Sánchez’s threat of resignation fails to make the country’s headlines

Normally, if the leader of a country announced that they were thinking about quitting it would be a hot topic of conversation. Yet, despite Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, writing a letter stating his intention to do just that, people here don’t seem to be talking about it.

A message from my friend read: “Pedro Sánchez writing a letter saying he might quit on Monday was not what I expected on this calm April night haha”. It was the first time I’d heard the news.

Funnily enough, that sums up the general reaction of people here in the Basque Country in Northern Spain. Cool and collected – not especially bothered.

On Wednesday April 24, Sánchez stepped back from public duties until the following Monday, saying that he needed to “stop and reflect” on “whether I should continue to lead the government or renounce this honour”.

The revelation came after a court opened a preliminary inquiry into his wife, Begoña Gómez, into allegations of influence-peddling and corruption. The case was brought to the court by a group called Manos Limpias (Clean Hands), whose leader, Miguel Bernad, is linked with the far-right.

Bernad has since acknowledged publicly that the claims may be false and were based on reporting by online outlets. He has insisted that, if the allegations turn out to be false, any blame for the incident should be laid with the false reports rather than with his group’s legal case.

In his letter, Sánchez insists his wife is innocent and claims that “this is an operation to harass me by land, sea, and air to try and make me give up politics through a personal attack on my wife.” He added: “This attack is without precedent, it is so serious and coarse that I need to stop and reflect with my wife”.

Allies of Sánchez point to previous smear campaigns against Gómez. For example in 2022, right eing news outlets ran a fabricated story alleging that Gómez was transgender and linked to drug trafficking. Threats of legal action quickly shut down the story on more mainstream media outlets.

Perhaps the reason people don’t appear too bothered by Sánchez’s announcement is that they don’t believe he’s seriously considering quitting. Spain’s PM has had brushes with adversity before.

Ousted from the leadership of his PSOE party in 2016, he toured the country in his Peugeot 407 and was miraculously back as the party’s leader the following year.

He is also capable of putting on political spectaculars. In 2018, for example, he managed to bring about and win a vote of no confidence motion against then-prime minister Mariano Rajoy. Rajoy, who had been in post for over 14 years, was widely seen as the grear political survivor of Europe.

Against the odds, Sánchez has survived as prime minister in the six years since then, forming coalitions, controversial deals and calling shock elections. He is nothing if not a savvy political operator – and a survivor.

It’s understandable why Spaniards might assume this is another one of his clever electoral strategies. Why fight so hard to become prime minister, only to throw it away and resign?

What’s more, Sánchez is a risk-taker. He controversially entered negotiations with Catalan separatist parties after last year’s general election, which failed to provide the left or right-wing blocs with enough seats to form a government. Months of deal-making enabled Sánchez to win the backing of Spain’s 350-seat parliament with a majority of just four votes – 179 votes in favour, 171 votes against.

Sánchez expended a huge amount of political capital by agreeing to an amnesty for all those involved in the illegal Catalonia Referendum, and by making deals with controversial parties like EH Bildu. If he went to all that effort, he is unlikely now to give it all away.