Along with the President of the Government, they are "the best electoral assets" of the PSOE, as highlighted in Ferraz. And, furthermore, they assure that they are the ones who "embody the best socialist management." Pedro Sánchez thus redeploys practically all of his ministers on the lists for 23-J.
Without big surprises or star signings, given the urgency of times and circumstances, the Chief Executive turns to his ministers to lead the candidacies, as he did in 2019. Again with the criteria of hierarchy in the Government and the territory of origin of the ministers, in most cases, to locate the headliners and complete the electoral lists in each constituency. Although again with some internal pulse, as happened again with the Aragonese federation led by the critic Javier Lambán.
After betting on Meritxell Batet in 2015, and on Margarita Robles in 2016, in the 2019 general elections it was Carmen Calvo who accompanied Sánchez as an electoral ticket for Madrid. The great unknown that remained to be revealed is who would head the Madrid list this time along with the Prime Minister. By government hierarchy, and the first vice president, Nadia Calviño, –independent and who was never part of the candidacies– was ruled out, the best placed was the third vice president, Teresa Ribera, who in 2019 ranked fourth on the list for Madrid. And so it will be: Ribera, Minister of Ecological Transition, will occupy the number two position on the Madrid list, behind Sánchez.
The Minister of the Presidency, Félix Bolaños, will debut on the lists as number three for Madrid, while the Defense Minister, Margarita Robles, will occupy the fourth position. The Foreign Minister, José Manuel Albares, will also be located in the Madrid candidacy. As already happened in 2019, this is the list that will have the most ministers.
In addition, María Jesús Montero, head of the Treasury and vice general secretary of the PSOE, will lead the candidacy for Seville; the Government spokesperson and Minister of Territorial Policy, Isabel Rodríguez, for Ciudad Real; the head of Health, José Miñones, for A Coruña; the Minister of Science, Diana Morant, for Valencia; that of Agriculture, Luis Planas, for Córdoba; the Minister of Industry, Héctor Gómez, for Tenerife; and the head of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, will repeat as number one for Cádiz.
The Minister of Education, Pilar Alegría, will in turn head the list for Zaragoza, despite the fact that the still president of Aragon and leader of this federation, Javier Lambán, now out after the 28-M elections, wanted to make his opposition clear to what he considered an imposition of Ferraz.
The PSC also confirmed that the current president of the Congress, former minister Meritxell Batet, will again lead the candidacy for Barcelona, as in 2019. On this occasion, she will be accompanied by the two Catalan ministers: Culture, Miquel Iceta, and Transportation, Raquel Sanchez.
The only members of the Executive who will not join the lists, in addition to Calviño, are José Luis Escrivá and Pilar Llop, by their own decision.
In the comeback chapter, four should be highlighted: former vice president Carmen Calvo will be headlining Granada on this occasion; the former vice secretary general of the PSOE Adriana Lastra will lead the list of Asturias, and the former minister and former secretary of organization of Ferraz José Luis Ábalos will be number two for Valencia. In addition, Antonio Hernando, former spokesperson in Congress and current deputy director of Sánchez's cabinet, will be the headliner for Almería.
The PSOE federal committee will ratify the candidacies this Saturday, as well as the electoral program. And despite the rush for the electoral advance decided by Sánchez, in Ferraz they warn: "The machinery is greased."
