It is about “overthrowing a government, not at the polls but by other means,” according to Minister Óscar Puente’s warning yesterday, in the face of the flood of judicial cases pressuring Pedro Sánchez. “The PSOE will not tolerate it, we will not bow to anyone’s attempts to disturb our democracy through undemocratic methods,” warned the Minister of Transport from Congress.
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The denunciation of a plot to try to bring down Sánchez at all costs – “whoever can, let them do it,” as José María Aznar reaffirmed – was not just a hot-headed remark from one of the most combative ministers of the Moncloa tenant. Rather, it was a full call to the barricades by the Government and the PSOE. Seeking a reaction like the one that occurred during the five days of April 2024 when Sánchez withdrew to consider whether to resign after his wife, Begoña Gómez, was charged, which turned into a clamour of support for the head of government.
<p“The older you get, the less you believe in coincidences,” noted another minister ready for the fight, Óscar López, the day before, facing a judicial calendar in which cases against the president’s wife and brother, David Sánchez, the indictment of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, and now the National Court’s investigation in Ferraz coincide.
Page insists on his criticisms: “If anyone thinks the PSOE is flatlining, they are wrong”
Too many coincidences and coincidences, warn the Executive. “Here the timing of justice and politics align in a tremendously surprising way,” Puente confirmed. “I don’t believe in coincidences and I’m not naive. I am very clear about what is happening, and many people in this country are too. There is a government that is being targeted for overthrow by undemocratic methods,” the minister insisted.
“Let the Justice work, but let’s also make it clear that around these investigations there are clear interests in overthrowing the Government,” Puente denounced. And, regarding the cases against Sánchez’s wife and brother, he assured that “there are judicial cases that do not hold up.”
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Pedro Sánchez himself is the first who is not willing to give up, trying to reverse an explosive situation. The president requested yesterday to appear before the plenary of Congress, “to report on the political situation related to the latest known judicial investigations, as well as the last meeting of the European Council,” announced Moncloa.
Torró guarantees that Ferraz “has not ordered, supported, or cooperated in any criminal conduct”
His expectation is that the appearance will take place after the next European Council meeting, scheduled for June 18 and 19 in Brussels. Just the day before, on June 17, Zapatero is summoned to the National Court as an accused for alleged corruption crimes. And a week later, Sánchez has another crucial appointment on his imminent agenda, with the PSOE federal committee convened for June 27.
In the meeting of the party’s highest decision-making body between congresses, latent tensions in the PSOE will surface amid the flood of judicial cases. The problem, for Sánchez’s critics, is that a large majority of the federal committee members continue to close ranks around their secretary general.
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Thus, it is very likely that the president of Castilla-La Mancha, Emiliano García-Page, will again be left alone, almost as the only dissenting voice, in his urgent demands to Sánchez: “Either a vote of confidence or elections.” This already happened to him at the last federal committee meeting, in July 2025, again in a turbulent climate after the imprisonment of the then Ferraz organization secretary, Santos Cerdán, on corruption accusations.
“There is a government that is being targeted for overthrow by undemocratic methods,” warns Minister Puente
“You chose me as the captain of this ship, and the captain does not abandon ship when rough seas come, he stays to weather the storm, to save the course and reach the port,” Sánchez argued on that occasion.
But Page insisted yesterday on his demands, arguing that “there is a very large majority who think very similar things about the PSOE, but very discreetly.” “If anyone thinks the PSOE is flatlining, they are wrong,” he stressed, in the face of the “cluster bomb” of judicial cases pressing Sánchez, whom he accused of “bunkering” himself in Moncloa.
Puente responded to Page’s criticisms. “There is deep indignation among the socialist membership,” he warned. Referring to the pressures from Page and Felipe González, he warned that “some who are not measuring well will end up having the opposite effect of what they intend.” “There are many people who already express absolute exhaustion from the spurious political use of these cases, they are already at the limit,” Puente alerted.
“We will not bow to attempts to disturb democracy,” says the Minister of Transport
And Ferraz’s organization secretary, Rebeca Torró, concluded: “The PSOE has not ordered, supported, or cooperated in any criminal conduct.”
Illa: “I know how to distinguish a coincidence from what is not”
The president of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa, emphasized yesterday during a public event that “the truth will eventually prevail” and highlighted that he trusts the justice system… “even if it is difficult.” In this way, the leader of the Catalan socialists also responded to the investigation of a new plot that would affect the PSOE in the National Court, which has requested information about the advertising expenses of the PSC’s 2024 electoral campaign. “Democracy rests on the concept of truth and the truth always ends up prevailing, it may take longer or less, but it ends up prevailing,” Illa stated, adding that democracy also consists of plurality, in “contrasting different views oriented towards the common good, not destruction or annihilation of those who think differently.” “That is not democracy nor being a democrat, it is something else,” the president continued. He also asserted that being a socialist means “believing in dignity when it is difficult, believing in justice even if it costs, and also in people when many look the other way.” “We respect and I respect justice, but I know how to distinguish a coincidence from what is not and a coincidence from what is not,” Illa concluded, anticipating that “they will not bow” and that they are not naive. “Our strength does not come from institutions, it comes from our values,” concluded the PSC leader.
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