Óscar Puente resorts to rumors from the leftist media outlet that erased Sánchez's gray hair

Spanish socialism is suffering an unprecedented political earthquake since the era of its scandals during the time of Felipe González.

How did Spain fall into the PSOE's abyss, and what must it do to get out of it and not fall again?
The Sánchez government attempts to clean up its image with a retouched photo from 2023

Following the indictment of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero and the court order by Judge Pedraz uncovering a mafia at the heart of Spanish socialism, socialists are facing this situation in different ways: some with discouragement, others with disbelief, and some spreading conspiracy theories that see suspects and culprits everywhere except in the PSOE and in the corruption scandals that are no longer just affecting, but sinking that party.

A socialist leader who is beside himself is the Minister of Transport, Óscar Puente, who still hasn't resigned two months after his ministry's political responsibility for the Adamuz train accident was confirmed, which resulted in 46 deaths and about which the minister openly lied by denying that there were old rails at the site of the tragedy. Puente is known for insulting his rivals on Twitter and cheering on practices that INCIBE encourages people to report as a form of cyberbullying.

In response to the information that has been coming to light about his party, Puente has resorted to several conspiracy theories. Today he stated that "they want to overthrow a government using undemocratic methods", a defamatory reference to the Justice system and the ongoing investigations into alleged crimes committed by members of the PSOE. Likewise, on his Twitter account, the minister shared an image published by the Italian left-wing newspaper L'Espresso, which states the following: "The investigation into Zapatero, backed by US National Security, is interpreted in European chancelleries as a message directed at all governments that have challenged Trump."

That tweet from L'Espresso doesn't link to any supporting information. On its website, this left-wing media outlet publishes alleged rumors without naming names, linking the judicial investigations into the PSOE with Trump and even with Israel. This is a clear case of tabloid journalism whose purpose is more than evident: to bury the socialist scandals with conspiracy theories, in which its author, by the way, doesn't even bother to hide his true intentions, stating: "Anyone who cultivated ambiguous relationships with the old Chavista system now risks becoming vulnerable." It is referring to the narco-dictatorship with which Zapatero did business and whose dictator, Nicolás Maduro, now faces charges of drug trafficking and terrorism.

Interestingly, the Italian left-wing media outlet omits the fact that Zapatero came under US judicial scrutiny in 2021, during Joe Biden's presidency, due to his ties to the Venezuelan dictatorship. This is not a sudden case that the Trump administration has conjured up out of thin air. L'Espresso also omits that the current legal proceedings against Zapatero in Spain began at the request of the French and Swiss public prosecutors. Since this fact refutes the narrative of the Italian left-wing publication, it is simply deleted. This is the kind of "journalism" that the Spanish leftist government likes, as we already saw in December, when Sánchez and several of his ministers (including Puente) shared a cover of L'Espresso declaring the Spanish president "person of the year".

That cover became the subject of many jokes in Spain, because, faced with the visible physical decline of the Socialist leader, L'Espresso photoshopped a picture of Sánchez from 2023, removing his gray hair to make him look younger and healthier. As I pointed out at the time, that publication's sympathy for Sánchez's government is no coincidence. The editor of L'Espresso is Emilio Carelli, who was a member of parliament for the leftist Five Star Movement party between 2018 and 2021. This is what Spanish socialism is currently clinging to, as it is in dire straits due to its political corruption scandals.

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Photo: Efe. Pedro Sánchez, President of the Government of Spain, with Óscar Puente, Minister of Transport.