29-N election campaign and political news, live | Sánchez asks for 176 progressive deputies in Congress to “go sooner and further”

This Friday, the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, asked for 176 progressive deputies in Congress to “go sooner and further.” During a rally in La Rioja, the head of the Executive exposed the leader of the opposition, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, for his level of English and for ensuring that he was unaware of Marcial Dorado's links with drug trafficking when they were friends. The Television Academy has announced that the face to face between Sánchez and Feijóo will take place next Thursday and will be moderated by the president of the institution, María Casado. The leader of the opposition will start the debate and the President of the Government will close it, as announced by the academy in a statement. In parallel, Santiago Abascal has referred to the interview given by Feijóo to the YouTuber Jordi Wild in which the president of the PP gave his opinion on the distribution of ministries with Vox. “Let's see who is the president of the Government,” Abascal responded at a press conference in Toledo.

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Camilo S. Baquero

Rufián asks to sit with Jordi Wild: “Call us!”

The Republican Gabriel Rufián opened his campaign outside Catalonia this Friday in Palma, supporting ERC candidates in confluences of the Balearic Islands and Valencia and Irene Montero (Vamos). At one point during the rally, he addressed Santiago Abascal directly – “If you are afraid of Jordi Wild, imagine defending the people of Mohamed VI” – but he also took the opportunity to send a message to the famous YouTuber. “Call us!” he asked.

Rufián's proposal comes after the success of the Manresa YouTuber's interviews with Pedro Sánchez, Ada Colau and Alber Núñez Feijóo. In March 2023, according to data collected by this newspaper, Jordi Wild's two channels added more than 160 million views. Abascal has given up visiting his studio and that is why now Rufián – interested in reaching a younger audience and far from the traditional media circuit – knocks on his door.

For the rest, Rufián has made an intervention modeled on those of the pre-campaign, modulating, of course, the attacks on his party and banishing criticism of Junts per Catalunya and the way in which he considers that the Catalan media give more visibility to the theses of Puigdemont's people than to his own.

“I ask you to vote progressive, everyone has to do well,” Rufián assured before 1,200 people. “We are the Front,” he insisted. “This was not about joining the PSOE, but about subduing the PSOE from the left,” he added.

Camilo S. Baquero

Carme Gomila, candidate for the confluence of the left in the Balearic Islands, calls for more control over the ports

Carme Gomila, head of the list for Ara Més Front Ampli, assured this Friday that her party will force Balearic citizens to have more control over the islands' port ecosystem, in order to have more control over tourist flows. “The islands need to be able to give their opinion, to have a copy of the house key,” he assured before some 1,200 people gathered in Palma de Mallorca.

“We don't feel like continuing to live badly in our house,” added Gomila, who has continued with the thread of control over tourism that her telorena, the podemita Irene Montero, had proposed. “Here the only possible vote is for Ara Més,” he proudly stated, thus showing that it is one of the only territories where the forces to the left of the PSOE have managed to get together on a single ballot.

Gomila, an ERC activist in the Balearic Islands, has assured that his group will go to Madrid to "limit the purchase of housing to non-residents", to "put a price cap on rents and declare war on vulture funds." The candidate also sees it necessary to put a cap on the price of basic foods. “This way our families don't have to choose between meat or fish,” he added.

Camilo S. Baquero

Irene Montero advocates in Palma de Mallorca for prohibiting purchases for non-residents: “If posidonia could talk, it would say 'guiris, 'go home'!”

The Podemos candidate, Irene Montero, has advocated at a rally in Palma de Mallorca for prohibiting the purchase of homes for non-residents. “If the posidonia could speak, it would say 'guiris, go home!'” he said at a rally that he shared with Gabriel Rufián and the head of the list Carme Gomila, head of the list for Ara Més Mallorca-Front Ampli and which brought together around 1,200 people.

Montero has made a speech focused on the regulation of tourism, directly asking to prohibit both the purchase of non-residents and tourist apartments, which he claims expel nurses and hospitality workers who are forced to live in caravans. “Houses are for living,” he added.

The Podemos leader has also proposed “taxing” companies that pollute. "To their private jets and yachts, their pollution to do business with the electricity bill. Great tax!", he added. “These elections are going to be ruthless with those at the top and with the parties of the gentlemen who defend them, who do not like strikes and if it were up to them, slavery would still exist,” he stressed.

The Country

Sánchez: “Not only have they insulted my mother, but also women, migrants, gays, unions”

The president of the government, Pedro Sánchez, has once again responded to the insults he receives from the opposition, and stated during the event in Arnedo: "Not only have they insulted my mother; they have also insulted all the women who demonstrated every March 8, the migrants who come to our country to contribute to economic development, the gays, whom they have also tried to label their sexual orientation as an illness." The president has also referred to the unions, criticized by representatives of the PP during the general strike, and to the pensioners. Sánchez has assured that the elections are about “choosing between good politics and banishing bad education.”

The Country

Sánchez vindicates the unions against attacks from the right: “The labor reform is a success”

This Friday, the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, defended the role of the unions and attacked the attacks that, in his opinion, they receive from the right. The socialist has claimed the labor reform agreed with unions and employers which, as he has highlighted, has allowed the creation of “more than three million new jobs” and for Spain to reach 22.6 million Social Security affiliates. “That is the success of the labor reform, agreed with the unions and the employers,” said the head of the Executive, who has defended the work of the union organizations in improving working and salary conditions.

Faced with this, he has accused the Popular Party of disqualifying workers' representatives. “Bad manners are calling workers' representatives mafia, garbage or nonsense,” said Sánchez, who has framed the upcoming elections as a dilemma between “good politics” and speeches that question union action.

The Country

Sánchez exposes Feijóo for his level of English: “These are those of the culture of effort”

The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, has charged against the leaders of PP and Vox, Alberto Núñez Feijóo and Santiago Abascal, for their statements in the latest public interviews with Jordi Wild and David Broncano, respectively.

At a party event in Arnedo, La Rioja, the leader of the PSOE recalled Feijóo's words in his interview with Jordi Wild, in which he said "that the president of the Government of Spain must know English" and acknowledged that he did not speak the language and "he had not made an effort" to learn it either: "These are those of the culture of effort, those of merit... let's see if it is going to be true that Feijóo is not president because he doesn't want to," he blurted out.

Sánchez also recalled David Broncano's interview with Santiago Abascal: "He said that he was not an economist when talking about pensions... one is not president because he does not want to and the other because he does not know," he concluded.

The Country

Sánchez charges against Feijóo for ensuring that he was unaware of Marcial Dorado's links to drug trafficking

The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, criticized this Friday the leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, for stating in an interview with the YouTuber Jordi Wild that he did not know that Marcial Dorado was related to drug trafficking when he coincided with him on trips during the 1990s. At a campaign event in Arnedo (La Rioja), Sánchez recalled that Dorado was detained within the framework of Operation Nécora and questioned the explanation offered by the popular leader. “Today he has the nerve to say that he did not know in 1995 that Marcial Dorado was a drug trafficker,” he stated.

The Country

Sánchez asks for 176 progressive deputies in Congress to “go sooner and further”

The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, assured this Friday that Spain “today is much better than in 2018” and has defended that, with a new socialist Executive, “in 2030 it will be even better than in 2026.” During a campaign event in Arnedo (La Rioja), Sánchez asked PSOE supporters to keep two figures for the next elections: 75 and 176. The first, he explained, represents the level of participation that the entire Spanish society aspires to achieve at the polls, while the second corresponds to the absolute majority in Congress. “176, because it is the absolute majority of progressive seats to go sooner and further,” he stated.

The Country

The candidate for the Senate of La Rioja predicts a comeback like in Brazil: “The vote is the vote and, if not, tell Lula”

The candidate for the Senate of La Rioja, Concha Andreu, welcomed Pedro Sánchez at the campaign event in Arnedo and predicted a comeback like that of the Brazilian elections. "Do you know the power that the vote has? The vote is the vote and, if not, tell Lula," he challenged. The deputy general secretary of the PSOE in the autonomous community has stated that she belongs to a party that defends equality and the value of the vote no matter what part of the country it comes from. "The vote is the power of the people and we have it freely thanks to the Socialist Party. No powerful person is going to condition us," Andreu summarized.

The Country

Sánchez participates in a PSOE campaign event in La Rioja

The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, participates this Friday in a socialist campaign event in Arnedo, in La Rioja. The leader of the PSOE will be accompanied at this event by García Ibáñez; the congressional candidate for the region, Elisa Garrido; the head of the Senate list for La Rioja, Concha Andreu; and the mayor of the city, Rosa María Herce.

Subsequently, Sánchez will travel to Pamplona to participate in a second event that will be held at 7:00 p.m. at the Frontón Labrit and will also be attended by the president of the Government of Navarra and general secretary of the PSN, María Chivite; the head of the list of the Navarrese socialists to Congress and Minister of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, Elma Saiz, and the number one to the Senate for Navarra, Ángel Moleón.

The Country

The face to face between Sánchez and Feijóo will be next Thursday and will be moderated by the president of the Television Academy

The face to face between Pedro Sánchez and Alberto Núñez Feijóo will take place next Thursday and will be moderated by the president of the Television Academy, María Casado, as reported by the institution in a statement. In a meeting with socialist and popular representatives, the academy has begun to outline “the details of the list and coverage of the two consensual meetings between the candidates for the presidency of the Government of Spain.”

The first of them, the face to face between Pedro Sánchez and Alberto Núñez Feijóo, will take place next Thursday at Plató A in Madrid Content City by Secuoya Content Group, and will be moderated by the president of the Television Academy, María Casado. At the meeting, the thematic blocks of the debate were agreed upon by consensus, which will be, in this order: first, housing, economy and taxation; then, social policy and public services; later, the fight against corruption and democratic regeneration, and finally, migration and foreign policy.

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Camilo S. BaqueroBarcelona

ERC proposes to force by law to allocate 30% of railway investment to maintenance

Esquerra Republicana has taken advantage of the first day of the electoral campaign to put its railway plans on the table. With Gabriel Rufián campaigning in the Balearic Islands, this Friday Oriol Junqueras has assumed the weight in Catalonia, who from the Sants Station in Barcelona has proposed a reform in the Railway Sector Law that stipulates that at least 30% of the annual infrastructure budget be allocated to maintenance and security.

The initiative comes after a year marked not only by high-speed accidents, but also by the one in Gelida (Barcelona), in Rodalies, last winter and the day after the State-Generalitat Bilateral Commission where the railway transfer was addressed.

Junqueras has said that currently “less than 15%” of the budget is dedicated to maintenance, a figure that he described as “clearly insufficient.” His proposed increase, he added, would mean equating spending on that item with surrounding countries. According to the Republican, France, Italy and Germany allocate “between 34 and 39%” of their infrastructure budget to the constant review and improvement of infrastructure and their security systems.

The Country

'Koldo Case'

Expansion | The PSOE files a complaint against 'OkDiario' and the PP for payments for Koldo García's defense

José MarcosLiliana Ochoa

The PSOE has filed a complaint with the State Attorney General's Office against the PP and OkDiario after learning that the website paid the defense fees of Koldo García, former advisor to former socialist minister José Luis Ábalos. The socialists take this step after, on November 5,