but... Then a video of the team standing during the Spanish national anthem appeared online (above), and a number of dull-normal knobs on X/Twitter took to the platform to complain and mock.

Why? Well, honestly, good question. A bunch of the players had their hands over their heart during the anthem, which isn’t a very Spanish sporting thing to do. But more damning, apparently, was the fact that they didn’t look Spanish.

Many of the players are Spanish children of parents from cricket-playing countries—like Pakistan, India and South Africa—while others are half-Spanish (captain Christian Muñoz has an English mother and a Spanish father). And some people didn’t like that.
Cue racist commentary. Basically “Spanish?Are you kidding me?”, “Spainistan” and lame jokes based on jobs people of Pakistani origin are thought to do in Spain (“Better not try to order Glovo when the games are on” and “That guy served me my kebab the other day.”). Real high-end stuff.

The bigwigs of Spanish cricket were (justifiably) peeved by this. "It seems very unfair to me," said the president of the Spanish Cricket Association, Juan Carlos Rodríguez. "We are not a group of friends, we represent our country. And all of them are Spanish, have a Spanish passport and comply with the rules dictated by the European and international federations."

And we’re happy to note that most of the comments were not racist.

Plus, Rodríguez adds, playing cricket is a good way to learn English.

5.⚽️ The World Cup is coming to Spain! (And 5 more countries)

~~Football~~ Soccer lovers, rejoice! The host country of the 2030 FIFA World Cup has been revealed and it’s not one country, it’s three!

No, wait. Actually, it’s six.

And they are pretty far away from each other so if you want to attend all of the games, like any real soccer fan would, you better have started saving back in 1995.

The good news? The 2030 World Cup will be held in June-July in Spain, Portugal and Morocco. The bad news (for those in Spain)? The opening matches will take place in Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay to commemorate the tournament’s centenary (the first World Cup was held in Uruguay in 1930).

The first match is scheduled to take place in Montevideo (for those of you geographically challenged, that’s the capital of Uruguay) and will then move to matches in Argentina and Paraguay. It’s a long flight, so you better download some movies.
Once that part is out of the way and those three countries are (hopefully) happy that they made a special guest appearance in the World Cup (one of Argentina’s top newspapers calls the decision a “strange announcement”), the 48-team tournament is moving to Northern Africa and Europe, where it will be the usual shenanigans.

Politicians in Spain were happy to comment on something related to football that wasn’t the Rubiales Kissgate, for once. Caretaker Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez (that’s a mouthful) took to ~~Twitter~~ X to celebrate the “fantastic news” and said that it was “a great honor for Spain, Portugal and Morocco”.

“We will showcase the strength of football in our country as world champions, defending the values of equality, solidarity, and fair competition that should accompany sports,” he added.
PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo also commented on Twitter (let’s just call it that because everyone still does) that this was “great news,” adding that it was “a challenge” and a “privilege”.

FIFA President Gianni Infantino expressed his enthusiasm by underscoring “the unity it brings in a divided world”. Sure. It also makes a lot of money from countries with dubious human right records. But what do we know?

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We’ll be back next week with more.