Something is happening to Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s PP with the electoral campaigns. Some popular barons believe that they end up falling into a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy: the management confesses what its greatest fear is and, as the campaign progresses, it begins to get dangerously close, leaving Feijóo always on the edge of the precipice. It happened in the last Catalan elections, when the PP leadership held its breath until the end, trapped in the question of whether or not it was going to surpass Vox (in the end it did, by 15 to 11 seats), and it has also happened in these European elections. The PP, which weeks ago saw a comfortable victory in the plebiscite it had designed over Pedro Sánchez, now ends up in a state of nervousness over a possible tie with the PSOE.
The majority of popular territorial leaders and leaders consulted believe that the distance with the socialists will be close this Sunday. Under these conditions, selling an end of cycle seems complicated. Feijóo crosses his fingers so as not to fail, with the sensation – again – of finding himself, without knowing how, in water up to his neck.
Although Judge Juan Carlos Peinado threw a lifeline to the PP by breaking in in recent days with the summons to Pedro Sánchez’s wife, the popular people have suffered with a campaign that began crookedly. Some of the leading barons describe her as “lazy.” “The first week was bad for us, with [Javier] Milei and [Benjamin] Netanyahu mobilizing votes for the socialists,” recalls an autonomous president of the PP. “We were behind, without initiative,” he remembers.
The popular ones suffered the entire first part trapped in the frameworks of the left due to the diplomatic crisis with Argentina and the massacre in Gaza – with a photo of Netanyahu and Abascal included -, and with the PSOE and Vox comfortable in their political positions while they did balances and appeared blurred. Feijóo also made some of his own mistakes, such as when he opened the door to pacts with the Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, which gave oxygen to the PSOE’s strategy, focused on the danger of the rise of the extreme right; or at the end, when he slipped by not ruling out a motion of censure against Sánchez with the support of Carles Puigdemont. At first everything went from bad to worse, reveals a baron: “During the first week, several of us came to think we were losing.”
The PP has the feeling that the final stretch has been straightened out, thanks to the final approval of the amnesty law and, above all, the judicial summons to Begoña Gómez. But, with everything, the popular ones seem to have squandered the wide distance that they had over the PSOE before entering the electoral arena. Last March, the GAD3 pollster even gave the PP an eleven point difference over the PSOE in the European elections. In April, SigmaDos gave them almost a seven-point lead. And now, even though all the regional presidents and Feijóo have dedicated themselves to seeking a mobilization of the right at the gallop of anti-sanchism, the conclusion in the party is that they arrive at the meeting with the ballot boxes broken and with the PSOE stepping on their heels. heels, at a distance that has been reduced to only two or three points, as estimated by the main PP baronies. The latest 40dB barometer. for EL PAÍS, from the month of May, left that difference at three and a half points.
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In the PP they believe that the PSOE has managed to hold on strong, around 30% of the votes, according to most polls, “because it is eating Sumar and Podemos”, while on the right Feijóo fails to absorb Vox ( In the 40dB poll, Sumar has 5.7% and Podemos 4%, with Vox at 12.6%). The extreme right is the key that confuses the PP, which cannot find the key to attract its electorate: it resisted in the Basque and Catalan elections and will do so in the European ones, according to the polls. “The anger with Pedro Sánchez over the amnesty and the case of Begoña Gómez makes Vox maintain its ground,” analyzes a popular baron, in line with others who warned that exalting passions too much in the campaign could benefit the ultras.
The debate on the strategy to defeat the extreme right is agitated in the PP, and in light of what happens on Sunday it will intensify. Some voices defend that a joint government should be dropped to give them a blow, while others who govern with them believe that we should not fall into nervousness and the best bet is for a slow death, as happened with Ciudadanos. Other barons miss “more winks from Feijóo to that electorate”, despite the fact that the leader of the PP has already allowed himself to be contaminated with ultra discourse on issues as sensitive as immigration, to which the popular ones have fallen into linking the delinquency. The moderate sector thinks the opposite: “They are going to stay where they are, so let’s forget about seeking a transfer of their voters,” defends a member of the leadership. The disparity of opinions gives an idea of how tangled the ideological discussion is in the PP about the relationship with the extreme right.
The PP barons believe that this Sunday the important thing is to win, but for it to be considered a good result, Feijóo would have to surpass Sánchez by at least three points. The popular ones know that if they want to convince that Sánchez is at the end of the cycle, a victory is not enough: they need it to be broad. “Even if Feijóo won by four points, they were going to say that there are more of them, because they all come together and because we have not managed to make it clear that agreeing with Puigdemont is like doing so with the extreme right,” laments a PP leader from Madrid. . The possibility of a tie, which Feijóo has put on the table in the final stretch, “would be bad news,” underlines an autonomous president. And a defeat, although not contemplated, would open unexplored terrain with a lot of internal noise in which some in the PP see Sánchez advancing the general elections.
Ayuso was the only one who warned of the risks of taking victory for granted. “Let’s not fall into the mistakes of the last campaign,” she said, setting a profile for what may happen on Sunday night. Whatever happens, in the main popular baronies, including the one in Madrid, they assure that Feijóo’s throne in the PP is not in danger, taking into account, furthermore, that Sánchez’s governability is not consolidated by the labyrinth of the next Government of Catalonia and that general ones cannot be ruled out in the short term.
Now, a mediocre result for the PP on 9-J will stir up internal waters and activate the territories’ claims: from changes in Feijóo’s leadership team to a congress or a political convention before the end of the year. The risk of having presented the European elections as a plebiscite against Pedro Sánchez is that not winning it will consolidate the socialist president in office and sow doubts in the leadership of the president of the PP. “If Pedro Sánchez has tied on Sunday night, he stays. And we, I’m not going to say how… but also,” acknowledged Esteban González Pons, director of the European campaign, this Friday at the closing in Valencia, with a sad gesture. Feijóo himself surprised at the last rally with a message that pointed to a close result. “This party is a solid party,” he said, “we can get better or worse results, with political hurricanes we can rock, but they will never knock us down.” “Your vote is the answer,” was the party’s motto for July 9, and now some in the PP are anxiously awaiting that answer.
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