13-F Elections Castilla y León
The PP of Castilla y León appeals to the Madrid president in the face of the setback of its electoral expectations
Pablo Casado and Alfonso Fernández Mañueco have pivoted their electoral discourse on the aspiration that the PP rule alone in Castilla y León. Until yesterday, Isabel Díaz Ayuso exposed in public what the popular leaders quietly ruminate, the inevitability of the agreement with Vox. “Hopefully we don’t need it, but if necessary, I would always agree with Ortega Lara’s party (Vox) before with those who agree with those who kidnapped him,” said the Madrid president at an act in Valladolid, the first of the two of the day he starred with Mañueco.
The leader of the PP and his regional candidate have drawn in rallies and interviews the thesis of the pact with the party of Santiago Abascal after the appointment this Sunday. Admitting that scenario is kicking the appeals to the useful vote of the right to which both Casado and Mañueco are clinging. The strategists of any campaign also warn that accepting an agreement before the elections is giving carte blanche to vote for either of the two parties because, in the end, they will understand each other.
The circumstance also occurs that on this occasion Vox has raised the price of its collaboration. Those of Abascal are no longer satisfied with external cooperation, they want to enter the regional government if they are necessary. The last thing Casado wants is to reach the general elections with the mortgage that he is condemned to co-govern with Vox. That scenario drives away its most moderate voter and encourages those who are further to the right to transfer.
THE KEYS:
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Strategy.
Experts argue that talking about pacts before the elections demobilizes voters -
Dual function.
Ayuso’s presence aims to encourage the popular electorate and stop the expansion of Vox -
Testing bench.
Castilla y León can determine the course of the future relations of the PP with the extreme right
But the Madrid president yesterday threw a jug of cold water on those calculations by demanding that the PP leader not be afraid of the agreement with Vox, a party co-founded by José Antonio Ortega Lara, kidnapped by ETA for 532 days. That understanding, she continued, will always be preferable to an agreement with the socialists, who “agree with those who kidnapped” the former prison official in 1996, alluding to the nationalist left. She helped, in any case, she did not forget the central message of the campaign and also demanded the vote for the PP to govern in Castilla y León “without needing anyone.”
Casado has at all times avoided talking about pacts or approaches to Vox. Since the speech of October 22, 2020 during Abascal’s motion of censure against Pedro Sánchez, he distanced himself from the far-right party and relations between the leaders of both parties have not been recomposed.
The downward electoral expectations of the popular in Castilla y León can change everything. In Madrid, after the regional elections last May, it was not necessary because Ayuso’s victory was incontestable and Vox was relegated to a secondary role. Next Sunday’s test will be crucial for the future of relations between the two formations.
The “pull” of the president
This irruption of Ayuso in the Castilian-Leonese campaign responds to a change in strategy by the PP. His presence was going to be limited, like that of the rest of the barons, to one day. This is how the party leadership and Mañueco’s campaign committee planned it. The Madrid president participated last Friday in electoral acts in Segovia and Burgos, and her presence unleashed delirium among PP supporters. An impact that had already been detected during her interventions in the regional congresses of the conservatives, such as the one in Castilla-La Mancha last November. “In Segovia it took us an hour and a half to travel 200 meters,” Ayuso’s collaborators proudly recalled. “She has a lot of pull and cannot be wasted because of her problems with Casado,” they recognized in Mañueco’s environment.
At a critical moment in the campaign, with the PP falling in the polls and with Vox on the rise, the national leadership and those responsible for the campaign swerved and doubled the presence of the president of the Community of Madrid. In addition to the enthusiasm that she arouses among popular voters, her figure has a lot of prestige among the extreme right, as was verified in the Madrid elections with the discreet result of Vox.
Ayuso was yesterday at noon with the candidate in Valladolid, in the afternoon he traveled to Ávila, and the scenes of passion and frenzy were repeated. It is also expected that he will participate in the closing of the campaign, although the Madrid government has left his participation up in the air. The protagonists of that rally will be Casado and Mañueco, and the PP barons should limit themselves to covering them without intervening to give an image of unity. But the Andalusian president, Juanma Moreno, has already distinguished himself by a trip to the Dubai Expo. Ayuso may be the next casualty due to “schedule problems”.