The first week of the 28-M campaign reveals what was already expected: if the debate between Pedro Sánchez and Alberto Núñez Feijóo reaches high tension levels when it is held in parliamentary headquarters, it was logical that in an electoral context both will raise the tone In the attached video, rally by rally, the main points of friction between the Prime Minister and the opposition leader are linked. Sánchez and Feijóo are campaigning these days for the PSOE and PP candidates, in various Spanish cities, but they do not lose sight of each other. Messages are sent and reproaches are exchanged. The municipal and regional elections will be read as a first round of the December general elections and no one lets their guard down. “They are generals,” Feijóo said at a rally this week, arguing that there are polling stations in the more than 8,000 Spanish municipalities.
In his interventions, the economy occupies a prominent place. Sánchez boasts of what he considers the achievements of his team and the good economic progress of the country. For Feijóo, the Government has indebted Spain for a few generations. The socialist leader reproaches the popular for bad economic omens, which he describes as the apocalypse that never comes.
Along with housing, pension reform or inflation control, if there is an unavoidable issue in political acts at this time it is terrorism. The campaign was monopolized by this issue since it became known that EH-Bildu had included 44 ETA convicts on its lists. And at the moment the PP does not loosen up. "It is unfortunate that they continue to rely on Bildu," Feijóo reproaches the Government. "When the right doesn't know what to say and is losing the campaign, it talks about ETA," replied the PSOE leader.
Another point of contention between the two is Sánchez's strategy of announcing government measures at PSOE rallies. The President of the Government has made various announcements: from the right to be forgotten oncology to a bonus for people over 65 to go to the movies on Tuesdays for two euros, or the easing of the contribution period for early retirement for people with disabilities . The opposition leader complains that these ads are made during the electoral campaign. “In an electoral year, the Government does the same as in other years, which is to carry out its measures,” Sánchez replies.
The various controversies registered between the two government partner parties, PSOE and Unidas Podemos, particularly in recent months, are a recurring theme with which Feijóo attacks Sánchez. He also blames the suppression of the crime of sedition and the modification of the crime of embezzlement. And he adds reproaches for the fissures that the law of only yes is yes has shown, with hundreds of releases of those convicted of sexual crimes. A recurring phrase of the president of the PP is that "sanchismo must be repealed", personalizing in Pedro Sánchez all the measures carried out by the Government in the last five years that the PP does not approve.
Another matter for which the opposition leader has criticized the president is that he used his international agenda to get out of some internal controversies. At the beginning of the campaign, at a rally in Toledo, Feijóo criticized Sánchez for having gone to Washington to meet with the president of the United States, instead of staying to "learn about the problems" of the Spanish people. Sánchez went to the White House coinciding with the start of the electoral campaign, although it was not really up to him, rather it was Joe Biden who invited him that day.
