No one can deny that Pedro Sanchez He is the socialist leader with the most risk drive of all those who have governed Spain since the recovery of democracy. Even his opponents have been surprised by the call for early elections for July 23 that he announced on Monday. Before the defeat without palliatives that the PSOE suffered at the polls, it seemed that Sánchez only had three options: accept it and go through six months of ordeal for the sake of the Spanish presidency of the European Union that begins on July 1, keeping his partners in the Government or letting them fall in the hope of stopping the hemorrhage, or resign in a personal capacity. But neither one nor the other. Sánchez presented the unexpected advance of the elections as the consequence of having assumed “in the first person” the message sent with the results. With an electoral setback produced after a campaign that he himself faced as a plebiscite on his management and with a blue tide that will snatch most of the territorial power of the PSOE, it was not enough to point to its partners as the only ones responsible for the wear and tear and hope that with that the next semester would not become a slow agony.
Another thing is to summon elections in the middle of summer, something unprecedented in Spainand during the first month of the European presidency, it will not cost more than uncertain benefits that it intends to obtain with it the general secretary of the PSOE. from the skillful tacticism To which Sánchez has accustomed us, the call intends to invest in two months what has failed after three years of Government. Mobilize the left-wing electorate during a pre-campaign that is marked by the PP and Vox alliancestake advantage of the start of the european presidency (at the price of plunging it into electoral uncertainty) and proposing an ultimatum in the face of the cainite differences that bleed the Podemos space. The chosen calendar leaves them 10 days to also draw their conclusions from the shipwreck that has dismounted the purple ones from many institutions and close ranks or to persist in the error and feed the useful vote for socialism.
The purpose of making the next elections a kind of duel in the sun between two politicians, one anointed by his status as European leader, and the other a prisoner of the extreme right, is not only risky. It seems that he wants to instruct public opinion, as if it had not perceived the true dimension of what was at stake in the elections that have just been held. But it will hardly prevent the July 23 elections from being largely a repetition of the confrontation that we have witnessed in the last electoral campaign. While the socialist leader will once again warn that the PP, if it wins, will govern with Vox, Feijóo will base his speech on denouncing his opponent’s alliances with the independentistas and with left-wing extremists.
After having anticipated any saber rattling within the PSOE with his initiative, it remains for Sánchez to mobilize his own and, above all, the voters of Podemos and Sumar. With a politician like Pedro Sánchez, who has shown his ability to overcome adversity, anything is possible. But risk must be managed with discernment. And it is very risky to foresee that, after dealing the same cards again, Sánchez will once again have a winning hand.