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It’s getting hot in here

💥 “Everything Everywhere All at Once”, Sánchez edition

No, it’s not because of the heat wave. Right now, everything is hitting Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez at once. This week has delivered a brutal one-two-three punch: his former right-hand man, José Luis Ábalos, was sentenced to over 24 years in prison, his ex-adviser Koldo García to nearly 20, and his wife, Begoña Gómez, is now officially heading to trial in a separate case.

Legal Earthquake #1. On Monday, the Supreme Court issued a ruling in the so-called Caso Koldo (which we’ve covered many times here). Ábalos, who was once one of the most powerful figures in Sánchez’s PSOE and a key architect of his rise to power, was found guilty of running a corruption scheme tied to pandemic-era mask contracts (and got the longest prison sentence ever for a former minister — congrats!).

• Bad men #1 + #2. The court found he participated in an organized operation involving kickbacks, influence-peddling, and steering public contracts allegedly steered toward friendly companies. His close aide, Koldo García, was also convicted as part of the same network.

• Snitching Cooperating pays. Then there’s Víctor de Aldama, the businessman at the center of the scheme, who was convicted too, but won’t go to prison because he cooperated with the authorities. The court explicitly rewarded his testimony and evidence, arguing that collaboration helps dismantle corruption networks.

• The audacity! Inside the government, that decision has triggered real unease. Not because of Aldama himself (who made threats against Sánchez, suggesting he was involved), but because of what it signaled (at least to them): tell the truth, and you will receive leniency testify against the socialist party, and you walk.

Legal Earthquake #2. Just when things couldn’t get more complicated politically, another crisis hit Sánchez’s personal orbit. That is, Judge Juan Carlos Peinado has formally opened trial proceedings against his wife, Begoña Gómez, accusing her of leveraging her position as the prime minister’s wife to boost her professional projects and influence business relationships.

• The charges range from influence peddling to corruption in business dealings — serious accusations that Gómez has denied. The Madrid public prosecutor has questioned the solidity of the case, but Peinado is like a dog with a bone and is pressing ahead nonetheless.

Red flags. What has really set off alarm bells, though, is how the judge is handling it. In a WTF moment highly controversial move, he ordered Gómez to surrender her passport and banned her from leaving Spain, citing a potential flight risk.

• Questioning the Thin Blue Line. Peinado suggested that the very police officers assigned to protect her could help her escape (which pissed off pretty much everyone). The National Police and police unions, which are not exactly known for siding with this government, called it outrageous. And the judicial watchdog, the CGPJ, voted in favor of opening a disciplinary investigation into the judge over those statements. (Still, Gómez turned in her passport yesterday).

Out to get her? This case itself has been controversial from day one. It originated from what many saw as a flimsy complaint filed by Manos Limpias, a pseudo-union linked to the far right, and has been marked by a series of once again, WTF eyebrow-raising moments.

No comment. Sánchez’s response has been a combination of trolling and exhaustion. Just hours after the Supreme Court’s bombshell ruling on Koldo, he posted a TikTok advising people to drink water and wear sunscreen during the heatwave.

• The best defense is a good offense. Yesterday in Parliament, he switched to full mixed metaphor combat mode, condemning corruption, defending his record, and aggressively going after the opposition, especially the PP. Corruption exists, he says, but not in his government as a system (a distinction that may be too cute by half), and certainly not on the scale seen in previous administrations (which sounds like he admits it exists, but anyway…).

• The opposition laughed at his response, with PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo asking him to call an election. Even former Socialist PM Felipe González said he should either resign or call early elections out of “political responsibility.”

What happens now? We’re headed for a summer break (yay!). Begoña Gómez is on track to stand trial unless a higher court intervenes, and the broader corruption investigations linked to the Caso Koldo are still unfolding, meaning more revelations could be coming.

• Sánchez insists he will stay the course until 2027 (though his comments suggest he’s rebating that from July to March). But after a week like this, that timeline suddenly looks far less certain.

More news below. 👇👇

🔔 But first… Don’t miss the latest episode of The Bubble Podcast!

We discuss PM Zapatero’s corruption accusations, the very complicated relationship between the US and Spanish governments, and the World Cup. Find us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube!

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💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🇺🇸💔🇪🇸 Are American businesses souring on Spain as Sánchez and Trump duke it out?

Economic reverb. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s stand against President Trump’s war in Iran, tech bro assholishness, and Israeli military attacks are either a principled stand against the 🍊 Menace’s policies or the political grandstanding of a leader unloved at home (or both; it can be both). But it could be hitting Spain where it really hurts — you know, el bolsillo 🤑.

• What’s the deal? American companies are pulling money out of Spain at a historic pace. Between January and March 2026 — the first quarter to fully capture the diplomatic faceoff between Madrid and Washington — U.S. disinvestment sextupled (not often you get to use that word!), rising 534% year-over-year to €3.3 billion.

• Long time high. That’s the largest quarterly disinvestment spike going back to when records began in 1993. Net U.S. investment cratered 719%, flipping from slightly positive a year ago to negative €1.97 billion. In one quarter, ‘merica went from Spain’s #1 foreign investor to #254.

The timing is a bit obvs. Sánchez came out hard in March against the U.S. and Israel’s quest to send Iran back to the Stone Age, including by blocking America from using the joint bases in Spain for the war. Trump responded by calling Spain “a terrible partner.” That’s the last month the new data covers, which matters because American investment had been booming until then: 2025 closed with record U.S. investment, up 53% to €10.2bn.

• The U.S. numbers are the worst, but they’re not alone. Overall, foreign net investment in Spain fell 16.8% in Q1 2026, with total foreign disinvestment up 84.8%.

• But why? The fracas with the Orange Menace compounds pre-existing conditions, like Spain’s complex regulations and energy grid problems (remember the apagón?). It’s also worth noting that Spain’s so-called escudo antiopas — a screening system meant to stop foreigners from getting their grubby paws on buying strategic Spanish companies — again directed about 40% of its 2025 reviews at U.S. investors (it’s been consistent since the escudo launched in 2020).

• Two sectors seem to be taking the worst of it. Data centers, where Spain was competing with France for Mediterranean leadership (France: 320 active centers; Spain: 145), and defense, where industry sources say flatly that “most bridges are broken.”

What’s next? Economists are watching closely whether Q1 was a one-off — a handful of major exits skewing the data — or the start of a real shift. In part to avoid drama, some regional governments — chiefly Aragón (33% of Spain’s data center projects) and Madrid — are going to court U.S. investors directly and leave the 🍊 fella and Mr. Handsome to fight things out on their own time.

2. 🏺 Archaeologists prove Extremadura was super de lujo back in the day

You may think Extremadura is just the hot place that Spain’s conquistadores would do anything to get away from, including going to the New World to die (or kill). But no — back in ancient times, that could barely afford the written word, it was like Las Vegas and Dubai all wrapped into one.

• How do we know this? Archaeologists at Casas del Turuñuelo, a Tartessian site (long story) in Guareña (Badajoz), have just wrapped their eighth dig season with another mind-blowing find: half of a bronze ritual cart from around 500 BC, decorated with griffins, a river god with his tongue out, and two bearded Atlas figures holding the whole thing up.

• Really, this is crazy unique. Esther Rodríguez and Sebastián Celestino, the CSIC co-directors behind the dig, say they’ve “searched by land, sea and air” and found nothing like it. The only partial parallels are Etruscan.

Turuñuelo has been delivering for years. Previous campaigns at the mound turned up the first Tartessian stone sculptures ever found (five near-life-size busts); a slate tablet with one of the oldest known paleohispanic alphabets carved around a scene of battling warriors; and the bones of 42 horses and assorted livestock, arranged with eerie ceremonial precision — the first documented animal sacrifice on the scale described in the Iliad and the Old Testament.

• What else is hiding under the mound? A two-story monumental building from 2,500 years ago, unique in the protohistoric southwest Iberian Peninsula.

What it all means. Rodríguez is calling this “the year of imports.” Why? The cart is probably Etruscan. Found alongside it were attic ceramics from Greece, an Egyptian alabaster perfume flask, ivory fragments carved with warriors, lions, and lotus flowers, and a Greek ritual foot-washing basin that the team believes “traveled in a package” with a marble altar column found last year.

• Someone at Turuñuelo knew what the objects were for. The striking thing, Celestino says, is that these Mediterranean luxury goods keep turning up in landlocked Badajoz but not at coastal sites like Cádiz or Málaga. That’s just another reason Extremadura intrigues us — that and how much good seafood you can eat in the desert zone.

What’s next? The other half of the bronze cart is presumably still somewhere under the mound, with half the site still unexcavated. Spain’s largest protective dome is being built over the site. Isotope analysis will try to pinpoint where the bronze came from.

• And then there’s the central mystery. Why did Tartessian Extremadura’s inhabitants destroy everything, bury it in a mound, and walk away 2,500 years ago?

3. 🛩️ And then the princess flew a plane…

You know we’re always up for heartwarming royal news about Princess Leonor. Just three weeks ago, we breathlessly recounted how Felipe VI’s eldest daughter had jumped out of a plane more than once as part of her military parachuting training. At the time, we speculated that Spain was all there for Leonor because watching her grow from teen to adult was a welcome break from political scandals and weird stories about corpses that dominate our news.

• Now she’s done even more! Not only can she jump out of planes — she can fly one alongside her dad!

What happened: On June 19, the 12th anniversary of Felipe VI’s proclamation as king, the Royal House released 18 photographs of father and daughter doing some serious father-daughter bonding — by flying together.

• Kinda like when your dad did bumper cars with you. Leonor, in her third and final year of military training at the Air and Space Academy in San Javier (Murcia), flew a Pilatus PC-21 trainer aircraft as her father flew one alongside her, and together they soared over La Manga del Mar Menor on the Murcian coast. Like cute chickadee nestlings taking their first flight.

• The king was told what's what by the princess. Before takeoff, Leonor presented the mission briefing to Felipe, explaining the technical details and safety procedures. To her father. Who is the king. This is either excellent parenting or a slightly overachieving daughter. We’re guessing both.

• A note on the landing. “I felt better than I expected,” Felipe said, stepping off the plane (suggesting…?). Leonor hugged him and said: “Thank you, Papa.” The Academy director, watching them land, said it “went quite well.” High, if understated, praise all around.

The 12-year milestone. The timing wasn’t accidental. When Felipe VI was proclaimed king in June 2014, he promised a “renewed monarchy for a new era.” Twelve years later, watching his daughter brief him on flight safety before climbing into a combat trainer and flying formation over the Mediterranean — well, that image is doing a lot of monarchy renewal work.

• What’s next? Leonor’s military training wraps in July, when she receives her commissions as Lieutenant in the Army, Lieutenant in the Air Force, and Ensign in the Navy, in three separate ceremonies alongside her classmates. After three years of sailing tall ships, jumping from planes, and flying combat trainers, she returns to royal duties full-time. With a CV that puts most 21-year-olds (like, um, the younger versions of us?) to shame.

4. 🏳️‍🌈 Gay-jà vu: People are mad (again) at Madrid’s Pride banners

Oh, boy. It’s that time of year again. Madrid Pride is back to take over the city, and so is the annual controversy surrounding the City Council’s campaign. Earlier this week, PP Mayor José Luis Martínez-Almeida’s government unveiled the official posters for MADO Madrid Orgullo 2026 — and people are, once again, pissed off not happy.

• Rings a bell? Remember back in 2024 when people hated the banners because they appeared to reduce Madrid Pride to sex and alcohol? Well, this year’s campaign is swapping people for… random objects. But hey, at least they are rainbow-colored castizo objects!

• No, seriously. Instead of faces, bodies, or community imagery, the posters feature AI-generated scenes of ultra-Madrid staples: a flower-filled balcony, stacked terrace chairs, jars of candy.

• All wrapped in rainbow colors and stamped with slogans like “Proudly from Madrid” and, later, the updated line: “Diversity is lived in Madrid”. (You can see them here.)

Over the rainbow. The idea, according to the City Council, is to show how diversity is “integrated into everyday life” across neighborhoods, homes, and businesses. The problem? For a lot of people, that’s exactly the issue.

• Opposition leaders on the left said the campaign erased the people Pride is meant to celebrate. PSOE’s spokesperson in the city, Reyes Maroto, accused Mayor Almeida of turning Pride into a “marketing campaign” that reduces the community to decoration, while Más Madrid’s Rita Maestre slammed the initiative as disconnected from the movement’s history.

• LGBTQ+ organizations went further. Arcópoli, a major Madrid LGBTQ+ rights group, accused the city of a “systematic erasure” of LGBTQ+ people.

• The city responds. José Fernández, Madrid’s Social Policies chief, said LGBT diversity “isn’t a slogan here and that diversity isn’t just visible during Pride, but present year-round in the small, everyday details of the city.”

A gay old time. Madrid Pride Week kicks off today and runs until July 5. Last year’s edition attracted between 1.5 and 2 million visitors and generated close to €900m, making it the biggest Pride celebration in all of Europe. Even though there’s still work to do, Spain is killing it.

• Demand is already surging. Accommodation searches are up 70% over last year. So, whatever you think of the posters, Pride in Madrid is still a massive deal.

5. 😔 A rash of drownings put Spain’s beaches under scrutiny

This is a sad one. A series of tragic drownings over the past few days has shaken Spain just as the summer season begins. The most devastating incident took place in Tarragona, where three children — aged 12 and 13 — lost their lives, while two more adults died in separate incidents along the Alicante coast.

• In Tarragona, six kids were swimming near a rocky area known as Cova del Gos, when strong currents and waves pulled them out to sea. (A yellow (caution) flag was flying at the time because of rip currents and undertow.) Three made it back to shore and alerted lifeguards, but the others became trapped against the rocks, unable to fight the current or find a way out.

Rescue was very difficult. Rough sea conditions forced lifeguards to improvise; at one point, they had to abandon a boat rescue and swim out themselves. One of the children died at the scene despite multiple attempts at resuscitation.

• The other two were stabilized and rushed to the hospital (one by helicopter), but both later died from their injuries. City officials declared several days of mourning.

In Alicante, too. There, two more people died.

• One man was found unconscious in a rocky cove in Torrevieja with no lifeguard service present; despite CPR efforts, he could not be revived.

• Later that same day, a 24-year-old man drowned at Mil Palmeras beach shortly after lifeguards had ended their shift. Conditions had been rough all day, with warnings issued and a yellow flag raised.

These incidents highlight a critical issue as Spain heads into peak beach season — knowing where and when to swim can be a matter of life and death.

• Rocky areas, strong currents, and unsupervised beaches dramatically increase risk — even for young, healthy swimmers.

• Summer seasons. With more people heading to the water as rough seas affect parts of the coast, authorities are again urging caution. Basic rules: check the flags, avoid dangerous zones, and never underestimate the sea.

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Who, me?

👨🏻‍⚖️ Former PM Zapatero heads to court and swears he’s like totally innocent

Another week, another political first. For the first time since the return of democracy, a former prime minister testified in court as a suspect this week.

• Yup, it was ZP. Socialist José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, who was in office from 2004 to 2011, spent nearly three hours at the National Court yesterday morning, denying any wrongdoing in a sprawling corruption and money laundering probe linked to the controversial €53m government rescue of airline Plus Ultra during the pandemic.

• It’s the beginning of a major scandal that exploded recently, that has the center-left PSOE party freaking out and spiraling asking for “patience”, and that has put Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez in the extremely tricky spot of having to defend his number one supporter.

Hold on. How did we get here? Investigators suspect Zapatero may have used his influence with the Spanish government to push the bailout through and benefit companies linked to businessman Julio Martínez, in exchange for commissions allegedly paid through sham consultancy arrangements.

• The 1%. At the center of the case is an alleged 1% cut of the Plus Ultra bailout that may have been funneled to Zapatero and cohorts (including his daughters) through a network of companies, possibly including an offshore structure in Dubai. Oh, and investigators think some of the bailout money was used to launder funds skimmed from Venezuelan government programs by businessmen tied to Nicolás Maduro’s government. Nice!

• Who among us does not have an emerald necklace? On top of this, police found jewels worth €1.3m in a safe in Zapatero's Madrid office, a discovery that added new charges, including tax fraud and smuggling, and intensified scrutiny.

I am not a crook. In court, Zapatero stuck to a clear line. That is, he had “no involvement whatsoever” in the Plus Ultra bailout and no contact with officials to influence it. He insisted his work was legitimate consulting based on his experience as a former PM

• Just guys paying each other on a handshake deal. Zapatero acknowledged knowing Martínez since 2011 and working with him from 2020 under what he described as a verbal consultancy agreement, paid annually.

• What, me? But he rejected the idea that the company involved was a shell used to channel illicit payments. He also denied ever owning or creating companies abroad and said he knew nothing about any commission agreement tied to the bailout. (The judge, for one, had doubts, saying, “He has failed to refute the rational indications of criminality”).

The jewel of denial. The issue of the jewels remains unresolved — and kinda awkward. Zapatero attempted to delay answering questions about them earlier this week, arguing he needed more time to document their origin. The judge refused, saying they were not new facts.

• So he didn't say anything. Zapatero chose not to answer on that point and will return to court in the coming days to address it specifically. It’s one of the most sensitive parts of the case, and potentially the most damaging from an optics standpoint.

No flight risk. Despite the seriousness of the accusations, the judge rejected the prosecutor’s request to seize Zapatero’s passport and impose travel restrictions.

• The reason? His public profile and “deep roots” in Spain make him an unlikely fugitive, and most key evidence has already been secured. There are suspicions, sure, but not enough, for now, to justify limiting his freedom. Plus, why would he leave? It's summer in Spain!

Really, I meant it! Zapatero released a short statement after leaving court, repeating he is “completely innocent” of all charges and will prove it, “however long it takes.”

• 🐌 Considering the speed of Spanish courts, that could take a while.

More news below. 👇👇

🔔 But first… Don’t miss the first episode of The Bubble Podcast!

We discuss PM Zapatero’s corruption accusations, the very complicated relationship between the US and Spanish governments, and the World Cup. Find us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and YouTube!

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🧑‍🔧 ¿Cómo se dice Watergate en español?

Spain is one big anti-corruption report these days. Spain’s elite anti-corruption unit, the UCO, dropped its zillionth special investigative report this week — and it’s gonna leave a mark.

• Documents. Basement. This should ring a bell. Among documents seized from former PSOE bigwig Santos Cerdán’s locked devices in the basement of the party’s headquarters, investigators claim to have found evidence that the PSOE’s former organization secretary had authorized — and been fully briefed on — a coordinated operation to torpedo judicial cases threatening the Sánchez government.

• But Cerdán was not alone. At the center of everything was a woman named Leire Díez, whose nickname, la fontanera de Ferraz (the plumber of the PSOE HQ on Madrid’s Calle Ferraz), turns out to be entirely apt. She was there to fix leaks.

So who the hell is Leire Díez? And why is the government so scared of her?

• Small town to secret agent. Diez started as a politician in the Cantabrian mountain town of Vega de Pas (where the former mayor called her “very manipulative”), before working her way through PSOE communications roles and up to the post of director of philately at the national postal museum. Her LinkedIn page stops there, but somewhere along the way, she allegedly became the operational core of a scheme to kneecap judges, prosecutors, and the UCO itself. The party, it now emerges, paid her €45,000 between 2015 and 2017.

Great travel perks. According to the UCO, her activities were overseen by Cerdán, who ordered PSOE staff to approve any trip she requested, no questions asked. The alleged scheme was to find people who were willing to hand over compromising information on judges and prosecutors unfriendly to PSOE interests, sometimes in exchange for help with their legal cases.

• A document titled “Incumplimientos” (Failures) — found both on her laptop and on Cerdán’s Ferraz devices — allegedly catalogued the whole operation, strongly suggesting that somebody in PSOE leadership knew.

• Travel agent. A WhatsApp group the conspirators named “Vacaciones y Viajes” (Holidays and Travel) — yes, really — allegedly coordinated efforts to derail the case against the PM’s brother in Badajoz.

When we say “strongly suggesting”... Díez reportedly told one contact that when “your wife and your brother are charged, you realize you have to clean things up” — language uncomfortably close to describing Pedro Sánchez’s own situation.

• The initials “P.S.” also appear in her notebooks next to notes about arranging a lawyer for David Sánchez. (We are sure this is a total coincidence. It could mean Paquita Salas.)

• Totally not a threat. “I know much more than what appears in the notebooks,” she has said. “I’m worth more for what I keep quiet.”

This week’s report also deepened suspicions about Mercedes González — the government-appointed head of the Guardia Civil — who met Díez multiple times, then opened three internal investigations into UCO agents in nine months. She appeared before the Senate this Tuesday, where she repeatedly denied influencing the investigations.

• We definitely wouldn’t be worried if we were in government. Not at all. /sarcasm

2. 🛃 That whole “free residency” thing got a few more applicants than expected

500,000. That’s the number of undocumented immigrants in Spain the Sánchez government repeatedly estimated would apply for the massive one-off regularization it approved in April. The think tank Funcas pegged it at 840,000, while others went as high as 1m, but Immigration Minister Elma Saiz stuck with 500,000.

• It appears the government was wrong. With two weeks still to go before the June 30 deadline, over 900,000 people have applied — almost double the government’s public estimate, and a record that blows past the previous high of 691,655 applications set in 2005 (576,506 were accepted then).

• It could hit one million by the time the window closes. Of those, around 359,000 have been formally admitted to the process — meaning those applicants now hold provisional residency and work permits while their cases are reviewed.

Why so many? The requirements were more flexible than previous regularizations — no pre-work contract required — and the ministry actively encouraged people to apply even with incomplete documentation.

• Shhhhh… Also: there were simply far more undocumented people in Spain than the government was willing to say out loud. Spain’s police said they had estimated figures much closer to reality, but their projections were “questioned and minimized” by the government. And most of these applicants, by the way, didn’t arrive on inflatable dinghies — they flew in as tourists, mostly from Latin America, and stayed.

The right is predictably furious. Vox has challenged the decree at the Supreme Court — which refused to suspend it in May but still has to rule on its legality — and the PP, which initially didn’t block the process, has since fully embraced scary tales of an immigrant flood.

• The government, for its part, is “cautious and optimistic,” noting the numbers need filtering for duplicates and pointing out that each valid application generates an estimated €4,000 in net fiscal benefit to the state.

The administration has three months to process each application. Given the volume, this is going to be quite a hot bureaucratic summer.

3. 🗣️ FIFA realizes that lots of people actually speak Spanish (and Spain loses a few times)

FIFA caused a big ol’ escándalo scandal at the World Cup when they outlawed the use of Spanish at press conferences unless one of the teams there was from a Spanish-speaking country. Which seems odd, considering that the World Cup is being hosted by (checks notes) the U.S., Canada, and…Mexico.

• They might as well have just screamed “Nein!” FIFA officials at World Cup press conferences repeatedly told journalists from Spanish-language media that they couldn’t ask questions of Spanish-speaking players in Spanish.

• Seriously? Wanna use Spanish to ask the Dutch player Frenkie de Jong, who’s played for years at FC Barça, what it’s like to be a team leader? How about posing a question to Vinicius Jr., who plays at Real Madrid? Nope, and nope.

• “It’s for the translation.” That was the excuse the FIFA official rolled out when he told a Mexican media reporter he could only use English, Dutch, or Japanese to talk to De Jong.

The incident that lit the fuse. Rodrigo Ornelas, a journalist from Mexico’s TV Azteca, tried to ask Morocco player Achraf Hakimi — who was born and grew up in Madrid — a question in Spanish before the Brazil-Morocco match in New Jersey.

• A FIFA official cut him off. Hakimi offered to just answer in Spanish anyway. The official said no. Video of the exchange went viral across Spain and Latin America (see above).

FIFA quietly reversed course shortly after — with no official statement, because humility — adding Spanish translation to all U.S. matches and instructing officials to allow questions in Spanish going forward.

• Context that perhaps should have been obvious from the start. Again, Mexico is a host nation, and 57 million people speak Spanish in the U.S., making it the world’s second-largest Spanish-speaking country. Behind only Mexico.

But what about the Canadians? No word yet on whether reporters will be allowed to end their questions with “Eh?” in the country that gave us Neil Young and Justin Bieber (moving on…).

• In other sad Spanish sports news. The Georgian-Spanish mixed martial arts superstar Ilia Topuria got his ass kicked lost for the first time, quitting after the fourth round with two broken orbital bones at the 🍊 Menace’s cage match 80th birthday party in the White House construction site.

• And Spain’s national soccer fútbol team got its ass kicked tied its first World Cup game 0-0 against Cabo Verde, a country making its first appearance at the competition and that many of you thought was in Latin America. Whoops!

4. 🫠 Madrid classrooms are turning into saunas, and we’re not sure who’s in charge

Sweat n’ wild. Madrid is once again facing a very apocalypse 2026 problem: classrooms that are just too damn hot for learning (or even screwing around). With temperatures climbing well above 30°C, and in some cases hitting 35-37°C, students and teachers are dying struggling to get through the day.

• En plein air. Lessons are being moved to hallways, gardens, or anywhere with a hint of shade. Others are improvising survival tactics: water sprays, fans, even literal “manguerazos” (using a hose to get wet like it’s 1920) during breaks.

Sorry, kids, not our problem. Here’s the core problem: no one fully agrees on who is responsible. The center-right regional government (led by PP’s Isabel Díaz Ayuso) handles major infrastructure, while the City Council (PP’s José Luis Martínez-Almeida) is responsible for smaller interventions. And the center-left federal government provides funding. The result? A lot of finger-pointing and very little urgency.

• Dude, we're trying. Madrid’s regional government insisted it's invested millions in A/C (€17.8m this year, €80m since 2019) and pointed to the need for more federal money.

• Ha ha. At the Madrid assembly, Ayuso’s culture advisor even mocked argued that heat could be “a source of inspiration”, which we're sure is what sweating students and teachers were feeling: Inspiration to kick someone in the teeth.

• Who's laughing now? The leftist opposition party Más Madrid blamed the politicians they want to replace and suggested holding parliamentary sessions without air conditioning, just to see how politicians like it (we're gonna guess that prolly won’t happen but not a bad initiative, to be honest).

No one’s buying it. Unions and parents' associations have reported the situation to labor inspectors, saying the high temperatures are not only annoying but unsafe.

• There have already been cases of dizziness, headaches, and even fainting. One study found that temperatures above 27°C directly reduce attention, memory, and learning capacity. Note to self: Maybe our schools were designed for a climate that no longer exists?

• Repeat after us: It's almost vacation. Teachers are improvising, and some classes are being held in corridors or outdoors. In extreme cases, schools are starting to feel less like places of learning and more like The Hunger Games.

Into the frying pan. On top of all this, Spain is heading into what could be the first major heatwave of the summer, with temperatures expected to jump 5 to 10 degrees above normal — and potentially exceed 40°C in some areas.

• Brace yourselves, it’s about to get hawt.

5. 🤩 Javier Bardem left his print, and Hollywood just got a little more Spanish

First time for everything. We may suck at sports this week, but when it comes to the soft power of Spanish film talent, we’re feeling damn proud. Legendary actor Javier Bardem has officially joined cinema immortality, leaving his handprints and footprints at the iconic TCL Chinese Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard — becoming the first Spanish actor ever to do so.

• Among friends. He joins legends like Marilyn Monroe, Jack Nicholson, and a who’s who of film history. Like Vin Diesel.

Why him? Honestly, why not him? Bardem is one of the few Spanish performers who has managed to crack Hollywood without losing his identity (speaking English helps). Not only that, but damn, have you seen him perform (and his fabulous nose)?

• Hollywood longevity. From Jamón, jamón and Mar adentro to No Country for Old Men (which earned him an Oscar) and global blockbusters like James Bond’s Skyfall, Bardem has spent three decades doing what Denis Villeneuve described perfectly as transforming himself into whoever the story needs.

True to himself. Bardem played it exactly how you’d expect. He cracked jokes, he kissed the cement, he barked, and he thanked his late mother, Pilar Bardem, for grounding him in the idea that success (and failure) are both illusions.

• Aww… He also thanked his “wonderful” wife Penelope Cruz and his children.

Friends in high places. Around him were heavyweights like Villeneuve and Michael Mann, praising his talent and his integrity — something that matters more than ever right now.

• Keeping the Hollywood left alive. While Tinseltown has gotten quieter under the current U.S. administration, Bardem has been loud and clear on issues like Gaza and openly critical of the 🍊 Menace and U.S. immigration policies — even referencing ICE during the ceremony.

Can’t stop, won’t stop. Bardem is not slowing down. He’s currently starring in a new Apple TV+ adaptation of Cape Fear, stepping into a role once played by Robert De Niro (if you haven’t seen it, he’s amazing), and in the upcoming Dune: Part Three.

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Hallelujah!

🇻🇦The Pope gave a speech and somehow every politician agreed with him

Holy week. Fifteen years after the last papal visit, Pope Leo XIV landed in Spain on Saturday morning with a full-blown, high-octane tour that feels like a religious roadshow that could compete with Bad Bunny.

• Party! From a massive open-air mass in Plaza de Cibeles (1.5m attendees!) to the hair-raising, waterworks-inducing blessing of the iconic Sagrada Familia last night, and now heading to Canary Islands migrant centers, the pope’s been busy with spectacle, symbolism, and politics.

• Thank god for a break. For Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, the pope’s visit couldn’t have come at a better time. With legal troubles and corruption cases swirling around him and pals like former PM José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, the papal tour frenzy shifted the spotlight (if for only a minute).

Guess who. It was on Monday that Madrid witnessed something close to a miracle: the pope delivered a historic speech in Parliament, and every major political party walked away claiming, somehow, that he was basically on their side.

• You guys agree? In a chamber better known for screaming at each other than agreement on anything, MPs from across the spectrum applauded for over seven minutes.

• Even more surreal? Center-left PSOE, center-right PP and far-right Vox all insisted the Pope’s message aligned with their own political platforms. For real?

Listen up, sinners. The pope’s 30-minute speech (see above) itself was anything but neutral. Leo XIV touched on some of the most divisive issues in Spanish politics: immigration, abortion, euthanasia, education, war, and the toxic tone of public debate. If he didn’t opine on onions in tortilla de patata, it was probably due to a lack of time.

• On immigration, he was crystal clear. This is not a numbers game but a moral issue, calling for dignity, legal pathways, and integration.

• But… on the other hand, he doubled down on the Church’s traditional stance that life must be protected “from conception to natural death,” clashing with Spain’s loose laws on abortion and euthanasia.

• He also defended parents’ rights in education (a nod to religious schooling), warned about the dangers of AI, and called out the increasingly aggressive tone of political discourse. Disagreement, he said, should not mean humiliation. (We all can agree with that, right?)

Choose your own adventure. The reaction from politicians was a masterclass in selective listening. As it turns out, everyone agreed on one thing: no one felt criticized! On the contrary, political leaders, right and (mostly) left, seemed to think that His Holiness agreed with them and only them (which is obviously absurd).

Hits for everyone. The right was most directly confronted on immigration, peace, and international law, areas where the pope’s stance clashes clearly with both the PP and Vox. The left didn’t get off easy either, facing a head-on challenge on abortion, euthanasia, and education. Even nationalist parties caught a subtle jab, with Leo XIV emphasizing unity over division.

• The PP. Boss Alberto Núñez Feijóo said he felt like the pope spoke directly to him, insisting the speech fit perfectly with the PP’s humanist roots.

• Vox. Party leader Santiago Abascal also saw no contradiction with his party’s stance on immigration (despite the pope explicitly condemning the kind of “national priority” logic that Vox promotes).

• PSOE and the left, led by PM Sánchez, highlighted the parts about international law, migration, and human dignity they agreed with, brushing past the pope’s clear opposition to some of their flagship social policies.

🙉 Everyone agreed. Because of course. The whole thing was political projection at its finest: take what you like, ignore the rest, and declare yourself the pope's #BFF. So who actually took the biggest hit? The answer is: pretty much everyone.

More news below. 👇👇

🔔 But first… The Bubble Podcast is back for season 2!

In the first episode of this season, we discuss PM Zapatero’s corruption accusations, the very complicated relationship between the US and Spanish governments, and the World Cup. Find us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and YouTube!

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 👩🏻‍⚖️ Sánchez’s ‘beloved brother’ case is done except for the crying ruling

The best part of any court case? The closing statements, where each side blasts the other’s case and indulges in some theatrical badassery. That’s what we got this week as hearings wrapped in the trial of PM Sánchez’s hermanísimo David and the bullshit patronage job he was — or wasn’t — given in Badajoz (we wrote about this last week).

• The accusers went first. Lawyers for the various right-wing parties and lobbies called the creation of a “made-to-order” post for David a “farce”, said his “complete sham” of an interview for the position “never took place,” and that his “only merit” for holding the job was being “Pedro Sánchez’s brother.”

• The defendants were cutting. Miguel Ángel Gallardo, the former leader of the PSOE in Extremadura who faced trial for the supposedly illicit hiring of David, said his only crime was “not having the same ideas as the accusers” and that he’d already been “condemned socially”. Defense lawyers called the case “a house of cards,” and the plaintiff claims “a fictional script...devoid of the slightest sense.”

Now the screaming is done, and the case goes to the tribunal. Here are 5 issues to watch as you await the ruling:

1. Police report vs. people. The UCO analyzed thousands of emails and concluded the job was “predetermined” for David — pointing to Gallardo as the engine. But many of the 53 witnesses — and the state prosecutor — said otherwise. Who wins: one police report or half a courthouse of witnesses — mostly with ties to the PSOE?

2. David vs. David. His instruction-phase testimony was a slow-motion car crash: he couldn’t locate his own office, left 10-second silences, and rambled about his job title. His lawyers nearly silenced him at trial. The old videos were played in court anyway. Can his past self convict today’s David?

3. That “Hermanísimo” email. An email sent the day the job was posted — subject line: “Hermanísimo” — was the prosecution’s marquee exhibit. In court, its author walked it back to “a rumor I can’t source.” The tribunal’s president all but dismissed it. So, evidence or just a meme?

4. The ghost of Pedro. Five emails allegedly sent to Pedro’s personal account (but actually, it seems, to the account of his father, who has the same name) were unveiled at the last minute — with one plaintiff claiming they were deliberately left uninvestigated by the UCO after it was told to “stand down” by… the government 🤔? There are no charges against Pedro himself, but the accusation that political pressure shaped the investigation hangs over the whole thing.

5. Prosecution vs. prosecution. The state prosecutor asked for the acquittal of all 11 defendants. The right-wing groups want 6 years for David. Defense attorneys formally asked the court to make the accusers pay costs for “procedural bad faith.” Whoever loses won’t be quiet about it.

Tick-tock. The ruling could take until after August — no one is in pretrial detention, so the court has no urgency. Spain will have to wait.

2. 💎 A priest walks into a bar jewelry store

Wasn’t the Pope’s visit stirring? Well, apparently average Spaniards and politicians of all stripes weren’t the only ones to take inspiration from Leo XIV’s tour of Spain. But for some, it didn’t go so well.

• What happened: The Policía Nacional arrested seven people for the holdup of a Madrid gold shop yesterday afternoon. Three of the gang entered the store: two — dressed as a priest and a nun — asked an employee to show them a jewelry display, while the third violently forced her into the back room.

• Police caught them as they fled. During the arrest, the “priest” pulled a gun on two officers and had to be subdued. The costumes, police noted, were “not of very good quality.” The commitment was there. But the craft? Um, less so.

Not a one-off. This was Madrid’s sixth jewelry robbery in a month, all brazen, all in daylight, all apparently unconcerned with cameras or bystanders. A brief tour:

• May 15: A gold shop in Torrejón de Ardoz was robbed by five people who tricked an employee into opening the door. Estimated haul: €500,000.

• May 18: Four masked robbers hit a Puente de Vallecas shopping center with hammers, stuffing loot into raffia bags.

• May 22: A man and woman entered a jewelry store on Calle Toledo with a gun — which they left behind and turned out to be fake — pistol-whipped the owner in the head, and fled with the loot. At least she’s okay.

• June 2: Three hooded figures in military gear hit the José Luis chain at La Vaguada — Madrid’s first shopping center — making off mainly with Casio and Guess watches. Not exactly the crown jewels.

• June 8: Four more hit José Luis again in Torrelodones, this time with what witnesses described as a submachine gun.

The suspects. All seven arrested yesterday are Peruvian nationals. Two were picked up nearby as lookouts; two more were caught in a getaway car on the M-30, which crashed into a police vehicle. All face charges of robbery with violence and intimidation. Police are investigating whether they’re linked to the other recent robberies.

• New duds. As far as we know, this is the first time they dressed as men (and women) of the cloth. The Pope truly has inspired us all.

3.🚰 Madrid’s devastating water crisis: the city’s source of pride suddenly tastes ‘funny’

Madrid, what a town! It has a lot of things going for it, but one of its quiet superpowers has always (always!) been its tap water. Ask any local, and they’ll tell you that it’s the best drinking water in the world, hands down. No comparison.

• Seriously, you should never criticize Madrid tap water unless you want to make madrileños very angry. So when water suddenly started smelling and tasting weird this week, people did more than notice. They worried absolutely freaked out.

It started Sunday morning. All over the city (and beyond), people took their first sip of the day and immediately knew something was afoot. Social media exploded. Some said it tasted like chlorine, others like plastic, and others compared it to hospital water or even to drinking from a garden hose.

• Considering this is a city where 96% of people proudly drink straight from the tap, this was borderline identity crisis territory.

So what’s going on? According to Canal de Isabel II (the public company that manages Madrid’s water), the culprit was relatively boring mundane: a filtration adjustment gone wrong.

• Calm down, everyone. It was neither deadly nor dangerous (we hope). It was just that a maneuver involving activated carbon filters at the Santillana treatment plant altered the taste and smell of the water.

Don’t drink the Kool-Aid. While this may have sounded like the beginning of one of those weird plans concocted by comic book villains to murder thousands, experts say the reason people noticed so quickly is actually a compliment.

• Madrid’s water is famously “soft” (low mineralization), light, and clean-tasting, thanks in part to the granite terrain of the Sierra. So when something changes, even slightly, it’s immediately obvious.

• Some blame increased chlorine levels, possibly due to higher demand (hello, Pope + Bad Bunny!), which may have amplified the effect.

• Still, authorities insist the water was completely safe to drink. By yesterday, the issue had begun to disappear as the system flushed itself out.

The end of the (non) crisis didn’t stop many madrileños from temporarily switching to bottled water (a move that felt almost sacrilegious). It also didn’t stop political parties such as Más Madrid from demanding an explanation.

• Because water in Madrid is holy, and not because the pope was in town.

4. 🚆 Party! Fiesta! The youths get to travel for almost free

They may never be able to buy a home, or have a career not cut short by AI, or find love in the era of smartphone addiction, but at least the youngs have one thing going for them: They can travel across Spain for damn near free this summer! Hey, at least it’s something 🤷.

• What it is. Now in its fourth year, Verano Joven hands out heavily discounted travel passes to anyone aged 18-30 (Spanish national or legal resident) for trips between July 1 and Sept. 30. The government has set aside €130 million this year — €10 million more than last year.

The discounts. 90% off regular state buses and medium-distance trains. 50% off high-speed trains (Renfe, Iryo, Ouigo), capped at €30 per ticket. 50% off Avant. And 50% off a 10-day Interrail Global Flexible pass — so the party can extend to the rest of Europe too.

• How to get it. Register on the Verano Joven website (not live yet — coming “in the next few days”) with your DNI or NIE. You’ll get a personal code to use on each operator’s own site. Non-transferable, so don’t try to share it with your roommate or, like, mom.

The numbers. The program has racked up 4 million users and 16 million discounted trips across its first three editions, with 2025 setting records: 6.8 million trips, up 30% from 2024.

• Transport minister Óscar Puente called it “one of the public policies that has worked best” (shocking how free money is popular) and noted that young people’s desire to travel is “inversely proportional to the money they usually have in their pockets.” Correct, ministro.

Also, it has the nice effect of distracting them from all the world’s other problems. Come to think of it, maybe you could do the same for those who’ve passed 30? (Just asking for a friend.)

5.💊 We're not just a top holiday destination — we're also Europe’s main drug gateway!

Spain has a new nickname that's far less glamorous than “Europe’s Florida”. We’re now the main entry point for drugs into the European Union, at least according to the European Commission and the EU’s drugs agency's latest annual report.

• The numbers are high (pun intended). Spain led the EU in annual seizures of hashish (206 tons) and cocaine (124 tons) — by a wide margin. To put that into perspective: Spain alone accounts for around 37% of all cocaine seized in the entire EU. ☃️

• It doesn’t stop there. The country is also becoming increasingly relevant in synthetic drugs like MDMA, with a growing number of labs being dismantled. Turns out we’re not just a transit country anymore; parts of the supply chain are starting to settle here.

So why Spain? Not surprisingly, geography is responsible for that: Spain sits at the crossroads that join Europe with Latin America (cocaine routes) and North Africa (cannabis from Morocco).

• Drugs come in by sea, often through major ports or the Canary Islands, and then move across the continent. This country is essentially the front door, and the rest of Europe is, well, the house.

Dazed and confused. What’s changing (and worrying Brussels) is how sophisticated the trafficking has become (smugglers are using drones, high-speed narcolanchas in the Strait of Gibraltar, and smaller, fragmented shipments designed to evade detection).

• Law enforcement is catching a lot, but the report makes it clear: traffickers are adapting fast, and the game is getting harder.

We’re #1! Countries like Belgium and France are also major hubs (especially ports like Antwerp), but Spain combines entry point, transit route, and production zone — particularly when it comes to cannabis cultivation.

• Meanwhile, the Netherlands still dominates synthetic drug production, but Spain is increasingly part of that ecosystem too. So proud…

🔔 Don’t forget to follow us on TikTok!

@thebubblecomA corruption probe has triggered a political earthquake in Spain: Former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero is officially under investigation in a corruption probe linked to the controversial €53 million government bailout granted to the airline Plus Ultra during the pandemic. What happens now? Read all about it in this week’s newsletter, in your inbox this Thursday morning. #zapatero #psoe #venezuela #politica

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Friends in high places

👨🏻‍⚖️ Sánchez’s bro gets his day in court: scam job or “flawless” hiring?

Oh, brother. Spain’s political drama just moved from one courtroom to another, and this time, it’s hitting even closer to home for Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez. His brother, David Sánchez, is officially standing trial in a case that’s been building for over a year.

• The case centers on his 2017 hiring for a senior cultural role at the Diputación de Badajoz, a job that prosecutors believe may have been tailor-made for him.

• He faced charges of influence peddling and prevarication. Basically, the prosecution said he got a B.S. patronage job given because of his brother, didn't work, and lived in Portugal to avoid taxes. One lesser charge, of accepting an illegal appointment, has been dropped because too much time has passed to prosecute it.

• Co-conspirators? Several officials from Extremadura, including former regional PSOE leader Miguel Ángel Gallardo, are accused of playing roles in creating and fast-tracking the position.

• It's a family affair. PM Sánchez’s wife is also under legal scrutiny in a separate case, meaning he is now governing while both his wife and his brother are entangled in court proceedings. Add the scandals surrounding the PSOE party, and 😱.

Not on Infojobs. According to investigators, the role David ended up getting didn’t even exist before he came into the picture. Internal emails show it appearing suddenly in late 2016, with unusual urgency 😒.

• We have rules here. In Spain, public sector jobs are legally required to follow strict principles of merit, equality, and transparency. That means positions must be openly advertised, candidates evaluated fairly, and the selection process based on objective criteria. Personal connections? That’s a no-no.

• But maybe not this time? Spain’s Civil Guard (UCO) says there are “strong indications” the position was effectively pre-assigned to David. One telling detail: before interviews even took place, insiders were already reportedly referring to the role as being for “el hermanísimo”; literally, “the beloved brother.” (Note: Pedro Sánchez wasn’t PM at the time but was already the head of Spain’s socialist party.)

Witness for the prosecution. One key witness, Cristina de Frutos, who was a seemingly highly qualified candidate for the job, told the court she was warned days before her interview that the job was already “his.”

• Move on. Nothing to see here. She says her own interview lasted minutes, with no real questions asked. Her conclusion was that there was no real competition. The defense, in turn, pushes back hard, questioning why she didn’t formally report it at the time and framing it as hindsight rather than proof.

• Fourteen other witnesses — mostly officials from the institution — defended the hiring process, insisting both hires were carried out properly and with “no flaws whatsoever.” (But really? What has “no flaws whatsoever”?)

But wait, there’s more. Two Civil Guard officials have testified that they were told to “stand down” and not actively investigate politically sensitive issues — like this one.

• Yikes. One even claims there was pressure to produce a report concluding “there was nothing there.” Which is bad, because it suggests potential interference at the highest levels. Other agents, however, have denied receiving pressure.

When will it end? It won't.

More news below. 👇👇

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1.🚫 Feijóo is trying to remove Sánchez now, but it's not looking likely

Cue the Jaws theme. Spain’s opposition is quietly circling the current coalition government. In the middle of mounting pressure on Pedro Sánchez, center-right PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo is exploring whether he can pull off a political Hail Mary: a motion of no confidence that would kick Sánchez out and trigger immediate elections.

• The twist. He needs 176 votes, and his party currently has 137. Add the votes from far-right Vox (33), and he has a total of 170. He’s short six! This means he can’t do it alone, so he’s reaching out to nemeses unlikely partners: the Basque nationalist PNV and the Catalan separatists of Junts. Both of them are (begrudgingly) supporters of the Sánchez government.

• Refresher. A motion of no confidence is one of the few ways to remove a PM in Spain. Sánchez himself used it in 2018 to oust Mariano Rajoy.

It’s all about the timing. Sánchez’s own parliamentary allies are starting to wobble. National elections are scheduled for 2027, but frustration is building. Between political fatigue and a string of corruption scandals that have hit Sánchez's inner circle, several junior partners are openly saying this government is done.

• Feijóo is probing whether those parties would go one step further and actually help bring it down.

• If Feijóo gets the numbers, he says he’d launch what he calls an “instrumental” motion of no confidence (basically, a temporary government whose only job would be to call elections).

• He’s even trying to make it more palatable by promising Vox wouldn’t be part of that interim government.

Not feeling it. The PNV has basically said it wants elections, but it’s not touching a no-confidence vote. Junts? Not surprisingly, it’s been more theatrical.

• The party behind the disastrous (and illegal) independence referendum in Catalonia in 2017, whose leader, Carles Puigdemont, is currently living in self-imposed exile in a McMansion near Brussels, told Feijóo that if he wants to talk, he should travel north to negotiate directly with the big boss in his Belgian abode.

• Feijóo’s response was not enthusiastic: “Let’s talk about serious things.”

• Vox, in the meantime, is furious: They don’t like the idea of Feijóo even considering negotiating with Puigdemont (or cutting them out).

The government responds. First reaction: this is desperation. The government’s spokesperson accused Feijóo of “cynicism” for suddenly courting parties he’s spent years attacking.

• Sánchez himself took a more ironic angle, pointing out that Feijóo now seems to recognize Junts as a legitimate political actor after years of refusing to do so.

Our take. Unless there’s a miracle, it’s unlikely that Feijóo’s plan will move forward. The math isn’t there, and both Junts and the PNV would end up paying a high political cost for siding with the PP and Vox.

• However, don’t rule things out entirely. This is Spain, after all.

2.🐰 Bad Bunny’s Casita isn’t for you (unless you’re rich + hot)

Down the rabbit hole. Bad Bunny is in Madrid to supposedly give a masterclass in stadium shows. Instead, he may have accidentally started a culture war over a tiny pastel-colored house.

• Mi casa es su casa? During his concerts, there’s a second stage called La Casita (“the little house”), a full-blown replica of a traditional Puerto Rican home, right in the middle of the crowd.

• The symbolism. La Casita was born in the short film that accompanied his album DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS, as a symbol of Puerto Rican identity, memory, resistance, and anti-gentrification vibes.

• Fans loved it so much that his team turned it into a physical centerpiece of the tour. A house that represents “the people.” Except the people don’t seem to be getting in.

Cue the controversy. During the show, Bad Bunny moves around la casita while being surrounded by a very (very!) select group of people. La Casita, as it turns out, has become the most exclusive VIP zone in Madrid.

• We’re talking Ester Expósito, Ana de Armas, Chiara Ferragni, Marta Ortega, Los Javis, plus footballers and influencers. Add to that a handful of “lucky” fans picked from the crowd, and you have the most coveted square meters in Spain right now.

• And those “lucky” fans? Not exactly random. According to some media outlets and pretty much everyone on TikTok, there’s a whole unofficial casting process before the show. Scouts from Bad Bunny’s team roam the stadium looking for young hot girls dressed in a very specific “Caribbean-core” aesthetic (flowers, minis, boots, the whole thing).

• How-to: Right now, there are literal tutorials online explaining how to dress so you (hopefully) get picked.

Why the hate? Because this is the same Bad Bunny who built his brand on breaking norms, defending diversity, and calling out inequality. So watching La Casita turn into what some fans are calling a “showcase of curated bodies and celebrities” has rubbed people the wrong way.

• No Yes, fat chicks. The criticism ranges from “we want fat women” and “this feels classist” to “this completely contradicts his message.” Others, however, are rolling their eyes at the backlash: he’s a reggaeton superstar, not Sumar MP Yolanda Díaz. What exactly were you expecting?

• The controversy got so massive that by Tuesday evening, El País reported that “changes came” to the little house, and people of all ages, sexes, and looks were seen dancing to Benito’s tunes. (Though some VIPs were still seen in the crowd, such as Noah Schnapp, aka Will from Stranger Things, and Victoria Federica, aka King Felipe’s niece.)

Getting surreal. La Casita also spilled into the housing crisis debate after a fake listing popped up on Idealista “selling” the house for €1m, complete with sarcastic copy about exclusivity.

3. 👮 The shove heard ‘round the world country

A push from behind by a policía nacional that left a retired teacher face-planted on the ground turned a teachers’ strike in Valencia into national news this week, with the police union and the national government’s regional rep slapping each other on social media and everyone else asking, “What the f*ck is going on?”

• What happened: Video on Sunday showed a national policeman taking an unneeded detour to knock down a 68-year-old teacher before continuing on his crowd-controlling way, provoking howls across the political spectrum.

The context. Valencia’s public school teachers have been on indefinite strike since May 11, now entering week four, demanding better pay, lower class ratios, and improved school infrastructure.

• The regional government (PP) offered €200/month more. Two smaller unions (CSIF and ANPE) took the deal. The three bigger ones — STEPV, CCOO, and UGT — refused, demanding that the salary question be fully reopened. The Generalitat says that the point is closed. Both sides have been giving each other the stink eye ever since.

The Twitter war. After the push, government delegate Pilar Bernabé (PSOE) called it “unacceptable” and promised to investigate and “assign responsibilities.”

• No, you! The police union fired back on X that “You won’t investigate anything” and added that teachers who block streets “expose themselves to being removed from them” (because blocking streets isn’t, like, a right).

• Bad boy. The police force has opened a disciplinary hearing against the cop in question.

The tent city. About 150 teachers have set up a small encampment in Valencia’s historic Plaza de la Virgen. The PP-run city government says it’s the PSOE-run national delegation’s job to clear it. The national delegation says it’s the city’s problem.

• The religious event Corpus Christi, which fills that very square, starts this week. Nobody seems eager to move.

What’s next — or isn’t. Strike participation has reportedly collapsed from 50-88% in week one to just 5.29% now (according to the PP gov, so ojo on the numbers), as unpaid days pile up; a teachers rep wrote to us that strikers were being docked €150/day.

• Only 13 school days remain before the summer break. The conflict will almost certainly freeze until September — when, with perfect irony, everyone (strikers included) could return to the status quo, refreshed from two months off and ready to fight.

At least one union has already announced renewed nationwide action in the fall. But hey, for now we’ve got the summer. 🕺

4. 🪂 A princess jumped out of a plane

Spain has been having a bit of a love affair with Princess Leonor, probably because watching her grow from teen to adult is a welcome break from the string of political scandals and weird stories about corpses that have dominated the news. We watched, rapt, as she turned 18! And went shopping in Chile! And hit the beach in a bikini (naughty paparazzi)!

• Now guess what she’s done. She’s jumped out of a plane…more than once!

What’s going on: Last month, Leonor completed the Basic Parachuting Course at the Military Parachuting School Méndez Parada in Alcantarilla, Murcia — jumping multiple times alongside roughly 50 classmates, including at least one nighttime jump, one of the most demanding parts of the training.

• Leonor earned the diploma and badge of Cazador Paracaidista — the “Rokiski,” a metal insignia of wings surrounding a parachute that only goes to soldiers who complete the basic parachuting course. Spain found out when eagle-eyed observers spotted the badge on her uniform at the Armed Forces Day parade in Vigo on May 30.

A royal first. Neither her father, Felipe VI, nor her grandfather, Juan Carlos I, completed parachuting training during their military careers. Leonor is the first member of the royal family to earn the distinction. Felipe, speaking at the parade, said she’d performed “with effort and brilliance.” Peak king dad.

Three years in. The parachuting course capped Leonor’s third and final year of military training — at the Air and Space Academy in San Javier, where she also piloted a Pilatus PC-21 combat trainer.

• Before that: the Army academy in Zaragoza, and six months at sea aboard the Juan Sebastián de Elcano (hence the Chile shopping and bikini spottings).

• This week, she collects her farewell honors from Murcia: a Gold Medal from the region, another from the regional parliament, and the title of Honorary Daughter of San Javier. (Why do royals get “honors” from everywhere they live? We never get any.) She also asked for a photo with Wells, an ex-rapper of whom she's a big fan.

What’s next? Her formal military training wraps up this summer. After three years of jumping out of planes, sailing tall ships, and flying combat trainers, she returns to royal duties full-time — with, it must be said, a considerably more extensive CV than we had at 21.

5. 🇨🇺 ¡We’ll always have Adiós, Cuba!

The U.S. is kicking Spain out of Cuba again. The last time — after the Spanish-American War of 1898 — ended Spain’s last pretensions of empire. This time isn’t so bad, though it does suck if you’re looking for a cheap package vacation.

• What happened: Meliá and Iberostar, two big Spanish hotel chains, announced that they were halting operations on the island after the U.S. administration of a certain Orange Menace threatened to sanction them if they didn’t, um, piss right off.

The island that gave refuge to thousands of vintage American cars and made photographer Alberto Korda famous has long had an uneasy relationship with ‘merica (exploding CIA cigars and all, ya know?).

• But the 🍊 fellah kicked it up a notch on May 1, signing an executive order that vastly expanded sanctions on companies doing business with Cuba’s military dictatorship.

The GAESA problem. The companies in question were linked to GAESA — Cuba’s military conglomerate, which controls roughly 180 hotels through joint ventures with mostly Spanish and Canadian operators (GAESA owns the hotels; the hospitality chains operate them).

• Trump’s executive order targets any company doing business with GAESA, whose director is a military officer named Ana Guillermina Lastres. That made the Spanish chains’ Cuban partnerships legally toxic in a hurry.

The exits. Iberostar went first, dropping 12 of its 18 Cuban hotels on Monday. Meliá followed on Wednesday, pulling out of 15 of its roughly 34 properties — all GAESA-linked — through its Portuguese subsidiary. (The deadline for cutting ties before facing sanctions was June 5.)

• Both are keeping hotels tied to Cuba’s Tourism Ministry rather than the military. Canada’s Blue Diamond had already departed 62 properties, though it blamed flight cancellations rather than Trump.

Not that the hotels cared. Most of Meliá’s abandoned hotels were already closed anyway — Cuba’s ongoing energy crisis had made operating them nearly impossible, with average occupancy of 34% and net profits down 68% in the first quarter. Maybe that’s why Meliá’s stock rose 0.8% right after the news.

• Because tourism has collapsed, Cuba received just 328,000 visitors in the first four months of 2026, down 55.8% year-on-year. 2025 was already the worst year since 2002. At least 11 airlines have cut or suspended routes; Iberia halted Madrid-Havana until October.

The end is nigh. Before long, there may not be much left to sanction.🥺

🔔 Don’t forget to follow us on TikTok!

@thebubblecomA corruption probe has triggered a political earthquake in Spain: Former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero is officially under investigation in a corruption probe linked to the controversial €53 million government bailout granted to the airline Plus Ultra during the pandemic. What happens now? Read all about it in this week’s newsletter, in your inbox this Thursday morning. #zapatero #psoe #venezuela #politica

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Could it get worse?

👨🏻‍⚖️ Criminal investigation into ex-PM Zapatero blows up — and sets the government wobbling

Boom! It's Zapatero Investigation 2: Electric Boogaloo. That corruption investigation into the role that José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero (aka ZP), the former prime minister and BFF of current PM Pedro Sánchez, played in the dodgy bailout of a Venezuela-focused airline that we featured last week has gone 💥, and we are here to tell the tale.

• A quick recap. Last week, we explained how Zapatero (possibly one of the most symbolically important figures in Spain’s socialist party) is now officially under criminal investigation in a sprawling corruption and money laundering probe linked to the controversial €53m government rescue of airline Plus Ultra during the pandemic.

Now it gets interesting. The case file — known as the sumario — became public this week, releasing gobs of salacious details. And then other investigations piled on. Let us count the ways.

• Jewelry 💎. A search of ZP's office turned up a safe containing two hard drives (yawn…but maybe useful!) and a pile of jewelry that his assistants claimed came from his wife's family inheritance and gifts received while traveling. Friends of ZP said the value of the bling was €30,000-50,000, while a jeweler interviewed by El Español said they could go as high as €3.9m. 🤔

• Money 💰. A police search of the house of Julio Martínez Martínez, a close personal friend and running buddy of ZP who has, um, paid ZP a lot in recent years, turned up €286,000 in cash stuffed in a golf bag, a radiator, and various other amusing hiding spots. 🤔 Again.

Cool nicknames and mafia shoutouts. Text messages from telephones seized as evidence from a lawyer implicated in the corruption case referred to Zapatero as ‘Zorro’, ‘Z’, and ‘ZZZZ’ (we wish we had such cool nicknames). And according to the legal filings, onetime Plus Ultra owner Rodolfo Reyes was so enamored of Zapatero’s ability to influence both the Spanish and Venezuelan governments that he said “Zapatero is in charge here” months before the bailout.

• Money for the kids, too? The UDEF (Economic and Fiscal Crime Unit) of the National Police said that ZP's daughters, Alba and Laura Rodríguez, accepted payments for their dad, via their marketing agency Whatthefav (do explain the name!), to cover his alleged influence peddling.

Terrible timing. The expansion of the investigation lands at the worst possible moment for PM Sánchez’s government, which is already battered by years of scandals, judicial drama, and political exhaustion.

• They're shooting us! One Socialist figure summed it up for El País — first "they” shot the government in the legs, then the arms, and now they’ve gone “for the heart,” meaning Zapatero himself.

• Going down with the ship (or taking it down with him). Sánchez, however, is still defending Zapatero and insists he will remain in power until 2027. As you can imagine, the opposition believes the scandal is the coup de grâce for Sánchez.

• The call is coming from inside the house. Even former PSOE PM Felipe González says Spain should hold a general election “this year” to avoid further damaging the party. (Though González gave a backhand backing to Zapatero's innocence claims: he said he didn't think ZP had the "capacity” to put together a complicated money laundering ring. Ouch! But thanks.)

Shocked! Zapatero is allegedly “surprised” by the accusations. And — shocker! — he denies everything and says he can't be held responsible for the deeds of his longtime friend Martínez, now one of the key figures in the case.

• ZP will speak. His legal team requested a postponement to review the case file. He's now expected to testify June 17 and 18.

How did we get here? The investigation itself actually began far away from domestic politics. In 2024, authorities in Switzerland and France alerted Spanish prosecutors about a sophisticated money laundering network, tied to Spain, that was allegedly used to move skimmed Venezuelan money through shell companies and offshore accounts connecting Latin America, Europe, and tax havens.

• Venezuelan money trail! Some of those operations were allegedly linked to businessmen suspected of laundering money tied to Nicolás Maduro’s government. While investigating that network, authorities came across possible connections between the Plus Ultra bailout, ZP buddy Martínez, and others linked to Zapatero.

And now we wait. Over the next few weeks, this country will be treated to what promises to be a deadly mix of leaks, court appearances, political hysteria, and television shouting matches.

• Somewhere in the middle of all this, Sánchez will claim that things are perfectly normal while his administration appears to be held together with duct tape. 🥳

More news below. 👇👇

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. ⚽ Spain names its World Cup team and the star is… the King? (Oh, and controversy too!)

You can’t watch the announcement video of the Spanish World Cup team (above) and not get a tiny bit emotional. Spain may have no greater skill than its tear-jerking nostalgia videos about fraternity and working together (seriously, watch a few ads for the El Gordo lottery).

• But that’s not the point. What is? That King Felipe VI (F6) starred in the announcement of the 26 members of this year’s World Cup team, and there is controversy. Because that’s what soccer football’s about!

And the winner is… After a bait-and-switch — coach Luis de la Fuente appears, apologizes, and says he won’t be announcing the team after all — F6 took over, walking onto the pitch at Las Rozas to explain that the squad belongs to everyone — “to those who wake before the sun, who work the sea, who deliver the goods” — before closing with: “This is the list of an entire country. This is the list of Spain.”

• Normies. Then ordinary Spaniards — bakers, fishermen, librarians — read the names out one by one. Previous announcement videos featured Antonio Banderas, Ricky Rubio, and Carolina Marín. F6 has raised the bar kingly.

• Fun fact! The filming took over two hours in Madrid’s sweltering heat — and happened to fall on May 22, the King and Queen’s 22nd wedding anniversary. Queen Letizia advised behind the scenes. Romantic!

The squad:

• 🧤 Keepers: Unai Simón, David Raya, Joan García

• 🛡️ Defense: Cucurella, Grimaldo, Cubarsí, Laporte, Pubill, Eric García, Llorente, Porro

• ⚙️ Midfield: Rodri, Pedri, Gavi, Zubimendi, Fabián, Baena, Merino

• ⚡ Attack: Oyarzabal, Olmo, Nico Williams, Lamine Yamal, Ferran Torres, Borja Iglesias, Yeremy Pino, Víctor Muñoz

The controversy. For the first time in Spanish World Cup history, not a single Real Madrid player made the squad.

• Spanishification 🇪🇸. Enter Enrique Riquelme, who’s challenging Florentino Pérez for the Real Madrid presidency on June 7 and is promising the “Españolización” of the club: “If I become president, there will be a Real Madrid player who’s played the World Cup with Spain.”

Fun fact #2. Spain has 3 Atlético de Madrid players in its squad. Argentina has 7. The Colchoneros: proud to serve… Buenos Aires!

• In other Spanish football news, Alexia Putellas is leaving FC Barcelona after 14 years — two Ballons d’Or, 38 titles, 504 games, 232 goals, and a fourth Champions League clinched just days ago. She titled her farewell video Una historia perfecta. She was not wrong. London reportedly awaits La Reina.

2. 👮 Welcome home! Flotilla protesters beaten on their return to Spain

Cruel irony alert! The group of Spanish pro-Palestine protestors who’d participated in a flotilla bringing symbolic aid to Gaza had already had a tough time before their welcome home:

• They and their flotilla compatriots had been intercepted and detained by Israel, in whose custody they were reportedly abused, tortured, and demeaned — and some say sexually harassed.

• Condemnation. Amnesty International demanded justice, the U.K. Foreign Office condemned the actions, and Canada’s PM Mark Carney spoke to the Israeli president about the ‘appalling treatment’.

Then the Spanish protestors arrived back in Bilbao — and the regional police opened another can of whoopass on them.

• Moments after the six activists deplaned, what was meant to be a kind of hero’s welcome home devolved into a brawl, replete with baton smacks and handcuffed returnees.

What the hell happened? The six activists arrived at Bilbao’s Loiu airport on Saturday to find roughly 40 supporters waiting.

• The gathering was unannounced, but an agreement had reportedly been reached between the Ertzaintza (regional Basque police) and flotilla representatives by midday: there would be an orderly welcome, a traditional aurresku dance, and no blocking of other passengers. Twenty-five officers were deployed. It held — briefly.

The ETA twist. According to airport CCTV footage shown to the Basque Parliament, the spark was struck by a former ETA militant, one Oses Carrasco, who pushed the lead officer at 1:49 p.m., then grabbed and yanked a second. That was the match.

• Also present in the crowd: Itziar Moreno Martínez, another former ETA member, convicted of the attempted murder of a French gendarme.

Within seconds, batons were out, people were on the ground, and four were in handcuffs.

The other version. The activists flatly deny any provocation. Lawyer Sandra Garrido called the incident “absolutely constructed” by the Basque police — and said “we were broken more here than in Israel,” because, unlike the assault at sea, they weren’t mentally prepared for it at home in Spain.

• Amnesty International called it an “excessive use of force,” saying the images showed “no legitimate cause” — especially for baton strikes on people already on the ground.

The fallout. Basque Security Councillor Bingen Zupiria (PNV) took responsibility for the operation on Sunday, saying what happened “should not have happened” — and that those who “provoked” the Ertzaintza response would be investigated.

• A triple investigation is underway by internal affairs, an external police oversight body, and the courts.

• Trolling. The Israeli Foreign Ministry, meanwhile, posted on X, calling the detainees “anarchists” and mocking that they were driving the Spanish police “crazy”.

They weren’t so wrong about that part.

3. 📻 Two radio stars who narrated Spain just ended an era

Streaming killed the radio star. Sad news for those of you who (for some reason) are into AM radio. In the span of days, Àngels Barceló and Carlos Alsina, the two voices that have basically narrated Spain’s mornings for years, announced they’re stepping away from the most high-pressure part of their shows.

• Absolute shock. Barceló is leaving the Cadena SER station entirely after 21 years, while Alsina is “self-relegating” from the political 8 a.m. news grind on Onda Cero station to focus on the more featur-y second half of his show, Más de uno. If you care about news and politics, this is seismic.

Not hard to see why. Barceló and Alsina defined the morning conversation every day. Barceló’s Hoy por Hoy was pulling in around 3 million daily listeners, making it the most-listened-to morning show in Spain, while Alsina had turned Más de uno into a record-breaking competitor with nearly 1.8 million listeners and growing.

• Politically, both have labels — Barceló as center-left, Alsina as more centrist/liberal — but what actually made them stand out was their journalistic credibility.

• Tough interviews and analysis, and a level of professionalism that cut through Spain’s increasingly tribal media landscape. Even their critics listened (Alsina’s interview with PM Sánchez was chef’s kiss).

Why are they leaving? Depends on who’s asking. SER’s official reason was that Barceló wasn’t renewing her contract.

• However, there were reports that pointed to internal clashes within Prisa (the media conglomerate that owns SER) over editorial direction, with pressure to “diversify” voices and possibly shift tone after recent falling audience numbers.

Alsina’s exit was more philosophical. He openly admitted he’s “spent” after decades of political broadcasting and wants to focus on a different kind of radio (less confrontation, more storytelling).

• Conspiracy theory. Within hours, social media and some fringe media outlets were full of theories about a “right-wing conspiracy” to push out critical voices, especially as the electorate “moves to the right”. (There’s no evidence for that).

What now? Barceló’s future is unclear (podcast? Substack?), while Alsina is reinventing his role. Undoubtedly, Spanish radio is entering a new era. The age of the all-powerful morning anchor who sets the national mood at 8 a.m. is fading. In its place? God only knows.

4.🏅 Los Javis won big at Cannes with ‘The Black Ball’

Spanish cinema scores again. Los Javis (aka Javier Ambrossi and Javier Calvo) won Best Director in the Cannes Film Festival for La bola negra (The Black Ball), sharing the award with Paweł Pawlikowski, and yes, they got one of those long, emotional standing ovations (16 minutes!) that pretty much tells you that you’re cool.

• This is a huge moment for them, especially in a year where expectations were sky-high and most of the Spanish competition walked away empty-handed (sorry, Almodóvar!).

Blackballed. La bola negra is a layered drama inspired by legendary Spanish playwright and poet Federico García Lorca, weaving together three timelines (1932, 1937, and 2017) to explore love, repression, and queer memory in Spain (Lorca was gay and was murdered at the start of the Spanish Civil War, so it fits).

• Built partly from Lorca’s unfinished work, the film revolves around the idea that queer history often survives in fragments and that recovering it is almost an act of resistance.

• The cast is stacked with young Spanish talent (like Guitarricadelafuente and Miguel Bernardeu), and both Penélope Cruz and Glenn Close appear in it.

Political and emotional. The Javis used their Cannes moment to double down on why they think this story matters and say this is about reclaiming Lorca as a real person, not a sanitized cultural icon.

• Big statement. They said “Lorca was murdered for being gay” and their film leans hard into that, connecting past repression with today’s cultural and political tensions. It’s a very Los Javis film: unapologetically queer and definitely emotional.

The film hits Spanish cinemas on Oct. 2, and Netflix has already snapped up U.S. rights in a deal reportedly worth around $5 million. It's going global, fast.

• No love lost. The most surprising part of all this (in a good way)? It comes right after Ambrossi and Calvo, known for giving us iconic TV shows like Paquita Salas, Veneno, and La Mesias (and being the mainstay judges on Drag Race Spain), ended their relationship. Professionally, though, it looks like they’re still very much together.

5. 🤑 No more betting on whether Pedro Sánchez will leave office this year

The Ministry of Consumer Affairs is going after prediction markets — hard. The ministry on Tuesday announced that it had initiated disciplinary proceedings against Kalshi and Polymarket for operating (virtual) casinos without gambling licenses. Which, to be honest, they do. But there’s more.

• Who are these guys? Kalshi and Polymarket are basically online bookies that let you bet on anything — sports results, elections, and when Venezuelan ex-Pres. Nicolás Maduro would be kidnapped by the U.S. military.

But like we said, there’s more. The ministry led by Pablo Bustinduy — you know, the guy Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary called a “crazy communist minister” — decided that an investigation and possible fine and shutdown in Spain wasn’t enough. No, it moved to preemptively block the sites in Spain — and it did just that.

• What does that mean? Not only can you not place bets on the date by which Pedro Sánchez will leave office (see above), you can’t even see the page where Polymarket takes the bets. Because even knowing about this is dangerous.

• Seriously, we tried. We couldn’t get through to the pages unless we used our VPN. And now this all reminds us of China, but minor league. (Editor's note: A day later, the sites were again available; the ministry earlier said it would take 7-10 days to block the sites.)

The reasoning. Spain’s gambling regulator says prediction markets are gambling — you’re betting on uncertain outcomes, and operating that without a license violates the law.

• Beyond the license issue, neither platform has the consumer protections Spain requires: age verification, identity checks, and self-exclusion mechanisms for problem gamblers.

• The ministry tried to notify both companies directly at their foreign addresses. No luck — so it published proceedings in the official state bulletin, the BOE. Very Spanish.

• The timing. Full proceedings will take 3-4 months.

The context. Prediction markets have had a rough year.

• A U.S. Army soldier was charged after making $400,000 on Polymarket betting on the Maduro capture — which he helped plan.

• French authorities investigated thermometer manipulation at Charles de Gaulle airport to game a weather bet.

• A recent study found 70.8% of Polymarket users lose money, while the top 1% takes 84.1% of all winnings. Basically, a casino where the house is people who know more than you do.

Worth a mention: Presidential “wünderkind” (rolls eyes) Donald Trump Jr. is an investor and advisor in Polymarket (because of course he is), and the U.S. regulator overseeing these platforms has been run, under Papa Trump, by a former crypto industry lawyer.

• Not alone. Brazil blocked both platforms in April. Polymarket told the WSJ it welcomes collaboration with Spain. Kalshi didn’t respond.

🔔 Don’t forget to follow us on TikTok!

@thebubblecomA corruption probe has triggered a political earthquake in Spain: Former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero is officially under investigation in a corruption probe linked to the controversial €53 million government bailout granted to the airline Plus Ultra during the pandemic. What happens now? Read all about it in this week’s newsletter, in your inbox this Thursday morning. #zapatero #psoe #venezuela #politica

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The scandals don't stop

👨🏻‍⚖️ From ex-PM to suspect: Zapatero corruption investigation shakes Spanish politics

Political earthquake. One of Pedro Sánchez's closest allies just achieved a first, and not in a good way.

• Former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero (PSOE, 2004–2011) has been formally placed under investigation in a corruption case tied to the controversial €53m pandemic-era bailout of Venezuela-focused airline Plus Ultra that, per the judge, may have involved Maduro-regime money, Emirati shell companies, and Zapatero's daughters' marketing agency. Yes, really.

• This is the first time in modern Spanish democracy that an ex-PM is formally under criminal investigation for corruption.

The case in a nutshell. At its core, it’s about whether Zapatero used his political influence to help Plus Ultra secure the €53m bailout, and whether he and people around him financially benefited from it.

• Undercover organization. The judge believes Zapatero may have been part of an elaborate network (think Emirati shell companies, dodgy payments, and behind-the-scenes lobbying) designed to push favorable decisions through the PSOE-led government's channels.

• The Caracas connection. The investigation even appears to involve money from the dictatorial regime of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro (with which Zapatero was very cozy), which adds an extra geopolitical layer to an already sordid story.

Not just him. The case pulls in Zapatero's close associate and running buddy, Julio Martínez, who allegedly helped manage the business side of things, as well as companies linked to Zapatero’s goth-kid daughters. (If you've never seen the photo with the Obamas, you've got to take a look.)

• Free money! Their marketing agency, Whathefav, is under scrutiny for receiving big payments from firms connected to the scheme for doing basically nothing. In total, investigators are looking at around €1.95m in suspected commissions, with about a quarter going to Whathefav.

• Zapatero says this is all bullshit nonsense. He released a video saying he has “never” intervened in any public decision related to the bailout and insists everything he’s done has been on the up and up. He’s also framing this as part of a broader campaign against him. (Being the subject of a conspiracy is all the rage these days; just ask the Orange Menace.)

PSOE closes ranks. Sánchez, who relies on Zapatero as a key adviser, and his PSOE have given Zapatero full-throated backing, stressing the presumption of innocence and ye olde right-wing conspiracy.

• But this couldn't come at a worse time. Sánchez is already dealing with corruption allegations involving people very close to him, including his wife, his brother, and two of his right-hand men. This just tosses gasoline on a fire that was already burning.

The right is in attack mode. The center-right PP is demanding explanations (and of course elections) and tying Zapatero directly to Sánchez, arguing this reflects a broader stain of corruption on his government.

• Blow it all up. Far-right Vox has gone further, pushing (again) for a motion of no confidence. The PP said no and called the idea childish.

Well, that's a surprise. Zapatero has been seen as a relatively “clean” former leader compared to Spain’s long list of corruption scandals. The fact that even left-leaning media are treating this as serious (and referring to Sánchez's political movement as "sanchismo", an old PP talking point) tells you everything you need to know about how bad this could get.

• We'll sit the one out. Even the government’s leftist allies in Parliament, like Sumar or ERC, are being cautious and have switched from crying “lawfare” to being “prudent” as the case moves forward.

Next stop. Zapatero is due to testify on June 2 before the National High Court. From there, the case could expand, stall, or explode, depending on what investigators find. One thing it won't do? Go away.

More news below. 👇👇

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🗳️ The PP wins — but does it really? — in Andalucía

Not great results for pretty much everyone. Andalucía voted Sunday, and while the result looks like a clear win for the PP and a clear loss for the PSOE — and both are true — the reality is a lot messier.

• Happy? The PP, led in Andalucía by current regional president (aka governor) Juan Manuel Moreno, won the regional elections comfortably, finishing far ahead of the PSOE.

• Not happy. But the headline isn’t the victory—it’s what they didn’t get: a majority. The PP secured 53 seats, down from 58, falling short of the 55 needed to govern alone.

And the others. The PSOE, led by María Jesús Montero, dropped to 28 seats (from 30), marking its worst result ever in the region. Once the dominant force in Andalucía, where it regularly flirted with 50% of the vote, it now gets less than 23%. This is its fifth straight defeat in the region. Bad, bad, bad.

• Holding steady. Far-right Vox edged up slightly to 15 seats (+1), while leftish coalition Por Andalucía (basically Sumar+Podemos) held steady at 5.

• Lefty surprise. The real surprise came from leftist localists of Adelante Andalucía, which surged from 2 to 8 seats. The new player siphoned off votes and blocked the PP and PSOE from translating their support into seats.

• Newbies on the rise. Adelante Andalucía's rise and Vox's continued strength shows (again) that voters are tired of big mainstream parties (the PSOE especially). Instead, they're moving to more local and identity-driven movements.

No majority? No Yes, problem. Moreno, who has built his brand on moderation and distance from the far right, now needs Vox to govern. Whether that’s through abstention or a formal deal, Vox holds the key. Which stinks if you're Moreno.

• Vox has already made clear it wants policy concessions, including its controversial “national priority” in access to public benefits, and the end of “socialist policies” in agriculture, immigration, and energy.

Up and to the right. This election was the last major regional test before Spain heads toward general elections next year (or earlier), and it reinforces a broader trend. Across recent votes in Aragón, Extremadura, Castilla y León, and now Andalucía, the right has consistently outperformed the left.

• Even here, where the PP stumbled slightly, the right-wing bloc still holds a big majority. Spain ain't shifting overnight, but the direction is hard to ignore.

2. 👮 The son of Mango’s founder is arrested in his father’s death because his story's got holes like Swiss cheese

The whole “accidental” death of Isak Andic is looking less accidental. Jonathan Andic, the heir to the multi-billion-euro Mango fortune, was taken into custody by Catalan police Tuesday — on suspicion of, well, pushing his father off a cliff — questioned, and released on €1 million bail. And with that move, armchair Agatha Christies the world over now feel vindicated.

The case. We’ve covered this before: Isak — Istanbul-born billionaire, worth €4.5bn at his death — fell over 100m from a cliffside Montserrat hiking trail in December 2024, with Jonathan the only witness.

• For the uninitiated: Mango is Spain’s second-largest fashion empire (behind Inditex, aka Zara et al.), with more than 2,000 stores and €3.8bn in annual sales, all built from a single Barcelona shop Isak opened in 1984.

• Second generation less genius. Jonathan ran the business in the mid-2010s before his father had to step back in to steady the ship. Things between them were never the same.

The case was closed within six days of Isak’s death. But then it was reopened in January — and on Tuesday the judge lifted judicial secrecy and issued a 17-page ruling finding “sufficient evidence” of “active and premeditated” involvement.

The evidence. The judge found nine indications of a crime. These are the ones that sting:

• Jonathan told police he’d visited the trail once, about two weeks before the fatal hike. But traffic cameras and Barcelona’s low-emissions plate system placed his car at the site on Dec. 7, 8, and 10 — three times in the week before his father died.

• A mark at the scene looked like a slip—or push. Police ran 10 simulations and concluded it required deliberately rubbing a shoe sole back and forth at least four times. Not a trip.

• The autopsy found no injuries to Isak’s palms. He didn’t try to break his fall. He went “like a toboggan”, feet first.

• Jonathan called his father’s phone first after the fall — then his partner, then 112 — and gave different versions to the dispatcher and to police. When investigators asked for his phone, he handed over two — but neither was the one he’d used that day.

• In March 2025, Jonathan swapped phones, wiped the old one, and told his secretary it had been stolen during a trip to Quito, Ecuador — the same week news broke that the case had been reopened. The Mossos found no evidence of theft.

• WhatsApp messages showed what the judge describes as an “obsession with money” — and writings in which Jonathan allegedly expressed “hatred, resentment, ideas of death” toward his father.

The motive. In mid-2024, Isak informed Jonathan he was planning to change his will to create a charitable foundation (i.e., less for Jonathan and his two siblings). Jonathan’s attitude shifted “notably.” He proposed the hike as a reconciliation. The foundation was never established.

• The family. A spokesperson declared there are “no legitimate pieces of evidence against him.” Jonathan’s lawyer called the allegation “inconsistent — it stigmatizes an innocent man.”

What’s next? Jonathan has to make weekly court appearances, but he hasn’t been formally charged (yet). If he is, he faces a jury trial and 10 to 15 years. Mango continues under CEO Toni Ruiz, who paid shareholders (the fam owns 95%) a record €217.6m dividend last year.

• More secrecy: Jonathan secretly married fashion influencerPaula Nata three months before his father’s death.

3. 💑 Awwww, Spain and Mexico are BFFs again

Claudia and Felipe sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G (figuratively, of course). After years of kinda, sorta not getting along because of some stuff that happened, like, 500 years ago, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum invited Spain’s King Felipe VI over to her house, and he accepted — and not even the Wicked Witch of the West Real Casa de Correos (you know who we mean) could keep them apart, try as she might.

• What really happened. Felipe VI will attend Spain’s third World Cup group game — against Uruguay, June 26, in Guadalajara — after Sheinbaum personally invited him by letter back in February. He’s already told FIFA President Gianni Infantino too, presumably to lock in good seats.

The breakup. A quick recap: in 2019, Mexico’s then-president AMLO formally asked Felipe (aka F6) to apologize for, you know, Hernán Cortés’s conquest of the Aztecs in 1521 — and, not surprisingly, got radio silence in return. And so, on taking office, AMLO’s protege Sheinbaum didn’t invite F6 to her inauguration. The Casa Real was not royally amused.

The thaw. In March, Felipe acknowledged — at a low-key museum visit that was very clearly planned and not low-key — that there “was a lot of abuse” and “ethical controversies” during the conquest.

• It wasn’t an apology. It was the diplomatic equivalent of leaving flowers on the doorstep and running away. Sheinbaum called it a “gesture of rapprochement” and invited F6 to the World Cup the same week.

Enter the villain. Last month, Madrid regional president Isabel Díaz Ayuso flew to Mexico, praised Hernán Cortés, called Spain’s colonial legacy something to be proud of, and (inevitably) spelled the country’s name “Méjico” — a provocateur to the last.

• Spelling 🐝. Ayuso was confronted at the airport by a local woman who reminded her that it’s México, with an X. The video went viral.

• Angry, not so angry. Sheinbaum pushed back on Ayuso’s provocation— then walked it back, insisting the bilateral relationship was bigger than Ayuso’s agenda.

And now guess who’s coming to Guadalajara? These kids…

4. 💰 Shakira wins €60M battle with the Spanish Tax Man

Judge rules those hips don’t lie. Shakira just scored a major win against Hacienda (aka the Spanish taxman), and if you’ve lived in Spain long enough, you already know this is about more than just one celebrity case.

• Spain’s National Court has ruled after a years-long legal battle that Shakira was not a tax resident in Spain in 2011, and ordered Hacienda to return more than €60m in improperly imposed taxes and fines (plus interest!).

• The whole case hinged on a deceptively simple rule: spend more than 183 days in Spain, and you’re on the hook for taxes on your global income. Hacienda argued she was already effectively living in Spain back then, largely because of her relationship with (former beau and current nemesis) Gerard Piqué and her growing presence in Barcelona after Waka Waka and her global tour.

Objection! The court didn’t buy it. It found that the tax agency could only prove she spent 163 days in the country, and that neither her personal life nor her touring schedule justified treating Spain as her fiscal base that year.

• Some context. After she met FC Barcelona star Piqué during the World Cup, she started spending more time in Barcelona. Hacienda later argued that by 2011, she had already shifted her life (and therefore her tax obligations) to Spain.

• That interpretation triggered a massive bill: roughly €55m in taxes and penalties, plus interest. While 2011 was never part of her criminal case (it was already out of the statute of limitations), it became the biggest financial front in her broader fight with Spanish authorities.

¿Dónde están los ladrones? This is where things get messy. Shakira did plead guilty to tax fraud for 2012–2014, accepting a suspended prison sentence and paying a €7.3m fine to avoid trial. So while this ruling doesn’t erase everything, it does hand her a symbolic and financial victory in the year with the highest amount at stake.

• Can’t remember to forget you. In a statement after the ruling, Shakira said there was “never any fraud” and accused Hacienda of treating her as guilty from the start, using her public profile to “send a threatening message” to other taxpayers.

• She framed the entire ordeal as eight years of reputational damage, stress, and institutional overreach—and expressed hope that the ruling sets a precedent for ordinary citizens dealing with what she sees as an aggressive system.

• Not over yet? Hacienda is expected to appeal to the Supreme Court, so the final word may still be pending, although experts suggest it’s unlikely to go anywhere.

No love lost. If you’ve spent five minutes talking to Spaniards about Hacienda, you’ll know that people don’t like it very much. The tax agency has a reputation (fair or not) for being relentless, bureaucratic, and very willing to push cases to the limit.

• What makes this case resonate beyond Shakira is that she’s not alone. Over the years, several local celebs—from El Rubius to Xabi Alonso and even Piqué—have also taken Hacienda to court and, in some cases, won.

5. 🥷 You know Spain has a tourism problem when Britain unveils its Most Wanted list here

They look just like the guys getting plastered at 10 a.m. at the bars off Benidorm’s Levante beach. And it turns out they are the guys. Late last week, Spain’s Interior Ministry, the U.K.’s National Crime Agency, and Crimestoppers announced the 20th annual edition of Operación Captura — the search for Britain’s 12 most wanted criminals — in Alicante, natch. Because British criminals need sun too.

• Operación Captura launched in 2006 on a simple premise that British fugitives, like British tourists, gravitate to Spain. In 20 editions, 111 criminals have been publicized and 98 caught — a 90% success rate. 47 of those arrests happened in Spain itself, seven more across Gibraltar and Portugal. Just since 2019, 254 British fugitives have been arrested in Spain on international warrants. Málaga leads with 86, Alicante with 54.

• It’s not hard to see why they come. 400,000 Brits live in Spain, and 19 million more visit every year. As Sexy Beast showed, the British criminal abroad is almost indistinguishable from the British tourist: both go red in the sun, consider a 10 a.m. pint reasonable, and are deeply attached to chips. The gambas blend right in.

Without further ado, here’s who they’re looking for. Two alleged murderers, one sexual offender, six linked to drug trafficking, and three to fraud and money laundering — including, wonderfully, a former TV actor. Eleven of the men are British and one is Russian. Most have documented ties to Málaga, the Costa Blanca, and the Canary Islands.

The ones hiding in Spain (allegedly):

• 🔴 Kevin Thomas Parle — Alleged double murderer (Liverpool, 2004 and 2005). Red-haired, nearly two meters tall, and fat big. Links to southern Spain. Has appeared in previous campaigns. Hard to miss, and yet…still out there.

• 🎬 Philip Barry Foster — Convicted of fraud and money laundering (8.5 years). Former TV actor. His hustle: convincing victims he could make them famous, charging large sums for terrible photos. Linked to Marbella, natch.

• 🐟 Charlie Salisbury — Cocaine supply and laundering. Koi carp and dragon tattoos on his right arm. Possible links to Málaga.

• 🍺 John Rocks — Accused of sexual offenses spanning 2012–2022. Shaved head, ginger goatee. Possible links to Benidorm. Of course.

• 💊 Matthew Purves — Cocaine conspiracy across the U.K. Links to southern Spain and possibly Tenerife.

• 💷 Dean Eighteen — VAT fraud totalling £7.8 million, filed in the name of two companies he ran alone. Left the U.K. in January 2019 and has been pursued across Spain ever since.

• 🚤 Simon Dutton — Organized large-scale cocaine imports; one operation netted 10.5kg. Detected across multiple Spanish locations. Has “Rachel” tattooed on his left arm, which seems like a clue.

• 🌴 Liam Michael Murray — Drug trafficking and money laundering. 34. Links to Alicante.

If you’ve seen any of these people, Crimestoppers will take your call anonymously. Or the Policía Nacional (091). Or the Guardia Civil (062).

🔔 Don’t forget to follow us on TikTok!

@thebubblecomA corruption probe has triggered a political earthquake in Spain: Former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero is officially under investigation in a corruption probe linked to the controversial €53 million government bailout granted to the airline Plus Ultra during the pandemic. What happens now? Read all about it in this week’s newsletter, in your inbox this Thursday morning. #zapatero #psoe #venezuela #politica

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Stumbling to the finish line

👮‍♀️ The death of two policemen turns Andalucía’s big election upside down

This Sunday’s Andalucía regional elections — likely the last dry run before national polls — were already looking grim for Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s PSOE. The numbers, let’s just say, are not there. Then two Guardia Civil officers died chasing drug smugglers off Huelva, and his party contrived to score three own goals in three days. Now, his candidate — the charmless ex-treasury minister María Jesús Montero — is heading into Sunday looking like someone who really, really wants to lose.

• The spark that lit the fire. Two Guardia Civil officers — Jerónimo Jiménez and Germán Pérez — died on Friday after their patrol boat crashed into another while chasing a narcolancha (i.e., a boat specifically designed and used by drug traffickers to transport illegal narcotics) off Huelva.

• Simmering anger. Drug trafficking has colonized this coastline as enforcement pressure pushed cartels west from the Campo de Gibraltar. But Huelva’s Guardia Civil was operating with 300 fewer officers than it needed, in semi-rigid boats without night vision, against narco speedboats with four engines and sometimes armed crews. Their colleagues had warned their superiors about exactly this — in a detailed report, months earlier. The warnings were filed and forgotten.

Own goal #1. The Saturday funeral of the officers. With the campaign suspended, Montero attended — and got booed. Interior Minister Marlaska did not come, citing the hantavirus cruise operation in Tenerife.

• The government did send two lesser officials, who no one considered adequate, least of all in an election campaign in the affected region. (Context: at a similar funeral in 2024 after the Barbate narcolancha attack, one dead officer’s widow refused to let Marlaska place a medal on the coffin. He has history here.)

Own goal #2. Monday night’s debate. Describing the deaths, Montero used the phrase “accidente laboral” — workplace accident — to describe the officers’ deaths.

• Exqueeze me? Far-right Vox’s Manuel Gavira fired back immediately: “These aren’t accidents, they’re murders.” Even the far-left Adelante Andalucía candidate used similar language to go after her. Montero stood alone with her phrase, which sounds like what happens when you cut yourself while making a hamburger at a Burger King.

Own goal #3. Tuesday’s cabinet meeting press conference: The government spokesperson refused to correct Montero. So she corrected herself: Montero posted on social media describing their deaths as an “acto de servicio” — technically a walk back or rectification or something. But she did not say sorry.

• Cherry on top. On Wednesday, Marlaska spoke at a Guardia Civil graduation ceremony in Jaén and was booed twice when he mentioned the deaths. He emerged saying he was “hurt and furious.” He also clarified, yes, that the deaths were obviously “acto de servicio.” PP leader Alberto Nuñez Feijóo demanded his resignation.

So what about the election? PP incumbent Juanma Moreno — steady, competent, largely boring — was heading for 54-55 seats, possibly an absolute majority, before any of this happened (which means he may be able to govern without having to make a deal with Vox).

• Montero herself was polling below 30 seats, the PSOE’s historic worst. At the debate, she couldn’t land a clean punch even on topics where Moreno was vulnerable (a breast cancer screening scandal, for instance), and walked away having gifted the opposition a week’s worth of clips.

What next? Andalucía is Spain’s most populous region and the last significant test before national elections. Moreno, enjoying himself, was blunt about the stakes: if his majority is “lethal” for PSOE, “Sánchez won’t make it to Christmas without calling elections.”

• After this week, that looks considerably less like bravado.

More news below. 👇👇

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🦠 Spain contains the hantavirus (yay!), but politicians fight anyway

We did it! After days of global attention, rising anxiety, and a cruise ship that felt straight out of a bizarre mashup of Contagion and Speed 2: Cruise Control, Spain has officially brought the hantavirus crisis under control (or so it seems).

• Hello, and goodbye. The MV Hondius, which had been stranded with multiple cases and three deaths on board, finally docked in Tenerife. Passengers were evacuated, and the operation went a lot better than expected.

• Look at me! PM Sánchez called the mission a “success” and even said it was “a source of pride to be Spanish.” The WHO leader, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, backed him up and said there is nothing that suggests a major outbreak is coming.

Crisis not averted. But while the PSOE-led government was celebrating the end of the operation, the Canary Islands government was fuming. At the center of it all is Fernando Clavijo, the regional president and leader of Coalición Canaria, a regionalist, center-right party that has built its identity around defending the islands’ autonomy.

• How dare you! Over the past few days, Clavijo has accused the central government of acting with “arrogance,” “prepotence,” and even “lies,” claiming that his administration was sidelined at key moments and that crucial information about the operation was either delayed or never properly shared.

• No news. He insisted that he learned about key developments through the media rather than through official channels, and even suggested that Madrid concealed the existence of a positive case on board. The government denies this, arguing that what was described as a “positive” was in fact a non-conclusive test that later came back negative.

• Swimming rats! Clavijo even said infected rodents could leave the ship and reach land (the central government said his research came from ChatGPT).

What happens now? The 14 Spanish passengers have been transferred to Madrid’s Gómez Ulla military hospital, where they are undergoing a 42-day quarantine. One of them has tested positive and begun showing symptoms, though he remains stable, while the rest continue to test negative under close monitoring.

• Across Europe and beyond, other passengers are being tracked, part of an effort to ensure that no further transmissions emerge. The WHO says the risk remains low, but also warned that, given the virus’s long incubation period, this isn’t over yet.

2. ⚽ Real Madrid bossman Florentino Pérez loses his marbles after the team’s season from hell

Florentino Pérez held his first press conference in over a decade on Tuesday, and wow did he have a “Is grandpa off his meds?” moment. Pick your metaphor — a slow-motion train wreck, a sandcastle at high tide, Kash Patel speaking in public, whatevs — it was gruesome in a way we’d never expect from a dude with more power (at least in football) than gawd.

• The proximate reason for the conference? Pérez announced he was calling early elections for team president, which he has been since 2000, with a three-year break from 2006 to 2009. Since then, he’s been re-elected unopposed every four years.

Democracy, Bernabéu-style. To run, candidates for Real Madrid’s presidency must be Spanish, a club member for 20 years, and able to personally guarantee €187 million — 15% of the club’s annual budget. 🤑

• Are you a Mexi-can? Pérez referred to his rumored rival as someone with “a Mexican accent” who “talks with electricity companies” — a jab at 37-year-old Enrique Riquelme, an alicantino whose Cox Energy‘s biggest market happens to be Mexico. He called potential rivals “children,” dared them to show their faces, and delivered the day’s signature line: “They’ll have to shoot me to get me out.”

But there was so much more on the plate…

Florentino’s grievances were many: the press (he named the ABC newspaper 27 times and called out journalists by name), Barcelona (whose payments to the referee chief he called “the greatest scandal in football history”), and referees, who, according to him, stole seven league points from him, plus 18 league points this season alone.

• Strong as a bull. Pérez denied cancer rumors — “If I had cancer, wouldn’t I be in an oncology ward?” — called a female journalist “that girl”, and questioned whether another “girl” knew anything about football.

The response was swift. Spain’s Equality Minister called the remarks “anachronistic and machista.” The journalist he doubted wrote back: “Yes, Mr President, that’s who I am. A woman. What does it matter what I know about football? I do know the damage outside the Bernabéu.” Barcelona F.C. announced their lawyers were looking into it.

Of course, Florentino has plenty of reasons to be grumpy. This is Madrid’s second straight season without a title — the first time in 20 years. He fired his star coach, Xabi Alonso, after seven months, and current helmsman Álvaro Arbeloa looks to be next. Two players — Tchouameni and Valverde — brawled for two days running, leaving Valverde in a wheelchair and both with club-record €500,000 fines. Barcelona are champions, 14 points clear.

• Silver lining…ish? At least Arbeloa — the coach he’s expected to replace — has Florentino’s back: “I know what this club was like before Florentino. And I’ll take these 26 years.” Sweet. The likely replacement is rumored to be former Real Madrid coach José Mourinho. Two aging glories, well past their peaks, holding each other up like drunks leaving a bar.

P.D. On a TV interview Wednesday, Pérez claimed he'd only received "messages of congratulations” about his press conference. Maybe he's surrounded by yes-men? Just a thought.

3. 😨 Ex-FC Barça star Gerard Piqué also had a tough week

The former football star and Shakira diss track-target Gerard Piqué learned this week that the reason it’s so easy to make bank with insider trading is because it’s illegal. And that you can’t yell at referees in football. And Shakira has her own life. It was a lot.

The big one. Spain’s market regulator CNMV fined Piqué €200,000 for insider trading after he bought shares in a workplace health and safety company two days before its takeover was announced — based on a tip from a businessman friend.

• Piqué held the stock for a week, sold it, and pocketed roughly €47,000. So, he made €47k, owes €200k, and receives a “very serious offence” on his permanent record. The friend who tipped him off was fined €100,000. Being friends with Piqué can be expensive.

Meanwhile, in football. Piqué owns FC Andorra, a second-division club whose 1-0 loss to Albacete last weekend prompted him to allegedly tell the referee to “leave under escort so that you aren’t attacked,” and to note that “in another country they’d beat you up, but here in Andorra we’re a civilized country.”

• The Spanish football federation was not charmed. Piqueé got a six-match ban and a two-month suspension for “acts that undermine the dignity and decorum of sport.” The dignity and decorum of sport, it should be said, were also not charmed.

• Addendum. We were charmed to learn while reporting this story that Piqué’s second last name is Bernabéu, which is the name of the stadium of his former archrival, Real Madrid. Which is, let’s be honest, kinda funny.

And then there was Shakira. At her concert for two million people on Copacabana beach, she called herself a “single mother” — implying Piqué isn’t around much for their two kids. He’s reportedly furious, and his team is considering legal action. His lawyer, asked for comment, said: “I don’t know anything, truly.” As in, “Speak to the hand.”

• Suing Shakira — the woman who turned their breakup into a global hit — would be a bold choice. We’re rooting for it because god knows it would give us something to write about.

4. 🏳️‍🌈 Spain is the best European country for LGBTQ+ rights (homophobia still exists, though)

Suck it, Malta. Spain has just topped ILGA-Europe’s 2026 Rainbow Map, the most authoritative annual ranking of LGBTQ+ rights across the continent, knocking Malta off its long-standing perch and becoming — officially! — the best place in Europe to be queer.

• ILGA who? ILGA-Europe is the largest LGBTQ+ organization in the world. Every year since 2009, it has published its Rainbow Map, ranking 49 European countries on a scale from 0 to 100% based on their laws and policies affecting LGBTI people.

• Spain scored 89%. (Great!) The EU average? A humbling 52%. (Not so great).

Spain is killin’ it. Over the past few years, Spain has quietly (and then not so quietly) built one of the most progressive legal frameworks for LGBTQ+ rights in the world.

• The 2023 LGBTI and Trans Laws were landmark. Equality action plans, an independent anti-discrimination authority, and the removal of the requirement that trans people get a medical diagnosis or treatment before their identity is legally recognized — no doctor’s note, no surgery, no hormones required. You know. Big stuff.

A beacon (with some shadows). Over the last several years, Spain has become something of a refuge and a reference point for the LGBTQ+ community in Europe. At a time when other countries are legally dismantling protections, Spain has been moving in the opposite direction.

• This stands out in a continent where the Rainbow Map’s bottom tier reads like a tour of authoritarian regression: Russia, Azerbaijan, Turkey, Belarus, Armenia.

Still lots of work to do. The Rainbow Map measures laws and policies, but it does not measure what it’s like to walk down the street. And on that front, Spain has a problem.

• More than half. According to the Estado del Odio LGTBI+ 2026 report, 54% of LGBTQ+ people in Spain said they experienced harassment, discrimination, or a physical attack in the past year.

• That’s up 12 points from the previous report. And one in two trans people has been a victim of physical violence.

Our take. Yeah, the laws are there, and the protections are real. But the gap between legal progress and real life is wide, and growing.

• ILGA itself flags this — legal rankings don’t capture daily reality. And 74% of those who reported incidents to authorities had a negative experience doing so, which goes some way to explaining why most victims still don’t report at all.

Tsk tsk.

5. 🎤 More Eurovision drama: Israel, Spain… and a few hundred voters

Only getting started. So, this week’s Eurovision drama didn’t come from the stage in Austria. Nope, it came from The New York Times, and it involved Spain.

• Gaming the system. The paper dropped an investigation suggesting that last year’s Eurovision vote may have been far easier to influence than organizers have admitted, and that Israel knew exactly how to play the system. Their example? *drumroll*… Spain!

• Israel’s representative absolutely crushed the Spanish public vote in 2025, according to the report, taking roughly a third of all votes (around 47,000) despite polls showing the Spanish public opinion was largely critical of the Israeli government, which is… odd.

Euro-voting is tricky. Eurovision is not one person, one vote. Viewers can vote multiple times; up to 20 times last year, now capped at 10. That means a relatively small group of highly motivated voters can massively amplify their impact. The NYT estimates that in Spain, just a few hundred people voting repeatedly could have secured Israel’s win in the televote. No bots, no fraud. Just good coordination.

• In Spain, Israel’s entry secured around 33.3% of the televote, the NYT reports, which translated into roughly 47,570 votes. The second-place country, Ukraine, was way behind with about 9,620 votes (6.7%).

• On paper, that looks like a landslide. But when you factor in the ability for each person to vote up to 20 times, the picture changes. To reach those 47,000 votes, you wouldn’t need tens of thousands of people—you could get there with just around 2,400.

• Not illegal, but kinda messy. Even the contest’s own director admitted Israel’s promotion last year was “excessive.” And yet, crucially, there was no external audit, no full release of voting data, and no real transparency about what actually happened.

Loving the attention. Spanish media jumped on the story. RTVE had already raised concerns last year, asking for an audit after Israel kept winning public votes in countries where public opinion didn’t match the results. That request went nowhere. Instead, Eurovision tweaked the rules: fewer votes per person, and a ban on “disproportionate” promotional campaigns.

• Yet here we are again. Just days before this year’s contest, Israel’s delegation was warned after circulating videos explicitly telling people to vote 10 times (the new maximum).

Spain isn’t even playing. RTVE is one of five broadcasters (along with Ireland, the Netherlands, Slovenia, and Iceland) that decided to boycott this year’s contest over Israel’s participation, citing both the war in Gaza and what they describe as repeated rule violations. It’s one of the biggest fractures Eurovision has faced in decades.

• Espanovision. Instead, as we mentioned last week, RTVE is doing something… very Spanish. Rather than airing Eurovision this Saturday, it’s broadcasting its own musical show to compete with it.

🔔 Don’t forget to follow us on TikTok!

@thebubblecomFrom tapas to Krispy Kreme 🇺🇸 #spain #lifeinspain #madrid #expatlife

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Dear God, not again

⛴️ A cruise ship, a deadly virus… and Spain is right in the middle of it

The world has been glued to its screens for the past two days following the news unfolding in real time of a luxury expedition cruise ship drifting across the Atlantic with a deadly virus onboard — and now heading straight for Spain.

• The MV Hondius is carrying around 150 passengers and crew. What started as a mysterious illness quickly escalated into something much more serious. Three people have died, and at least eight cases of hantavirus (a rodent-borne virus that can cause severe disease) have been confirmed or are under investigation.

• The situation has snowballed into a multi-country health concern, and Spain is now at the center of it, because the ship is expected to dock in Tenerife on Saturday.

Quick recap. The cruise began in southern Argentina and made stops in extremely remote locations. Early on, a passenger fell ill and later died — but the cause wasn’t immediately identified.

• The ship kept going. Passengers kept traveling. And crucially, dozens of people disembarked mid-journey and flew home before anyone realized what they might have been exposed to. At least one person who left the ship has already tested positive. Authorities are now trying to trace contacts across multiple countries

This isn’t The Last of Us. Hantavirus is not new (outbreaks in Argentina have been happening since, like, forever). It’s not easily transmissible (so please don’t say this is “just like COVID”).

• It’s typically spread through contact with infected rodents, not casual human interaction. (Good). The Andes strain — the one detected here — can, however, lead to severe respiratory illness with mortality rates of up to 40% and can be transmitted from person to person if there’s very close, prolonged contact. (Bad).

• There’s no vaccine, no specific treatment, and when symptoms worsen, things can deteriorate quickly.

• Keep calm and carry on. On the ship, passengers are isolating, wearing masks, and limiting contact — but also reading, watching movies, and drinking tea. “Our days have been close to normal,” one passenger said. At least there’s that.

Now enter Spain. After being denied disembarkation in Cape Verde, the ship is heading to Tenerife following a request from the WHO, which has sparked… tension.

• Why involve us? The Canary Islands government is openly questioning why passengers couldn’t be evacuated directly from Africa instead of bringing the situation to Spain.

• You're not good at this. Regional president Fernando Clavijo has also complained about a lack of transparency and coordination from Madrid. On the ground, the reaction is simpler: people are nervous. (Remember COVID?.)

Full steam ahead. The central government, however, is sticking to the plan. Spain has activated EU emergency protocols and will handle the operation once the ship arrives.

• Welcome to Spain. Passengers will be medically screened, foreigners repatriated, and the 14 Spanish nationals flown to Madrid for quarantine in a military hospital. Everything is being coordinated with European partners.

• Please don’t panic. Health Minister Mónica García insists the risk to the general population is very low, while Fernando Simón, the Ministry’s Director of the Health Alerts and Emergencies Coordination Center, has gone out of his way to stress that this is “very, very different from COVID.”

What happens now? All eyes are now on Saturday, when the ship is expected in Tenerife. Passengers will remain onboard until evacuation flights are ready, and authorities will begin an operation to disperse them safely. Or maybe cause the end of civilization!

More news below. 👇👇

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🇲🇽 Ayuso travels to Mexico and — surprise! — pisses off her hosts

Guess who’s in town. Madrid regional president Isabel Díaz Ayuso (PP) landed in Mexico on Sunday for what was supposed to be a 10-day official visit. Instead, it’s turned into a transatlantic controversy almost from day one — centered (surprise!) on history.

• If you’re going to go controversial, go big. Things started to unravel when Ayuso backed a tribute to Hernán Cortés in Mexico City — you know, that Cortés. The one who overthrew the Aztec empire (with the help of other indigenous groups) and, in the process, massacred 3,000–6,000 unarmed people at Cholula, either to avoid an ambush or just because he wanted to.

• Heck of a guy. Ayuso praised Cortés as “a key figure in the creation of modern Mexico,” argued Spain’s legacy is one of mestizaje (cultural/racial mixture) rather than something to apologize for, and warned against the “death of democracy under socialism,” naming both Spain and Mexico as examples. So: a light agenda.

Bad timing. Spain–Mexico relations have been shaky for years after former president López Obrador demanded an apology for colonial abuses, which Spain rejected. Recently, though, things were starting to thaw: King Felipe VI offered some conciliatory words, and Mexico’s president Claudia Sheinbaum lowered the temperature in a visit to Barcelona.

• Then Ayuso shows up… and 💥.

Not amused — then amused. Sheinbaum fired back hard, saying anyone trying to reframe the conquest as something positive is “destined to fail.” But the next day, she walked it back, insisting Ayuso has “the right to speak” and this won’t derail bilateral relations.

• Back in Spain. Digital Transformation Minister Óscar López called the trip “irresponsible” — no surprise, given that Sánchez is setting him up as the PSOE candidate to run against Ayuso in the next election.

Presidenta non grata? At a Mexican airport, a local woman confronted Ayuso directly, criticizing her conquest comments and pointedly reminding her that México is spelled with an “x,” not a “j” — something Ayuso loves to do because it provokes people. The video went viral almost instantly.

• Wealthy Mexicans, who have been moving to Madrid in significant numbers, drawn for stability, lifestyle, and tax reasons, seem less stressed by Ayuso’s heroes, or her spelling.

Next stops? Monterrey and the Riviera Maya. We’re sure it’ll be calm. 🤣

2. 🇺🇸 Ceuta and Melilla are framed as ‘Moroccan’ in Washington

More surprises! Buried in a U.S. congressional budget document, a House committee has (for the first time) echoed Morocco’s long-standing claim over Spain’s Ceuta and Melilla.

• The wording is doing a lot of heavy lifting. The two cities are described as being “in Moroccan territory” but “under Spanish administration”.

• Um, like what “future”? The document encourages Secretary of State Marco Rubio (aka Mark Blondy) to help mediate their “future status.” (Translation: they are not quite Spanish, and are potentially negotiable). For the local government in these areas, this is a 🚩 (or a 🇲🇦, if you know what we mean).

Reality check. Ceuta and Melilla are not some ambiguous leftovers of the empire. They are Spanish cities, full stop, and have been for centuries.

• Heap long time. Melilla has been Spanish since 1497. Ceuta since 1668. Their residents are Spanish citizens, they vote, they’re part of the EU, and Madrid treats them the same way it treats Barcelona or Seville. For Spain, they’re not colonies, not disputed territories, and definitely not up for negotiation.

Why this now? Because of who pushed it. The language was introduced by Republican congressman Mario Díaz-Balart, a close Rubio ally and member of the pro-Morocco caucus.

• Freelance geography lessons. He’s been openly saying for weeks that Ceuta and Melilla are “in Morocco,” and that their status should be discussed “between allies.” That framing is exactly what Rabat has been arguing for years.

• Not law (yet). This is all part of an explanatory report attached to a budget bill. It still needs to pass the full House, then the Senate. But politically, it matters.

Great timing, too. Spain and the U.S. are not in their best moment. There’s been friction over Spain not doing its NATO spending, telling the U.S. it can’t use Spanish bases to attack Iran, and fighting with U.S. BFF Israel.

• Two great tastes that taste great together. At the same time, the U.S. has been doubling down on its alliance with Morocco (which signed a normalization agreement with Israel during Trump I).

Do not escalate. Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares brushed it off with a line that says everything: the Spanishness of Ceuta and Melilla is “as unquestionable as that of Santiago de Compostela.”

• Don’t forget us! PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo is heading to Ceuta this Saturday to mark Europe Day there and use the visit to “reaffirm the Spanishness” of both cities (and push for stronger EU backing).

Temperature rising. A few years ago, a comment like this would have been dismissed as noise. Now, during the “We’d like Greenland” presidency, it sounds sounds considerably less implausible.

3. 🎇 The trial of the century month is all over (except for the crying)

We hardly knew you, ‘Caso Koldo’. After 14 sessions, 70+ witnesses, and more salacious accusations than any single courtroom deserves, Caso Koldo — a case that was ostensibly about corruption in COVID mask contracts, but was really about whether the PSOE is a corrupt multi-headed hydra or just extremely unlucky in its staffing choices — has gone to the judges.

• The verdict may be months away. But memories last forever. Let’s get into what happened — and what’s next

The cast. This was a simple show, with three men sharing one stage (and trying to bring down the rest of the world with them). (A note: all the claims below are alleged, not proven.)

• The Lusty Boss Man 🤵. Ex-Transport Minister José Luis Ábalos allegedly ran a parallel economy from his ministry. In this telling, his bag man delivered cash in a Montblanc backpack — up to €250,000 per run — to his home and office; mask contracts were steered to his associates; one of his mistresses had her Madrid flat paid by his bag man’s partner; his advisor arranged prostitutes for him on a Mexico trip; and he got use of a beach house in Cádiz via a businessman seeking a hydrocarbon license. Prosecution asks: 24 years.

• The Furry Advisor (with a money habit) 🐻. Koldo García, Ábalos’s right-hand man and alleged operational hub. Known in the bag man’s notes as “grandu,” he allegedly told the bag man that Sánchez “knew everything.” His €400,000+ of spending in two years caught the police’s major crimes unit’s eye. Also maintained that his infamous “million in chistorras” text had nothing to do with money. Sure. Prosecution asks: 19.5 years.

• The Big-Mouthed Bag Man 💰. Víctor de Aldama — fixer, cooperating witness, and the man who made this trial considerably more entertaining than it had any right to be. Having admitted to everything, he used his testimony to go further — he named Sánchez “#1” of the criminal organization, roped in Sánchez’s wife Begoña Gómez and former Finance Minister María Jesús Montero, and tossed in Venezuela for flavor. The prosecution said his Sánchez claims lacked proof. Prosecution asks: 7 years (the cooperation discount).

The greatest hits? The prostitutes in Mexico, a paid-for mistress flat, cash in a Montblanc backpack, and Aldama’s blockbuster claim that €1.8 million in illegal donations flowed to PSOE through construction kickbacks — with the president allegedly aware of every peseta.

Their swan songs. In their final statements, Ábalos called the trial a “daily torture” (he comes in handcuffs) and an “inquisitorial process.” Koldo said he was “destroyed,” had lost his friends, and wasn’t “that bad.” Aldama said nothing. Probably wisely.

What’s next. A sentence will come eventually. Aldama and Koldo are also due at the Audiencia Nacional on May 14 in a parallel investigation. For now, Ábalos and Koldo will stay locked up pending the verdict because, not surprisingly, the prosecution says they are flight risks.

We’ll miss you, Caso Koldo. Don’t call us.

4. 🤐 You’ll love this apartment — the owners are about to die

Want more proof that the Spanish real estate market has gone mad? A real estate agency on the outskirts of Madrid caused major drama this week when it promoted a property on Idealista as a great buy because — wait for it — the current owners were on death’s door. ☠️

• Excuse me? Troya Servicios Inmobiliarios, an agency in Leganés on the outskirts of Madrid, listed a flat for €90,000 (😱), calling it a “unique opportunity” because both owners — aged 56 and 59 — “have delicate health conditions such as scoliosis, dialysis, and diabetes that could accelerate the future availability of the property, and they have no offspring.” That’s agency-speak for “one foot in the grave, no one to inherit”.

Some context: Spain has a real estate model called nuda propiedad, in which owners — typically elderly, often sick — sell their home while retaining the right to live in it until they die. The buyer gets a below-market price and… waits.

• Not exactly uplifting. The sellers are usually retirees desperate to avoid poverty, not people optimizing their real estate portfolio. Which makes the incentive structure, let’s say, awkward: as in, the buyer is quietly (or not) rooting for the seller to die. Preferably soon. Troya just forgot to keep that part quiet.

• It gets worse. Buyers circulate jokes about nudging sellers toward extreme sports or crowded places (hi, COVID). We couldn’t document actual foul play — but a movie exists, and French notaries recently faced charges for buying a property from a woman with Alzheimer's symptoms who died 28 days after signing. Just saying.

Anthropologist Jaime Palomera put it well, talking to El País: “The more the life expectancy of those living in the property is shortened, the greater the expected return for the investor. It’s a profoundly predatory logic.” Idealista took the listing down and blamed the agency for, like, maybe revealing confidential health info. The agency said its salespeople were “busy.”

• Troya’s real crime wasn’t doing anything especially wrong. It got caught saying the quiet part out loud.

5. 🎤 Screw Eurovision… We have our own musical show!

We’re not backing down. For the first time in 65 years, Spain’s public broadcaster RTVE will not show Eurovision (aka the Gay Super Bowl), following the country’s withdrawal from the contest over Israel’s participation.

• But don't cry! Instead, that same night, RTVE is rolling out a full-scale alternative: a prime-time musical special designed to fill the Eurovision-shaped void.

Friendly reminder. Spain joined Ireland, Slovenia, Iceland, and the Netherlands in declining to participate, turning what started as controversy into a coordinated boycott. But Spain’s absence hits differently.

• Eurovision here is more than popular. It’s one of the biggest TV events of the year, regularly pulling massive audiences and dominating the cultural conversation (last year’s final pulled over 50% share).

A worthy replacement? Enter La Casa de la Música, a 2.5-hour special hosted by zaddy Jesús Vázquez and packed with big musical names that you probably don’t know (including many with only one name): Raphael, Chanel, Manuel Carrasco, Chenoa, Mónica Naranjo, Ana Belén, Guitarricadelafuente (OK, you may know him), and more.

• Look over here! Officially, RTVE is framing the night around music and “coexistence for peace,” carefully avoiding direct references to Eurovision. Unofficially, it’s a one-to-one replacement, a concert that showcases sSpanish talent and makes a political statement.

Keeping it diplomatic. Eurovision's director said he “misses” the countries that pulled out and wants them back. And the RTVE feels him: TVE director Sergio Calderón said he “understands” the concern and left the door open to a return.

• Awww…But not yet. RTVE marked May 17 (the day after the final) as when they’ll reassess, depending on how the contest unfolds and, crucially, what happens with Israel’s participation. So, not this year.

• Sneaky! The Eurovision organization also tried to lure back some Spanish presence by inviting Jorge González (a Benidorm Fest finalist) to perform at an official event in Vienna. He declined, saying that if his country ain’t going, neither is he.

You can still watch Eurovision. The contest will be available via the official YouTube broadcast, and you can even vote from Spain. But the shared national experience? Gone. No Spanish entry, no coverage, no collective meltdown over televote points.

🔔 Don’t forget to follow us on TikTok!

@thebubblecomFrom tapas to Krispy Kreme 🇺🇸 #spain #lifeinspain #madrid #expatlife

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Party pooper

😥 The economy fiesta might be coming to an end

The economy of Spain in general and Madrid in particular has been “killing it” (technical term) in recent years, as we’ve noted again and again. It’s been leading the big EU countries and, seriously, everyone is moving here (like, even Walton Goggins 🥳).

• But now it looks like there may be clouds on the horizon. Or flies in the ointment. Or ketchup on the tortilla. And we’re beginning to worry that we — and the PSOE-led government that rules us — may be facing a paradigm shift. Let us count the ways.

Three letters: GDP. Spain’s economy has boomed since the COVID pandemic, buoyed by tourism and EU funds, but the air is bleeding out of that balloon. After outpacing the EU’s biggest economies with 2.8% growth last year, it was already expected to slow to 2.2% this year and 2.0% in 2027. Then the Orange Menace started to bomb Iran, f’ing up those growth projections by sending oil prices up ⏫.

• The problem with rising fuel prices? Economy Minister Carlos Cuerpo (a.k.a. Carl Body) says inflation will shoot up to 3.1% (previous expectation: 2.1%), and when things are expensive, people buy less. Even so, Cuerpo is still claiming that 2.2% growth is on for this year despite the fact that the IMF cut its own projection to 2.0% (and 1.7% for 2027). But he admitted that if this war continues, they could cut the number by up to 0.8 percentage points (that would be to 1.4%, for those who don’t like math).

Getting a J-O-B isn’t as easy as it used to be. Employment numbers always sag after the holiday rush, but this year’s drop was crazy bad. The unemployment rate — which briefly dropped below Spain’s (embarrassing) 10% “good news” line at the end of 2025 — shot up to 10.8% in the first quarter with 231,500 new unemployed people, the biggest jump in that time period since 2013 (not including COVID, natch).

• Not great timing. The jump slump arrived just as the government is regularizing a guestimated 500,000 undocumented immigrants — a group that is especially exposed to the shop, restaurant, and domestic jobs that were lost. From exploitation to unemployment…

Finding a place to live? Also (even) harder. If you thought it was hard to find an affordable place to live, well, you might soon be nostalgic for the current situation. The average price per m² of a home in Spain was 14.3% higher in early 2026 compared to a year earlier (in Madrid and Valencia, it was worse: up 19%). Nuts.

• You may not be able to find a place to rent either. The Housing Law of 2023, which allows regional governments to cap rent in “stressed” areas in order to make housing more affordable and accessible, appears to be having the exact opposite effect.

• Less, not more. In Barcelona, which the Catalan government declared “stressed” in March 2024, the number of long-term rentals on offer fell from 132,259 to 79,456 — about 40% — between 2023 and 2026 as landlords took properties off the long-term market and converted them into short-term rentals, according to Observatorio del Alquiler, a think tank. (Fotocasa says more than a third of landlords plan to get out of the long-term market when their current rental contract is done.)

The real problem? Friend-of-The-Bubble (FOTB) Kiko Llaneras of El País has a fascinating deep dive into Spain’s economic state this week. Tl;dr? The average Spanish salary, taking inflation into account, has only risen 5% in the last 30 years — and because of constant tax increases, has actually fallen since 2015.

• Add in housing, and 💥. Take stagnant wages, rising taxes, and housing prices that have risen on average 47.7% since 2015 (and 95.6% in Madrid and Barcelona), according to Caixabank Research, and are you at all surprised that broke youth living with their parents seemingly forever are unhappy — and getting angrier (and moving to the right)?

More news below. 👇👇

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🇪🇸 Vox’s ‘national priority’ comes to life

Going national. Remember that whole “national priority” thing that sounded like a new discriminatory far-right talking point last week? Yeah, it’s now everywhere.

• Going big. What started as a chapter in regional deals between the center-right PP and far-right Vox in places like Extremadura and Aragón has officially taken over Spanish politics. Vox is pushing it hard across regional parliaments (and even town halls), and making it very clear that this is not a suggestion, it’s the line.

• More than a slogan. “Prioridad nacional” means giving preferential access to public aid, housing, and services to people with stronger ties to Spain, which, in practice, critics say opens the door to discrimination against immigrants and creates a two-tier system.

Come at us, bro. Vox, for its part, isn’t backing down. The party has warned the PP it won’t accept any attempt to “water down” the concept with softer language about “arraigo” (attachment) or legal nuance.

• The real deal. Internally, Vox sees “national priority” as a simple, emotionally charged idea that resonates broadly among working-class voters. Their strategy now is to force the PP to fully embrace it or publicly reject it.

Under pressure. In Aragón, regional president Jorge Azcón defended the measure during his investiture, insisting it’s “legal” (just in case) and based on rewarding those with long-term ties to the region.

• Everywhere! Vox is pushing similar proposals in Valencia and also warns they’ll ask for it in Andalucía if the PP needs their votes to govern there.

Quick backlash. PM Sánchez says this is about creating “first and second-class citizens” and has warned the government will step in if any measure crosses legal lines.

• Church, too. The secretary general of the Spanish Catholic bishops’ group has also rejected the idea.

Can’t stop, won’t stop. Vox, unsurprisingly, is emboldened by all of this. Party leader Santiago Abascal lashed out at Sánchez — calling him, among other things, “a piece of shit” during a rally.

• Hitting the church. He also lashed out at bishops who criticized his policies, accusing them of hypocrisy and siding with what he calls a system that “betrays Spaniards.”

Playin’ it cool. The center-right PP is trying not to alienate moderate voters while they face constant pressure from Vox to go further.

• That balancing act might actually be working. According to a poll conducted by the PP, a surprisingly large chunk of socialist voters (around 40%) are receptive to the PP’s softer version of the idea.

Assuming the PP's polling isn't just telling them what they want to hear, this may explain why they aren't slamming the brakes.

2.🐿️ The party might really be over for Alvise Pérez

Speaking about fiestas that are coming to an end, remember Alvise Pérez? The Telegram firebrand who, in 2024, shocked Spain by winning 3 European Parliament seats for his catchily-named party Se acabó la fiesta (”The Party’s Over,” or SALF) — riding 800,000 votes harvested from a brew of far-right messaging, anti-establishment grievance, conspiracy theories, and selectively-deployed online “exposés.”

• Well, his party may indeed be over.

Stripped. The European Parliament has officially stripped him of immunity, clearing the way for Spain’s Supreme Court to put him on trial over the alleged harassment of a Valencia prosecutor. The MEP shield doesn’t apply here because what he’s accused of has nothing to do with his job as a legislator.

• A mess from day one. Since arriving in Brussels, Alvise’s tenure has been an unbroken parade of public feuds with his own party members and constant controversy — culminating now in legal trouble back home.

The case. Prosecutors call it a targeted harassment campaign. In early 2024, Alvise posted messages and photos of a Valencia prosecutor on his Telegram channel, accusing her of persecuting Spaniards.

• The result: around 1,500 abusive messages from his followers, including threats and calls to harass her IRL. The Supreme Court believes there may have been a deliberate attempt to mobilize his audience against her.

Not the only one! This is one of five open legal investigations.

• The greatest hits. Illegal campaign financing — a €100,000 payment from a crypto bro “businessman” Alvise has openly acknowledged receiving; spreading a fake COVID test about a high-profile politician, admitted in court; allegedly harassing his own former SALF colleagues; and a separate Supreme Court probe into alleged threats against the mayor of Algeciras.

What now? With immunity gone, the Supreme Court can finally proceed with the first trial — and potentially others, depending on whether further immunity requests are lifted. None of this means he’s guilty. But the heat shield is off.

• Witch hunt! Alvise has already framed it all as part of a “corrupt system” targeting him — a narrative that plays well with his base. (Sounds familiar?)

Make Spain great again. Fret not, anti-establishment readers: he’s already announced he’s running in the 2027 general election.

3. 🌑 A year ago, all the lights went out — and we still don’t know who to blame

On April 28, 2025, a historic blackout plunged Spain into darkness, unleashing societal collapse of a profundity never seen outside of The Last of Us 🧟. Widespread looting, radioactive panthers, zombie hordes, paella made with chorizo…it was madness.

• Actually, none of that happened. Some 35,000 people were stranded in trains, and a team of window cleaners got stuck on one of Madrid’s Cuatro Cinco Torres skyscrapers. But at least judging from The Bubble’s “on the ground reporting” at the time, a big chunk of Spain’s population took it upon themselves to rescue warming beer and dance the Macarena (literally).

But it was a big f-up that cost us all a 💩-ton of 💰 — and a year on, no one’s saying whose fault it was.

• The reports. Four official investigations and one parliamentary inquiry have produced an impressive paper trail and exactly zero resignations. Beatriz Corredor, the former PSOE Housing Minister who Sánchez’s government appointed chair of partially state-owned grid operator Red Eléctrica — a €546k-a-year job — is still there. Energy Secretary Sara Aagesen still has her job. Sánchez himself has very pointedly not apologized.

What happened (allegedly). The technical consensus — to the extent there is one — points to a voltage surge cascading through a grid running on 55.5% renewables, causing every energy producer to go offline lest they suffer damage.

• Green fail? Not quite. The cause, experts say, wasn’t “excessive” renewables but a grid increasingly reliant on them and not yet fully adapted — meaning, in plain terms, more batteries and more gas/nuclear backup to absorb sudden clouds or a drop in the breeze. Spain has been early out of the gate on this; it’s uncharted ground.

The blame game. Red Eléctrica blames the utilities. The utilities blame Red Eléctrica. Iberdrola is suing. The Senate’s PP-majority report demanded dismissals — Corredor’s, Aagesen’s, the lot — which the government received with the seriousness it reserves for things it intends to ignore. Feijóo, predictably, called for resignations. Sánchez, equally predictably, has not delivered.

• Fines? Maybe. The CNMC (Spain’s competition authority and über-regulator), meanwhile, has opened 55 sanction investigations. Resolutions will arrive after an 18-month investigation — putting the actual reckoning in late 2027 or early 2028, by which point we will all surely have moved on to a fresh catastrophe (and past the next elections).

The money. Direct losses topped €1 billion. The extra cost of preventing a repeat (by topping up with conventional power)? €666m — a number whose biblical vibe is, we assume, conveniente. Consumers have absorbed it via a 10% rise in their electricity bills, because of course they did.

• Nobody else pays? Unlikely. Repsol is suing for €175m. The OCU may push households to sue. But CNMC’s maximum fine tops out at €60m — roughly a tenth of what consumers are paying to fix the problem.

The takeaway. 86.7% of Spaniards think it could happen again. They are, statistically speaking, probably right. As for who’s to blame — well, that’s what the next 18 months are for. For now, the lights are on. 🕯️

4. ✈️ Ryanair tells Spain it prefers Morocco and Italy

The war between Ryanair and Spain has gotten so bad that the cheap bastards discount airline is using a cake to mock the government. (See above.)

• Just wanted to say “hi.” Ryanair CEO Eddie Wilson flew into Madrid on Monday — exactly the day state-controlled airport operator AENA was distributing its annual dividends (€834m of which went straight to the state) — to announce that AENA’s fees are too damn high, so Ryanair will cut 1.2m seats in Spain this summer. (He says this year will be the first Ryanair hasn’t grown in Spain since it entered the market.)

The argument. Ryanair is annoying colorful (more on the cake below), but its grievances always reduce to money. AENA wants to raise fees 21% (plus inflation) over 2027-2031. Wilson’s take: AENA runs “excessive” 60% margins, has paid €5bn in dividends to the government over the past four years, and plowed €800m into airports in Brazil and the U.K. in the last 12 months alone — even as regional Spanish airports run 70% empty.

• Wilson’s verdict: “It is extraordinary that the Spanish government prioritizes dividends and sending money generated at Spanish airports overseas, at the expense of areas losing routes, tourists, and jobs.” Ouch. 🔥

Promises made, promises kept. None of this is new — Ryanair told us back in October it would do exactly this. The 1.2m cut is the third wave in a year, following last summer’s 800k-seat reduction and last winter’s 1m cut. Total damage since summer 2024: 3m seats

• So few seats. Asturias, Valladolid, Jerez, Tenerife Norte, and Vigo lose 100% of Ryanair service. Santiago drops 79%, Zaragoza 45%, Santander 41%. Girona and the Canaries take smaller hits.

• Ryan’s new friends. Meanwhile, Ryanair will grow 11% in Morocco and 9% in Italy — “significantly more competitive countries than Spain,” per Wilson. In other words, Ryanair to España Profunda: Screw you.

So much love. Ryanair’s other Spain grievances are still simmering: the €107m fine for charging for hand luggage (under appeal), the European Commission’s case against Spain over the hand-luggage sanctions, and the never-ending Bustinduy feud — group CEO Michael O’Leary’s nickname for the consumer minister, you’ll recall, was “crazy communist.”

And the cake? Pure Ryanair. The PR shop knows newspaper business desks need a single arresting image, so Wilson rolled out a frosted prop for AENA’s dividend day, showing most of its money reserved for dividends and investments abroad, with a tiny sliver for Spain’s regions.

• Petty? Yes. Effective? Also yes — exhibit A: this newsletter.

5. 🐾 Spain’s wildest ‘influencer’ lynx is hunting street cats

Uh-oh! A wild Iberian lynx nicknamed Veneno has basically moved into the small town of Cabañas de Yepes (in Toledo) and is regularly terrorizing hunting the local street cat colony.

• Viral cat. What would normally be a quiet ecological situation has exploded because neighbors started filming it, and now the media (get this) is calling it an “influencer lynx” thanks to how viral it’s become.

Here, kitty. According to very serious reporting, Veneno shows up almost daily, walking through streets, jumping walls, even sleeping in roundabouts like it owns the place. Veneno, who was born in 2024 in the Montes de Toledo, lives in a nearby valley (an ideal lynx habitat full of rabbits) and has learned a route straight into town.

• Once there, it targets the local cats — not out of cruelty, but instinct. For a lynx, other small mammals are either prey or competition.

• To locals, though, those are their cats. Some of them are even cared for by a community association. According to residents, 20 may already be gone.

Don’t pspspsps it. That’s where the tension kicks in. On one hand, many locals are fascinated (it’s not every day you see a critically endangered species strolling past your house!). On the other hand, there’s real concern for the cats, for the lynx itself (it could get hit by a car!), and for public safety if people start, like, crowding or chasing it.

• That’s already happening (shocker). People from nearby towns are literally showing up to take selfies with the murderous wild predator (don’t worry, according to experts, they won’t attack you). At one point, a town meeting about the lynx basically emptied because Veneno walked past outside.

Time to move on. Now, authorities are trying to gently push Veneno back out of town by removing food sources for cats, limiting human interaction, and discouraging people from feeding or approaching it.

• More followers than you. As for the “influencer” label, it’s because Veneno has become a viral star. Videos of it hunting or roaming are all over social media, turning it into an accidental celebrity (and even a potential tourist attraction).

Back with a vengeance. This is happening because the Iberian lynx is making a comeback. Just a couple of decades ago, it was on the brink of extinction, with fewer than 100 individuals left.

• Thanks to conservation efforts, the species has recovered. So Veneno wandering into town is actually a side effect of success. Can Madrid get one too?

🔔 Don’t forget to follow us on TikTok!

If you’re not following us on TikTok yet, you’re missing out. We’re posting exclusive content with our collaborators across Spain, breaking news updates, and pop culture coverage. Click on the post above and come hang with us!

🙏 Once again, please remember to share this newsletter with your friends on social media. The more we grow, the more information we’ll be able to offer each week.

Share

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Crossed wires

🇻🇪 Venezuela's opposition leader ghosts Sánchez government

Guess who was in town? María Corina Machado, leader of the Venezuelan opposition and recent Nobel Peace Prize winner, spent the weekend in Madrid and was welcomed like a head of state… just not by the Spanish government.

• ¡La Presidenta! Machado, who is widely seen as the real winner of the country’s last elections (even though she was disqualified from running), landed in Spain to a reception that felt closer to a victory tour than a diplomatic visit.

• Tighty righties. She met center-right PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo at party headquarters — where she was greeted with applause and chants of “libertad” — and then far-right Vox leader Santiago Abascal for good measure.

But wait, there’s more! Machado also held high-profile meetings with Madrid’s regional president, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, and Madrid mayor José Luis Martínez-Almeida.

• Want something shiny? Ayuso awarded Machado the Gold Medal of the Community of Madrid, and Almeida handed her the symbolic keys to the city, a gesture usually reserved for heads of state or major historical figures.

The optics mattered. Madrid is home to one of the largest Venezuelan diaspora communities in Europe. Some 200,000 people who fled the crisis back home came to the city.

• Many of them see Machado as their political representative, so her appearance at the Puerta del Sol, where she addressed a crowd of supporters waving Venezuelan flags and chanting her name, felt like a campaign rally (albeit in exile).

Where’s Pedro? Despite being invited, Machado did not meet with Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez nor anyone else from the Spanish government. Eeeeenteresting… 🤔

The water simmers. The awkwardness of not meeting started politely, through clenched smiles. Sánchez said he was “delighted to meet Señora Machado whenever she has the opportunity” — the doors of Moncloa, he added, are always open. Machado had said that meeting him simply “no es conveniente” (“It is not advisable.") right now. Nothing personal, you understand.

• But really, what's up? Machado nodded at one reason she didn't meet Mr Handsome —the progressive summit he was hosting in Barcelona, which featured left-wing leaders of countries like Colombia, Brazil, and Mexico who'd been kinda friendly with her nemesis, now-jailed Nicolás Maduro.

• Now we get it. She added some spice in an interview with El Mundo: “Meeting with Pedro Sánchez would have sent the wrong message; our cause is about truth and about the people.” Ouch.

The water boils. Then Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares started punching back on RNE. Machado, he noted, had managed to meet Feijóo, Ayuso, Almeida and Abascal: “She has acted as an ideological leader meeting with her political spectrum, which is the Spanish far right.”

• A little gratitude, please. Albares reminded everyone that this government flew Machado’s proxy Edmundo González out on a military plane and just rushed Spanish citizenship to fellow opposition leader Leopoldo López (who previously found asylum in Spain’s Caracas embassy). “Is it necessary to hide what Spain does for Venezuela in order to please others?” (Who are those others? Just wait…)

The pot explodes. Albares dropped a bombshell: Machado herself, he claimed, had once asked for refuge inside Spain’s Caracas embassy, and he’d granted it.

• Calling bull💩. Machado’s team called that “false.” Diplomatic sources told El Mundo the offer went the other way. And Machado fired back… obliquely: “There are opaque episodes” around Spain’s dealings in Venezuela, she told El Español, and “I have information others don’t” — that will be deployed once verified, we presume. 🤔

So what’s going on here? Two things, probably.

• First, of all European governments, Sánchez’s has been friendliest to Maduro — which doesn’t exactly build trust with the Venezuelan opposition.

• But more importantly, Sánchez and Trump are at each other’s throats, and Trump is the one who might actually install Machado in Caracas — having, in January, ordered the Fuerte Tiuna raid that dragged Maduro off to a New York cell. ”The only head of state who put his citizens’ lives on the line for our freedom,” she gushed in El Español. A bit thick, but she knows which side her arepa is buttered on.

P.S. Watching Leopoldo López try to avoid getting involved in the Machado/Sánchez spat in this interview is hilaaaaaarious. Dude will say anything to say nothing. Deer in headlights total.

More news below. 👇👇

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🧑🏻‍💼 Pedro Sánchez has an international fan club, but…

The Prime Minister’s moves to take on Trump and Netanyahu, as well as his recent confab of the international left in Barcelona, have brought him a sizable fan club abroad. And that fandom went up 11 on Monday, when the CIS public research institute’s April poll showed Sánchez’s PSOE extending its lead over the center-right PP to 12.8 points, 36.4% to 23.6%.

• Overseas praise flooded social media, like the post above from DemsMight, a pro-Democratic party (U.S.) messaging group: “Looks like being anti-war and having cojones is popular. Spain is taking notice.”

But there’s a data problem. The CIS has a certain cachet — publicly funded, historically respected — but in recent years, well, not so much. After taking office in 2018, Sánchez appointed sociologist José Félix Tezanos — then a sitting PSOE executive committee member — as chair. Since then, the rosy poll numbers the CIS hands the PSOE have been wrong so often that they mostly qualify as wish fulfillment.

Seriously, that bad. As friend-of-Bubble Kiko Llaneras of El País has documented, the CIS under Tezanos has overestimated the left in 41 of the 42 elections analyzed since 2018. (Another analysis finds that the CIS underweights support for the right — PP + the far-right Vox — by 11 percentage points on average.)

• Plenty better ones. Private pollsters like 40dB. and the El País poll-of-polls have been consistently more accurate, while the CIS lives in a parallel (inaccurate) universe where the left almost always does a bit better than in real life.

• It’s not just the numbers. Former members of the CIS advisory council — including old friends and heavyweight sociologists — have filed formal complaints and quietly walked away, decrying the “CIS de Tezanos” brand that now clings to the center like bad cologne. One described it bluntly as “the least neutral institution in Spain right now.”

But has Sánchez’s Trump pushback helped? Yes — just not as much as the CIS suggests. Polls by SocioMétrica for El Español have found that the PSOE would win 110 seats (out of 350) if elections were held today, up 12 from two months ago, just before Sánchez took his stand against the war. That growth has come at the expense of the PSOE’s far-left allies and Vox; the PP held steady with 140, and could still form a majority with Vox.

• Does playing with the numbers help your side? Doubtful — and Sánchez may not trust the CIS polls himself. As the commentariat often notes, if he actually believed he had a 13-point lead, he’d call elections tomorrow.

Our take. Sánchez’s pushback on Trump is paying dividends (and is eminently justifiable). But Spanish voters are tired of him for many other reasons, and won’t switch to him en masse for heckling the Orange Menace. Indeed, Sánchez may be turning into Southern Europe’s Mikhail Gorbachev — popular abroad and unloved at home. Maybe the UN has a job for him?

2. 🤝 PP and Vox finally strike a deal in Extremadura (and it’s… complicated)

Cue the Imperial March from Star Wars. More than 100 days after the regional elections, regional president María Guardiola’s PP and Vox have reached an agreement to form a government in Extremadura.

• The deal secures a four-year coalition. Vox will form part of the government with a vice presidency, two ministries, and a regional senate seat.

• This is big news because it wasn’t supposed to be this easy, or even happen. Guardiola openly clashed with Vox leader Santiago Abascal during the campaign, even accusing him of “machismo,” and initially resisted governing with his party.

Agree to disagree. The deal itself is broad (61 points and 74 measures), but it’s the content that’s raising eyebrows. Among (many) other things, the coalition is pushing for lower taxes; a tougher stance on immigration; a ban on burqas and similar garments in public spaces; and a clear rejection of parts of the EU’s Green Deal and the UN’s 2030 Agenda. It also includes measures to “protect” the agricultural sector from Brussels and to extend the life of the Almaraz nuclear plant.

• The most controversial part? The so-called “national priority” principle. On paper, it prioritizes access to public aid, like housing and social benefits, for those with a “real, durable connection” to Extremadura.

• But, but, but… In practice, critics say it’s a backdoor way of discriminating against immigrants. The policy would favor long-term residents regardless of nationality, but it also explicitly seeks to limit access for people in irregular situations and calls for reforming Spain’s immigration law to make this possible.

Slight problem. Under current Spanish and EU law, this kind of discrimination is likely illegal, and the backlash was immediate. The PSOE labeled the pact “racist” and warned that it would challenge any discriminatory measures in the Constitutional Court.

• Surprise! Even within the PP, there’s discomfort: Madrid regional president Isabel Díaz Ayuso publicly questioned the legality of “national priority,” arguing that “you can’t exclude people who have rights and contribute.”

• Another surprise! Yesterday afternoon, emboldened by what was happening in Extremadura, Vox went on a series of, ahem, “controversial” statements about non-Spaniards in Parliament and insisted on the need to reform Spain’s immigration law. The PP chose not to confront them on the floor but then low-key sided with PSOE and voted against their motion, effectively killing it. Sad!

Business as usual. Guardiola, for her part, is trying to walk a fine line. On Tuesday, she insisted the government will “never break the law” while doubling down on the message that Extremadura won’t “pay the price of a broken migration model.”

• She said this isn’t exclusion, but fairness for those who “have been contributing for years.” Then, after being officially voted in as the new regional boss yesterday (see video above), she said "she wouldn’t apologize” for governing with Vox.

Other unholy alliances. While Vox and the PP are still trying to reach a deal in Castilla y León, the parties announced yesterday that they had also reached a deal in Aragón. Expect the debate over immigration to get a lot louder.

3. 🛂 The mass regularization of immigrants has begun — and everyone’s fighting about it

No one could have predicted this. Okay, everyone predicted this. Ram through a mass regularization via a questionable decreto real during peak culture war, and you’d expect just a little chaos and fighting. And we got it — in spades. Let us count the ways.

First, shambles. “The queues we see are only for getting the documents,” government workers deadpanned to La Voz de Galicia, after NGOs and municipal offices found scores of applicants asleep on cardboard outside their offices, waiting for Monday’s first in-person slots.

• So many people. Madrid’s daily applications leapt from 1,500 to 5,500 in a week. Outside Aculco, a Madrid NGO that handles 300 a day, hundreds queued from the night before. “We’re overwhelmed — we didn’t expect this,” director Álvaro Zuleta told CNN. The government’s own prep? A Friday-at-5:38pm email begging the Federation of Spanish Municipalities to pitch in.

• The biggest confusion. Municipal offices and NGOs have been slammed by applicants seeking a “certificate of vulnerability” — except no one quite knows how to certify it. Madrid’s social-policy chief (of the PP, so not a government fan) says functionaries are working practically blind. Valencia mayor María José Catalá (also PP) was blunter: “If the Minister of Inclusion, Elma Saiz, says that any undocumented person is vulnerable [which she kinda did], then the question is: why is a certificate required to prove it?“ Catalá is also asking Madrid to pay her city’s €1 million paperwork tab.

Second, prisoners. The Ministry of Interior quietly instructed Spain’s 80 state-run prisons to help inmates in preventive custody — some 3,500 foreigners without convictions — apply. The opposition? Not happy. “A preventive prisoner is someone a judge has sent to jail over the risk of flight or recidivism,” PP’s Alma Ezcurra tweeted.

• The worry? Paperwork moves faster inside prison than for migrants on sidewalks — and once regularized, deportation gets much harder. The move is probably fair — innocent until proven guilty and all — but not a great look.

Third, scams. Appointments for empadronamiento (residence registration) or to file paperwork at Correos are both free. A black market has sprung up anyway.

• Nayeli, a Mexican student, paid €150 for a padrón that never materialized; others report quotes of €400 for padrón and €600 for a single Correos slot. Police say mafias use bots to hoover up appointments and resell them in locutorios. The government delegate in Catalonia has had to beg consuls to tell their citizens: “Nobody has to pay a single euro.”

This probably isn’t making the whole regularization any more popular. SocioMétrica’s poll for El Español finds 66.7% of Spaniards against it — rising to 80.5% among 17-to-25-year-olds. Polls are famously imperfect, but those aren’t great numbers. “Spain is the daughter of immigration and will not be the mother of xenophobia,” Sánchez said. Fine sentiments. But Spaniards, it seems, are unconvinced.

4. 🦠 A Valencia med school gave anatomy students cadavers infected with Hep C and COVID

Whoopsie. According to investigations by El País and Eldiario.es, a private medical school in Valencia’s CEU Cardenal Herrera University has been using cadavers with infectious diseases in anatomy classes, including a body infected with hepatitis C, which is gross considered a high risk.

• Threepeat. According to El País, at least three bodies used between 2022 and 2024 carried infections: hepatitis C, flu (H1N1), and COVID-19.

Here’s why that’s a problem. Across Spain (and internationally), universities routinely exclude bodies with infectious diseases like hepatitis B/C or HIV from teaching use. Not necessarily because contagion is likely (experts say embalming and time reduce viral activity significantly), but because basic safety standards demand it. Even Spain’s own academic bodies stress this is “common sense.” (And this university’s own internal rules banned accepting those bodies.)

Who? Me? The university admitted there had been an “error” with the hepatitis C case, essentially acknowledging that the body should never have been accepted.

• We tried! Then they spoke to Las Provincias and explained that all bodies underwent serological testing and that the results came back negative for COVID and flu.

Another whoopsie. The university was already sanctioned by the regional government after a whistleblower revealed that, for years, cadavers had been embalmed by someone without legally required medical qualifications.

• Authorities confirmed the violation, which could have justified shutting down the facility, but ultimately issued a relatively small fine (€15,100).

Fortunately, no infections were reported among students, but this raises serious questions about how casually protocols may have been treated. Next, zombies! 🧟

5. 🫣 Bullfighting’s biggest star receives a brutal ‘rectal’ goring in Sevilla

Hurts to see it. One of Spain’s most famous matadors, Morante de la Puebla (whose retirement we covered last October), was left “very seriously” injured after being gored during a bullfight at the iconic Plaza de la Maestranza, in Seville.

• The bull caught him from behind, driving its horn into his glute and causing a 10 cm wound that perforated his rectum 😱 (one of the most serious injuries in bullfighting — and gross!).

Wait, who? Knowing our readers, you’re probably not into bullfighting. But Morante isn’t just any torero.

• A living legend. He’s like the Elvis of bullfighters and a cultural icon who has transcended the bullring to become a mass phenomenon in Spain. His post-retirement return this season had fans super excited, making the incident even more shocking.

Behind you! The moment itself was sudden and brutal. The bull ignored the cape, turned unexpectedly, and struck him from behind before he could react. Morante collapsed in the arena, visibly searching for the wound as assistants rushed in.

• The audience went silent while they carried him out “like a Christ figure” to the infirmary (yes, the bullring has its own operating room in case it’s needed). There, he was operated on before being transferred to the hospital.

A real pain in the ass. Doctors later confirmed the severity: damage to the anal sphincter and a perforation of the rectum, requiring complex reconstructive surgery (they promise to make his rectum Hollywood pretty). Surgeon Octavio Mulet said the real danger wasn’t just the injury itself, but the high risk of infection due to the location.

• Morante told El Mundo that it was “the most painful goring of my life” and that he feared the horn had reached “his guts”. Despite that, he’s already left the ICU, and he is stable and even “in good spirits.”

Hurts donut? The incident has reignited the usual debate around bullfighting. Animal rights party PACMA responded sharply, asking: “Does it hurt? For the bull, always.”

• They criticized the attention given to the matador’s injury while the bull's suffering “remains normalized”. (The bull, by the way, is now dead.)

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Grab the popcorn

🇨🇳 Sánchez visits China again. And again.

Back in town. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez is back in Beijing. Again. But this time, the context couldn’t be more, ahem, loaded. As Spain’s relationship with the U.S. continues to sour over the war in Iran and broader geopolitical tensions, the PM has doubled down on a different strategy: strengthening ties with China and positioning Spain as a key player in a rapidly shifting global order.

• Hold on to your butts. This is Sánchez’s fourth trip to China in just over three years, a pace of diplomatic courtship that would be eyebrow-raising in normal times. Over a packed few days, he delivered a major speech at the “Harvard of the Communist Party”, met with President Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of the People, signed cooperation agreements with Prime Minister Li Qiang, and toured tech giant Xiaomi (because apparently no trip to China is complete without touring a tech campus and pretending you understand the supply chain).

A busy agenda. Officially, Sánchez’s visit was about strengthening economic ties, attracting Chinese investment, and boosting Spanish exports, especially in sectors like agriculture, infrastructure, and green technology.

• Spain, like much of Europe, depends on China for key materials and renewable tech. But politically, this trip is about something bigger: positioning Spain as a “middle power” that can operate beyond the traditional U.S.-EU axis, especially at a time when Washington is increasingly unpredictable.

Not a one-off. Spain has quietly become one of the most China-friendly countries in the EU. While others in Europe flirt with a tougher stance, Sánchez has leaned into engagement, even as critics warn the relationship is deeply unbalanced, with China dominating trade. However, Madrid sees Beijing as both an economic opportunity and a geopolitical necessity.

• In Beijing, Sánchez didn’t hold back — well, at least not entirely. He called on Beijing to “do more” to uphold international law and help end conflicts from Gaza to Ukraine.

• He also delivered a message on trade: Europe has opened up, and now it’s China’s turn. “We need China to open up so Europe doesn’t have to close itself,” he said, calling the current trade deficit “unsustainable.”

• Really, Spain needs a trade upgrade. Spain’s trade deficit with China jumped to €42bn last year — accounting for 74% of Spain's total deficit. A central aim of the visit was to sign a High Quality Investment Agreement that, Bloomberg notes, aims to ensure that Chinese investments in Spain involve technology transfers to local companies, contracts for local suppliers, and jobs for locals. (🤞 on that.)

BFFs 4 ever. The real headline came in his meeting with Xi. Without naming Trump, both leaders took aim at what they see as a world drifting toward unilateralism, or, as Xi put it, “the law of the jungle.”

• Sánchez echoed that language, pushing for a stronger multilateral system where the EU and China cooperate to ease global tensions.

• Sánchez’s outspoken “No to war” stance, especially his refusal to support U.S. military operations in Iran, has made him something of an unlikely hero in China.

• Chinese officials and media have praised his position, portraying him as a leader willing to stand up to Washington and as being on the “right side of history”. More importantly, Beijing increasingly sees him as a bridge between China and Brussels (a role that, notably, parts of the EU now seem to support).

Sánchez is trying to redefine Spain’s place in the world, somewhere between Brussels, Washington, and Beijing — and a lot closer to the latter. Whether this is visionary or reckless probably depends on how the next six months of global trade politics (and the Orange Menace's whims) unfold.

More news below. 👇👇

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💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🛂 The government fired the starting gun on its massive immigrant regularization — and it’s already got troubles

Spain’s “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses” moment is finally here. On Tuesday, the PSOE-led coalition approved a royal decree that will regularize an estimated 500,000 undocumented immigrants.

• We covered the mechanics in depth when the first draft dropped, so here’s the short version. Think tank Funcas estimates there are 840,000 undocumented immigrants in Spain; to qualify, you need to have lived here for at least five months as of Dec. 31, 2025, and have a clean record; and the application window runs until June 30. (Read this if you want more.)

Now, the fun part. The decree was pushed through as a real decreto rather than a real decreto-ley — a crucial distinction, because the latter requires congressional ratification within 30 days, while the former bypasses parliament entirely. No debate, no opposition input, no vote. It’s essentially payment to hard-left Podemos for support on other issues — and the reason the opposition is heading straight to the Supreme Court.

Politics first. You will not be shocked to learn that Vox hates it, and that the PP feels obliged to perform outrage lest Vox hoover up its voters.

• PP boss Alberto Núñez Feijóo said “immigration in bulk” (as opposed to case-by-case) “has no precedent in any European country” and could become “the gateway for illegality.”

• Madrid’s Isabel Díaz Ayuso announced she’d appeal to the Supreme Court over the supposedly catastrophic effects on public services. (Worth noting: both PP and PSOE governments have done big regularizations before, with no sudden service collapse to speak of.)

• Vox’s Santiago Abascal went ominous on X, writing, “The people won’t forgive you. Sooner or later you’ll have to pay for it.” His party also said it would appeal to the Supreme Court.

Then there’s the fine print. El Consejo de Estado — the advisory body that checks legislation for constitutional compliance — found plenty to complain about.

• The most eyebrow-raising problem with the original draft? It let applicants self-certify that they had no criminal record. As in, “Trust me.” (A bit of an oversight!) The government has since amended this to require a police report; if an applicant’s home country is slow to provide one, Spain will follow up through diplomatic channels. Problem solved, technically.

And pity the poor bureaucrats. Half a million new applications are incoming, with no meaningful increase in the number of people to process them. Immigration officers across Spain have threatened to strike starting April 21 — the day after in-person appointments open — arguing the system simply isn’t ready for the flood.

• Our take? It’s a messy law, rushed through with minimal debate. But getting half a million people out of the shadows — where they are routinely exploited — is a good thing. (Sánchez’s own defense of the decree is here.)

2. ⚖️ PM Sánchez’s wife faces four charges and is on the brink of trial

Here we go. The investigation into PM Sánchez’s wife, Begoña Gómez, has taken a decisive turn. After two years of legal drama, Judge Juan Carlos Peinado has formally proposed sending her to trial — in Spanish legal terms, the step right before oral proceedings begin.

• 4 crimes. In a 39-page ruling, he argues there are sufficient indications to charge her with four crimes: influence peddling, corruption in business, embezzlement of public funds, and misappropriation of a trademark. (One earlier accusation, professional misconduct, has been dropped).

Wait… how did we get here? The case dates back to April 2024, when a complaint was filed by the pseudo-union Manos Limpias, a far-right organization known for filing politically charged lawsuits that usually end in nothing.

• That initial complaint snowballed, with additional accusations from hard-right groups like Hazte Oír and Vox turning what started as a fringe legal move into a full-blown political and judicial saga.

At the center of it all is Judge Peinado himself, who has become almost as controversial as the case. His investigation has been repeatedly corrected by higher courts, including the Audiencia Provincial, which has overturned several of his decisions and limited the scope of the case.

• He has attempted to expand the investigation in multiple directions — from Air Europa’s bailout to implicating ministers — mostly without success. Add unusually political language in his rulings (including comparisons of the Sánchez government to “absolutist regimes”), and you get a judge who has become part of the story.

The substance of the case. Peinado argues that Gómez used her position as the PM’s wife to advance her professional activities.

• The alleged influence peddling centers on her role as a university chair at the Complutense and her relationships with companies that later secured public contracts.

• The corruption in business charge relates to how she allegedly negotiated sponsorships with major firms.

• The embezzlement angle focuses on a Moncloa-funded adviser who, according to the judge, worked partly on Gómez’s private projects.

• The misappropriation claim revolves around a software project developed with public and private resources that was later registered under her name.

But wait, Gómez is not on trial yet. For that to happen, the accusers must formally request a trial within five days. If they do, Peinado can issue an order to open oral proceedings.

• From there, the case would still face scrutiny from the Audiencia Provincial, which has already shown it is willing to rein in parts of this investigation.

The government, unsurprisingly, is not buying any of this. Government sources speak of “indignation,” accusing the judge of timing his decisions to coincide with Sánchez’s international trips (this one dropped while the PM was in China).

• Justice Minister Félix Bolaños went further, saying the investigation has “embarrassed many judges” and caused “irreparable damage” to the justice system.

• Sánchez himself has stuck to a more measured line: “I ask the justice system to deliver justice,” while insisting his wife is innocent.

So what happens next? After the five-day window closes, expect appeals, procedural fights, and, if the trial moves forward, a media circus.

• Realistically, we won’t know whether Gómez actually faces trial for months, and possibly not before Peinado himself retires in September. We’ll keep you posted.

3. ✝️ We’re fighting about the Pope’s visit because… reasons

Unlike a certain Orange Menace, Spain isn’t fighting with the pope. That wouldn’t be original and, plus, we’re classy. But that doesn’t mean we’re above fighting about the pope. Oh no, we’re getting all hot and bothered before the holy fella’s June 6-12 visit to Spain.

• Shocker, we know. You will be surprised, we’re sure, to learn that the throwdown over Pope Leo XIV’s visit is all sorts of political and reflects the usual left/right fault lines in Spanish society (which are deep but no, not as deep as the onion/no onion in the tortilla thing).

Leo’s coming at a time of religious change. The power in Spain’s church has begun to shift away from the conservative clergy who’ve run it for, like, ever.

• The influence of the Conferencia Episcopal Española (CEE) — the administrative institution in Spain — over the PP has faded; its relationship with the government has soured during negotiations over reparations for the church’s massive child sex abuse scandal; and a new generation of TikTok Catholic influencers — and not, you know, priests — have become the voice of the youth.

• Plus, church leaders have faced fire from far-right Catholics (in Vox and beyond) for being okay with renaming the Valley of the Fallen during the time of Leo's predecessor, Francis. And Leo himself has taken many firm stands on the need to treat illegal immigrants with respect (not exactly a right-wing talking point).

So there have been plenty of dustups before Leo’s arrival. Let us count the ways.

• His arrival. El País reports that the conservative side of the church would like him to arrive down the Calle de Alcalá in an alabaster chariot drawn by a team of angels (the chariot is a joke!), and pass through the Puerta de Alcalá in Barrio Salamanca (aka the rich neighborhood). Left-leaning clergy say it’s clear he should arrive through Carabanchel (aka the not-so-rich neighborhood), where he would presumably wash the feet of the poor and marginalized of the zone (plus the hipsters who’ve recently colonized the area). Okay, the hipster feet thing is our idea.

• Sponsors? Clergy and others not aligned with the CEE are asking why the group is raising sponsorship money to finance the €15 million trip — for a donation of €500,000 to €1m, you get a private audience with Leo — when the Spanish church’s income was €1.4bn in 2024. (We’re just happy to see that Mahou has already signed up as a sponsor, so there will be plenty of beer.)

• Addressing parliament. There are discussions about having Pope Leo speak to parliament, which would be a first for a pope. But there are worries that Vox might stand him up — not only has he spoken out in defense of immigrants, but he has also warned of far-right groups trying to use the church to further their aims.

Whether you’re a believer or not, this visit will be interesting. Just remember to refer to him in Spanish as el Papa, not la Papa, which would be a female pope — unlikely — or a South American potato.

4. 💉 The ‘Caretaker of Olot’ will now be a she — but still in jail

You know how sometimes bad memories return when you least expect or want them? Well, that happened this week when the Catalan newspaper El Punt Avui reported that Joan Vila, a serial killer serving a 127-year sentence at Puig de les Basses prison, is transitioning to a woman and henceforth will be known as Aida.

• Excuse me? Yes, really. Vila — a nursing assistant nicknamed “The Caretaker of Olot” for murdering 11 elderly patients at the Fundació La Caritat nursing home in Olot, making him Spain’s #1 serial killer of the 21st century — is already undergoing hormone treatment, has moved to the women’s block, and is awaiting surgery.

So who is the “Caretaker of Olot”? Between August 2009 and October 2010, Vila killed 11 patients aged 80 to 96, using methods that escalated in cruelty: first a cocktail of barbiturates dissolved in water, then insulin injections for diabetic patients, and finally — in the last five days of his killing spree — forcing victims to drink bleach or injecting corrosive substances directly into their mouths.

• Caught by chance. Vila was arrested almost by accident, after a coroner refused to certify one death as natural because the victim couldn’t have ingested that much cleaning fluid by herself. Vila confessed almost immediately — eventually to all 11 murders — saying the deaths made him feel “as if he were God.” In 2013, he was sentenced to 127 years, with a maximum of 40 to be served. He has been inside since October 2010 and has not had a single day’s leave.

Worth noting: During the investigation, Vila told authorities he had always felt like “a woman trapped in a man’s body” — so this is not exactly a bolt from the blue.

• The transition began over a year ago with psychological support and, according to El País, with input from feminist organizations (though El País insists Joan will become Aura, not Aida, so take that as you will).

And no, this is not a get-out-of-jail scheme. Legal experts and the victims’ families’ lawyers are unanimous that the transition has zero effect on the sentence. The court that convicted Vila and the Supreme Court that confirmed the verdict remain unmoved.

• Not going anywhere. Previous attempts by Vila’s defense to ease his prison regime — seeking “third-degree” status and day passes — were already rejected by the courts, which noted that Vila can appear charming but has a capacity for manipulation. The only procedural step required is to notify the court of the name change. That’s it.

Inspiration. Two books have already been published about Joan/Aida. Maybe this will inspire a third.

5. 🇫🇷 Spain takes Cannes: 3 films, 1 Palme d’Or dream

Spanish cinema has decided to show up at the Cannes Film Festival this year and not just politely wave from the sidelines. For the first time ever, three Spanish films are competing for the Palme d’Or, the festival’s top prize and basically the World Cup of auteur cinema.

• We’re talking about Pedro Almodóvar (obvi), Rodrigo Sorogoyen, and the duo Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi (aka the Javis, who recently broke up their personal relationship but remain business partners), all in the main competition. That’s right, the main event.

Yes, this is a big deal. The Palme d’Or competition usually includes around 20 films, and it’s historically dominated by French and American cinema. Getting one film in is already a win. Getting three? That’s borderline suspicious.

• Spain has never pulled this off before, which makes 2026 feel like a full-blown moment. Even Cannes boss Thierry Frémaux admitted as much: the selection comes from over 2,500 films. So this is quite the statement.

The lineup reads like a generational handover. Almodóvar returns with Amarga Navidad, his most intimate film yet; a story about grief, depression, and the blurred line between fiction and personal truth.

• He himself admitted he’s been losing his usual “pudor,” leaning more into autofiction: “There’s a lot of fiction, but nothing is invented.” Translation: this one is about him.

Then there’s Sorogoyen with El ser querido, making his official competition debut after years of climbing the Cannes ladder. The film follows a troubled reunion between a celebrated film director (played by Javier Bardem) and his estranged daughter, an actress stuck in a dead-end career.

• What starts as a professional opportunity turns into an emotional minefield. Sorogoyen called the moment “historic” and pointed out what everyone is thinking: that Spanish cinema has been building toward this for years.

And finally, the wildcard: the Javis with La Bola Negra. It’s their first time in the Cannes competition, and they’ve gone straight to the top tier, which almost never happens.

• The film, starring Penélope Cruz and Glenn Close, and inspired by an unfinished work by Federico García Lorca, follows three interconnected stories of gay men across different periods in Spanish history. It’s ambitious, emotional, and very them.

Three directors, three styles, three generations. Even Almodóvar framed it as a “day of celebration” for Spanish cinema, especially at a time when auteur filmmaking needs visibility.

• The Javis, meanwhile, summed it up more bluntly. They’re just happy to be there, alongside filmmakers they grew up learning from.

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Grab the popcorn

⚖️ Spain’s two biggest corruption cases hit court at the same time

It’s time for “Kolditchen”! That’s right, Spain’s peculiar judicial version of the 2023 double feature hit “Barbenheimer” just arrived in a theater courtroom near you, and we couldn’t be more thrilled.

• Party x2. Both the Kitchen case (corruption in the PP!) and the Koldo case (corruption in the PSOE!) trials are starting in the same week by complete coincidence (or so we hear).

And really, how often do you get to watch Spain’s two main political parties get breaded in corruption and dunked in hot oil like the croquetas we wish they were?

• It’s still early days in these trials. So we’re far from ready to put a bet prediction on Polymarket on who will go to jail. But a few things seem to be coming clear so far: everything politicians say is being recorded, pretty much nobody works in Spain, and women get the short end of the stick. So let’s get to it!

But first, a brief legal history lesson. Here's why each case is so relevant.

Caso Kitchen revolves around an alleged covert operation launched in 2013 by Spain’s Interior Ministry under PP PM Mariano Rajoy, which (allegedly) used police resources and secret state funds to spy on former PP party treasurer Luis Bárcenas. The goal? To obtain and potentially destroy documents linked to the party’s illegal financing.

• Why the name? It’s called “Kitchen” because the operation referred to Bárcenas' driver, who was allegedly recruited as an informant, as “the cook” (apparently he looked like a famous Spanish chef).

• Best costume: One of the strangest episodes involved a man disguised as a priest who stormed Bárcenas’ home at gunpoint in an apparent attempt to steal incriminating documents.

Caso Koldo revolves around an alleged corruption scheme during the pandemic, in which former Transport Minister José Luis Ábalos (PSOE), his advisor Koldo García, and businessman Víctor de Aldama are accused of taking commissions in exchange for awarding public contracts for medical masks. We’ve covered this case in excruciating depth.

• Ye olde kickbacks. Prosecutors say they used privileged information and emergency procurement rules to steer contracts to companies linked to Aldama. They face charges including bribery, influence peddling, and embezzlement.

First, Koldo. You might think that a major trial about kickbacks on public contracts would focus on, well, kickbacks on public contracts. But you’d be wrong. The first two days of the Case Koldo dove deep into ex-Transport Minister Ábalos’s (extramarital) lovers, and how they were plugged into apartments and government jobs by Koldo and Aldama. 🤦

• Doesn’t anybody work around here? One former Ábalos lover, Jésica Rodríguez, who lived in a €2,700/month apartment paid for by an associate of Aldama, earned €44,000 from two public administrative assistant jobs she was given but never worked at. When asked why she didn’t work, she said she was waiting for Koldo or his brother to tell her what to do 😂.

• Staring at a wall. Another Ábalos lady was former Miss Asturias Claudia Montes (no, he is not that attractive; it’s just that politics is Hollywood for ugly people). After being plugged into a state rail industry job, she was placed in an office corner facing the wall. Feeling that her services weren’t being used, she said she reported the situation to Ábalos and Koldo García and, in the meantime, spent her work hours reading books in Oviedo’s library. Pressed by the presiding judge, she clarified that they were always “books about trains.”

• Not nice. Jésica definitely got it worse. Ábalos’s lawyer went on a smear campaign to suggest that she and the ex-transport minister had never been actual partners, asking her if she was a prostitute — a move that caused conternation in court and in the press room. Her (well played) answer? “No. I’m a registered dentist.”

Ooooh, we’re gonna watch this one! There’s clearly more fun to come.

And now the Kitchen. More than a decade after the alleged espionage took place, former Interior Minister Jorge Fernández Díaz, his deputy Francisco Martínez, and several senior police officials are finally set to face trial. That said, so far the trial’s big moments have been mostly procedural.

• No more delays. Judges rejected attempts by the defense to annul the proceedings or move them out of Spain’s High Court, arguing that it was time to finally examine what happened.

• Can we expand? Piling on, the PSOE asked the court to expand the investigation and bring back former PP secretary general María Dolores de Cospedal, arguing that new audio recordings suggest she may have played a more significant role than previously established.

• Well, no. The court and the prosecution ruled that Cospedal had already been cleared during the investigation phase and that reopening that line of inquiry would only delay the trial further.

Expect to hear more about this. Did parts of the state apparatus act illegally to protect a political party from a corruption scandal? So far, this trial has been the less spicy of the two, but that could change.

More news below. 👇👇

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💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🇮🇷 Spain: No to war, yes to NATO, Orange Man bad

Now that WW3 has been postponed for two more weeks, here’s a roundup of Iran news as it relates to Spain (we'll leave the world press to tell you the rest). The tl; dr version? Whatever is happening in the Middle East, Spain doesn’t want to be dragged into it.

We’re busy, sorry. Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares said this week that Spain turned down an invitation to join a high-level international meeting on the Strait of Hormuz, convened by the U.K. and attended by more than 30 countries.

• For what? The meeting was meant to coordinate a response to the crisis and guarantee freedom of navigation in one of the world’s most strategic waterways.

• No to war. According to Albares, Madrid refused to participate because it would not be part of “any discussion that could involve military intervention or escalate the war.”

Guess who’s applauding. China praised Spain’s position, with its ambassador in Madrid going as far as saying that Pedro Sánchez is seen as a “hero” in Chinese public discourse (maybe a bit much). Beijing has framed Spain as a responsible, peace-oriented actor, essentially saying Madrid is in line with its own stance. But don't get too excited about this; it's probably just another way for Beijing to troll Trump.

• Not exactly neutral praise. At a time when the U.S. is pushing allies to do what it says and contribute to its war security efforts, Spain is taking a more ambiguous route: maintaining ties with Washington, but also strengthening its ties with China and positioning itself closer to what Beijing calls the “Global South.” (It is rather warm in Spain, after all.)

President non grata. A new 40dB./El País poll shows that Donald Trump is viewed by Spaniards as the biggest threat to global peace, slightly ahead of Vladimir Putin. The Orange Menace, always ready to collect a prize, will probably be happy about this.

• Worry all around. Yes, El País is a left-leaning, pro-PSOE publication. But you should know that even conservative voters ranked Trump as a major risk, though they place Putin slightly higher. The only voters who are relatively comfortable with Trump (and Netanyahu) are those of Vox (shocker). And the only ones good with Putin? Podemos (also shocker).

• But here’s a twist. Despite the anti-war mood and an ambiguous take on increasing defense spending, support for NATO remains strong across the board. Nearly two-thirds of Spaniards want to stay in the alliance (with only Podemos voters clearly backing an exit; again, shocker).

Official Iranian trolling. Remember how the PP was timid about criticizing Trump when he started bombing Iran? Well, it looks like Trump’s Easter message about destroying Iranian civilization may have been a bit too much, so PP boss Alberto Núñez Feijóo took to X to call for “sensibility, not brutality”.

• His tweet prompted the Iranian Embassy in Spain to reply somewhat cheekily “better late than never.” Iranian embassies around the world have launched a global trolling campaign against Trump — and people have noticed.

2.🎨 Spain is fighting over Guernica. Yes, the painting.

Put up your dukes! The Holy Week is over, so Spain can go back to its regular political drama. This time it’s not about housing or inflation, but a painting. Specifically, Pablo Picasso's iconic Guernica and whether it should leave Madrid.

• Never simple. What started as a relatively predictable institutional request has turned into a political clash between the Basque government and Madrid, with regional presidents Imanol Pradales (from the Basque nationalist PNV) on one side and Isabel Díaz Ayuso (PP) on the other.

Art history lesson. Painted in 1937, Guernica is not just another famous artwork; It’s one of the world’s most powerful political paintings of the 20th century.

• Civil War bombing. Picasso created it to illustrate the horror of the bombing of the Basque town of Gernika (Basque spelling, fyi) during the Spanish Civil War, when Nazi German and Fascist Italian planes flattened it in support of Franco’s forces.

• Back home. After spending decades at the MoMA in New York (Picasso didn’t want it in Spain because… dictatorship), it returned in 1981 once the country transitioned to democracy. It’s been at the Reina Sofía Museum since 1992.

• No more moves. The painting has been moved more than 30 times in its history, often rolled up and transported under far less controlled conditions than today. As a result, it is now extremely fragile, and experts have said for years that it should not be moved again. Not under any circumstances.

Enter the Basque Country. A couple of weeks ago, Pradales formally asked PM Sánchez to allow the painting to be temporarily moved to Bilbao. (Btw, this isn’t the first time they’ve asked.)

• Anniversary show. The idea is to exhibit it at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao between October 2026 and June 2027, to mark the 90th anniversary of both the bombing of Gernika and the creation of the first Basque government.

Computer says no. The response from Madrid was quick and (at least initially) quite technical.

• Maybe? No. The Culture Ministry, led by Ernest Urtasun, asked the Reina Sofía to evaluate the request. The museum came back with a clear answer: no. The vibrations alone, they said, could seriously damage it.

Enter Madrid’s presi. Speaking on Monday, Díaz Ayuso dismissed the proposal as a “catetada,” (essentially calling it provincial nonsense), and argued that culture should not be treated as something to be divided territorially.

• Slippery slope. She also said if you start relocating masterpieces based on origin, you might as well send all of Picasso’s work to Málaga (where he’s from).

• No, you! Her comments did not go down well in the Basque Country. Aitor Esteban, head of the PNV, accused Ayuso of being just as provincial for comments she made last year praising the concept of “having a beer on a terrace”.

Please stop. At the Senate this Tuesday, Urtasun tried to shut the debate down for good, making it clear that the government would simply follow expert advice and leave the painting where it is.

• The conservation reports, he said, are unequivocal. End of story.

Here we are again. In our political happy place.

3. 🤑 The Tax Man is back — and he wants your 💶

It’s the most wonderful time of the year 🥳! (Wait for it.) Tax season! But yes, all sarcasm aside, the filing season for Spain’s IRPF (income) taxes began yesterday. Because we love you, we thought we’d do as much as we could (in a few hundred words) to walk you through what to expect from Spain’s convoluted tax system this year.

• First: the calendar. You can file online from April 8 to June 30. If you want Hacienda to help by phone, you can request an appointment starting April 29, with phone assistance starting May 6. For in-person help at tax offices, you can request appointments starting May 29. One key gotcha: if you end up owing The Man and want to pay by direct debit, the deadline is June 25, not June 30. Miss that and, well...don’t.

• One big tip. Don’t just click through the prefilled draft that Hacienda provides and pray. The borrador is a helpful starting point, not a divine truth. Check your address, income, deductions, family info, rental income, and anything involving multiple employers, freelance work, investments, or side hustles. Spain’s tax agency is especially interested this year in crypto, tourist rentals, neobanks, changes of residence, and digital payments received by freelancers via Bizum. If it’s modern, they will pay extra attention. Because tax man no like modern 🦍.

What’s new this year? The headline change is a new deduction of up to €340 for lower earners, designed so workers on or around the 2025 minimum wage (€16,576) don’t lose the benefit of that pay rise to tax.

• More new-ish. Unemployed people are not automatically required to file just because they received benefits, unless they cross the normal income thresholds. Self-employed people still generally have to file regardless.

• There are also more regional deductions than you can shake a stick at (who does that, anyway?). You’ve got celiac food costs in some regions, gym deductions in others, vet bills, glasses, EV purchases, rent breaks, and more. Figuring them out is fun, in the same way that reading Facebook’s T&Cs is.

• Green & Rich. Deductions remain in place for green investments (EVs, charging points, certain energy-efficiency home improvements), as well as for subsidies to pay for damage from floods and forest fires. High earners, meanwhile, will pay more on savings income above €300,000, with the top rate rising from 28% to 30%.

One thing that’s almost inevitable? You’ll pay more this year. Not because you did anything wrong, but because Spain has again not adjusted IRPF brackets for inflation. So as salaries rise nominally, more of your income gets pushed into higher tax bands even if your real purchasing power hasn’t actually improved. Economists call it bracket creep. We call it 💩.

• The estimates are not tiny. According to Spain’s economists’ council, someone earning €25,000 may be paying around €250 more a year because of this. At €30,000, it’s roughly €352. At €45,000, about €533. And up it goes. So, yeah, there may be new deductions and even the thrilling possibility of paying by Bizum. But the general vibe is the same. Hacienda wants your money, a little more every year.

4. 🛬 Qatar Airways’ new big airport hub is in…Teruel?

Yeah, yeah, we know the joke: Teruel también existe. That snide reference to the largely empty desert-ish Aragonese province — as in, it exists, but not much more. But don’t tell that to the Qataris or the Emiratis or pretty much anyone else in the no-fly zone that is the Persian Gulf these days. Because for them, Teruel does a lot more than exist — it serves as their new home.

• Is that parking space free? National flag carriers from the area have been looking for a safe place to store idled planes since the beginning of the U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran. Enter Teruel’s airport. Ten planes arrived from the Middle East over one weekend early in the war, and now there are 23 parked there, mostly behemoth Airbus 330s or Boeing 787s from Qatar Airways.

Don’t think I’ve ever been there. There’s a reason: you haven’t. The Aeropuerto de Teruel, built in 2013 on the site of an old military aerodrome that was used in the civil war, doesn’t do passengers. It does something far more niche and increasingly lucrative: parking, maintaining, and recycling planes.

• Why here? Climate, dude. More than 250 days of sun a year, low humidity, and plenty of empty space (basically, the same that’s good for solar installations). What looks like a disadvantage — i.e., emptiness — is, in aviation terms, gold.

• High points for Teruel. Basically, every time the world poops itself, Teruel’s airport cashes in. COVID? With planes grounded for, you know, global plague — Teruel filled up (to 140 planes at one point). The Ukraine war? Aircraft linked to Russian companies in receivership are parked in limbo. Middle East conflict? You know the story. As one regional official put it, when airlines need to “protect their investments,” this is where they come, “and we are open to many more.”

• More good business from bad news. Today, rising fuel prices are already forcing airlines to cut routes and ground less efficient aircraft. That means more planes need somewhere to sit, be serviced, or be scrapped. Teruel today hosts around 90 aircraft overall, works with 100 clients, and supports roughly 1,000 jobs.

And it’s only getting bigger. The airport is on its fourth expansion, adding more hangars (including a blimp facility — because who doesn’t miss the Hindenburg). There’s a new aerospace engineering degree launching locally, and Spain’s Defense Ministry is adding a €42m training center. Keep on existing, Teruel!

5. ⚽ FIFA is investigating Spain for racist chants

Not every joke is funny. The world football body FIFA announced this week it was opening disciplinary proceedings against Spain over “Islamophobic and xenophobic” chants during a friendly national team game between Spain and Egypt. Which, when you’re preparing to host a World Cup in partnership with Morocco (checks notes — a Muslim country), is not a great look.

• What happened? During a recent “friendly” between Spain and Egypt in Barcelona, a part of the crowd was heard chanting, “Bote, bote, bote… Musulmán el que no bote” (“Jump, jump, jump! Whoever doesn’t jump is a Muslim”). The chant was repeated multiple times — before and after halftime — even as stadium announcements and on-screen warnings urged fans to stop discriminatory behavior. Those warnings? They were whistled.

The Spanish football federation condemned the chants. So did Egypt’s, calling them “loathsome.” And Spain coach Luis de la Fuente weighed in, voicing his “total and absolute disgust.”

• Enter The Kid. Then came Lamine Yamal, Spain’s teenage star — who is, not incidentally, a practicing Muslim.

• His take. “Yesterday in the stadium, we heard the chant ‘whoever does not jump is a Muslim,’” he wrote on Instagram. “I know it was directed to the opposing team and nothing towards myself as a person, but as a Muslim myself, this does not stop being a lack of respect, and something we can’t tolerate… Using religion as something to mock people in a football stadium shows you to be ignorant and racist.” (Amen).

Not a first for Spain. The incident is part of a history of racist behavior in European football. Spain has struggled with fan chants targeting players for their race. Example? In May 2023, Real Madrid star Vinícius Jr. faced racist insults from Valencia fans during a La Liga match.

• The chant itself. If this feels familiar, it is. The structure — “He who doesn’t jump is a…” — is one of football’s most portable bits of diss culture. It can be traced back to Argentina, where it reached heights after the Malvinas/Falklands War, when Argentine fans would chant “He who doesn’t jump is English.” It’s simple and totally customizable: Insert rival here.

The issue this time? It wasn’t a nationality or a team nickname. It was race or religion. Which is, um, less than cool. Or, really, just ugly.

🙏 Once again, please remember to share this newsletter with your friends on social media. The more we grow, the more information we’ll be able to offer each week.

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Ready, steady, vote

✉️ Andalucía fires the starting gun on Spain’s electoral season

Remember Spain’s one, two, three recent regional elections? Well, they were just the warmup to the one in Andalucía. The biggest “autonomous community” (how lacking in poetry that term is!), and a former stronghold of PM Pedro Sánchez’s PSOE center-lefties that for the last eight years has gone for the center-right PP, Andalucía is the big kahuna of regional votes. It’s Spain’s Texas! Or Florida! Or…both?

• And now Andalucía is officially going to the polls. Consider this the kickoff the the election season that will only end when Sánchez cries uncle makes the considered decision to call national elections. Folks, the starting pistol has been fired! 🔫

Moreno brings down the hammer. On Monday evening, the president of Andalucía, PP’s Juanma Moreno, called surprise regional elections for May 17, sending 6.5 million people (around 20% of Spain’s voters) to the polls two weeks earlier than expected. (He apparently only told PP boss Alberto Nuñez Feijóo two hours earlier and his own team 30 minutes before, so we know this was a Top Secret move to catch someone off guard — more on that in a moment).

On paper, the explanation is straightforward. Moreno wants a new government up and running before the summer. But the real logic behind the timing is more strategic.

• Busy times. June was complicated. The Pope’s visit to Spain between June 6 and 12 would have disrupted the campaign (many people in Andalucía will travel to Madrid and Barcelona to see him), and Andalucía’s packed spring calendar, from Feria de Abril to El Rocío, risks depressing turnout in unpredictable ways.

• Even the chosen date isn’t perfect, as it clashes with the Feria de Córdoba, something that quietly worries the PP. Still, May 17 is the least bad option.

• And then there was the bigger, unspoken reason: Pedro Sánchez. As speculation grew that the PM would try to capitalize on the momentum he'd garnered from his "No a la guerra” stance on the Iran war by calling snap national elections on May 31 (the day the chattering classes expected Moreno to choose), Moreno may have decided it was best not to risk being overshadowed.

Who’s ahead? As things stand, Moreno enters the race as the clear favorite. Polls suggest he could win 55 seats in the Andalusian parliament — a majority of the 109 seats, barely. That's down from his current 58, but still a remarkable position in a region that was a PSOE stronghold for decades until the PP’s breakthrough in 2018.

• His biggest concern is not losing, but how much he wins. The rise of far-right Vox could force him into a scenario he is keen to avoid. That is, falling short of a majority and needing a pact with the far-right to govern, as has already happened in regional elections in Extremadura, Aragón, and Castilla y León.

• Open the door. Vox, which now holds 14 seats, is expected to grow slightly and could become kingmaker if Moreno falls short of a majority. And unlike in 2019, Vox has already made clear it would seek to be part of the government this time, not just support it from the outside.

• Moreno has built his brand on stability and moderation (and his namesake"fachaleco"), and being forced into a pact with Vox would undermine that carefully crafted image.

The socialists are not giving up. Facing him is María Jesús Montero, Spain’s (admittedly charmless) Finance Minister and Sánchez’s right-hand woman, who is leaving the government to focus entirely on the campaign.

• Lukewarm enthusiasm. The PSOE is polling poorly (polls suggest Montero could get even less than the 30 seats the PSOE has now). Her strategy is to turn the election into a referendum on public services like healthcare, which has become one of the main concerns for Andaluces amid long waiting lists and scandals like the recent failures in breast cancer screening programs.

• This strategy may not land as cleanly as expected. Moreno’s government has just reached an agreement with healthcare unions that improves conditions for 130,000 workers.

• The further left won't help much. To the left of the PSOE, there are up to three competing forces: the Por Andalucía coalition, far-left Podemos (which still hasn’t decided whether to run alone or in coalition), and Adelante Andalucía, a regionalist left-wing party. Their fragmentation does not augur success.

Bottom line. Andalucía is the most symbolic test ahead of the next general elections, which are officially scheduled for 2027 but increasingly feel closer. Whether Sánchez actually calls them early or not, what happens on May 17 will shape expectations across the country.

More news below. 👇👇

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💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🛐 Sagunto’s confraternity says no women allowed (again)

You can’t seat procession with us. Spain’s most controversial confraternity just said “no” to women. Again. Over the weekend, the confraternity of Sagunto, one of the oldest in the country, voted against allowing women to take part in its main procession.

• Wait, what the hell is a confraternity (or cofradía)? Cofradías are Catholic brotherhoods that organize religious processions during Semana Santa (i.e., next week).

• The one in Sagunto, Valencia, dates back more than 500 years (founded: 1492) and has around 1,600 members. It’s the backbone of a celebration that has held the status of Festival of National Tourist Interest since 2004.

• There’s just one problem: it’s still men-only. Women can help behind the scenes, preparing robes, organizing logistics, basically keeping the whole thing running, but they’re not allowed to actually walk in the procession.

That’s what this vote was about. The proposal was as simple as it gets — change one word in the statutes, replacing “men” with “people.”

• But in a closed-door assembly where only male members could vote (hmm…), the result wasn’t even close: 267 votes against, 114 in favor.

• The reasoning? Tradition. Some members even went further: if women want to participate, “they can just create their own confraternity”. (Which, in their case, would be a consorority; an actual word).

• And the weight! Others worried about what would happen if women joined. Like, longer waiting lists, changes to internal rules, even questions about who carries the heavy floats.

The same debate has been going on for decades. It was rejected in 1999 and again in 2022. Activists have been protesting since at least 2021, calling it outright discrimination. But no dice. Not even a recent Constitutional Court ruling in a similar case that sided with a woman in the Canary Islands who had been excluded moved the needle.

• For the women pushing for change, it’s not about blowing up the tradition but about finally being part of it. “We don’t want to destroy Semana Santa, we want to participate equally,” one said.

Keeping the peace. The clavario, the young organizer of this year’s festivities (he’s 23), tried to strike a middle ground. He admitted that, in the 21st century, it makes sense to ask for inclusion, but insisted the environment isn’t “machista” and that many members are simply trying to preserve a deeply rooted tradition.

Not buying it. The Spanish government had warned that excluding women could cost Sagunto its “National Tourist Interest” status, which brings visibility and funding.

• Now, after the negative vote, the PSOE-led government confirmed they’ll move to revoke it, arguing that you can’t claim broad public participation while excluding half the population.

• Even Valencia’s regional president Juanfran Pérez Llorca, from the center-right PP, had called for dialogue and inclusion and was hoping for a different outcome. (He acknowledged that the cofradía is a private entity.)

Not our fight. The Church isn’t stepping in here. The Archbishop of Valencia has made it clear there will be no top-down intervention to force change, arguing that any reform should come from within the cofradía itself.

• This could take 500 more years. Just saying.

2. ✅ The IMF grades Spain’s economy — and warns about the war

Remember the Men in Black? No, not the movie with the murderous cute aliens and the guy who slapped Chris Rock, but the economists from the IMF — the guys in suits who swooped in after the 2008 financial crisis and told countries like Ireland and Spain to spend less and screw the poor.

• Well, they’re back. Not to impose austerity this time (thanks, guys), but to issue their latest report card on Spain’s economy (officially called an “Article IV Mission” because the IMF is nothing if not poetic). So, how are we doing?

The Good 😇. Spain remains one of the fastest-growing economies in Europe, outpacing most of its eurozone peers. Growth is still expected to lead big EU countries this year, driven by strong domestic demand, solid job creation, rising wages, EU funds, and — wait for it — lots of immigration.

• Even the energy shock from the war hasn’t hit as hard as it could have. Why? Renewables. Spain’s massive investment in solar and wind over the past decade is now paying off, cushioning the blow from soaring gas prices. So the lights stay on, and the economy keeps humming. Which is nice, right?

The Bad ⚠️. Now comes the warning label. The IMF has cut its growth forecast for Spain for this year from 2.3% to 2.1%, and expects a gradual slowdown — to around 1.7% in 2027 — as some of our recent tailwinds fade.

• The biggest risk? The war. Energy prices have already surged — oil is up more than 50%, and gas has nearly doubled — and if the conflict drags on, the IMF warns it could hit investment, consumption, and growth, while keeping inflation stubbornly above 3%. So, like, if this turns into a long war, not even all the solar panels in Extremadura can let Spain escape it.

• There are also political risks at home. The IMF politely notes that Spain’s fragmented parliament raises “questions” about whether the government can actually pass the reforms it needs. (If you need that translated, they mean, “Good luck with that.”)

The Ugly 😬. This is where the long-term scaries begin.

• First, there’s housing. The IMF is blunt here (and they agree with what we’ve been saying). Spain needs more housing. And unless someone proves otherwise, rent controls appear to be making the situation worse by pushing landlords to take homes off the market. Their advice? If the evidence holds, scrap the rent caps when their three-year trial ends next year. And build more — lots more.

• And then, Spain is getting old. From 2030 onward, Spain faces a huge rise in spending on pensions, healthcare, and long-term care — like, one of the biggest increases in Europe. Because so many more olds! Public debt, which is currently under control, is expected to start climbing again. Fun! The IMF suggestion (hidden in economist speak)? Maybe be less generous. (That seems unlikely.)

Our take. Spain is doing a lot right in terms of growth, jobs, and renewables. But the IMF’s message is pretty clear — enjoy it while it lasts. Because between war abroad, housing at home, and a tidal wave of Spaniards heading into retirement, it’s not gonna get a lot easier.

3. 💥 The Iran war takes over parliament

And it was a hot one! PM Pedro Sánchez’s appearance in the Spanish Parliament’s regular oversight session/fight club yesterday focused on the upcoming elections in Andalucía, the Iran war, and a batch of emergency decrees meant to ease the economic pain caused by the conflict (read: high oil prices).

• Oh, and lots of insults. We’ll get to that. But first, your vegetables: the decrees.

Two decrees enter, one decree leaves. Of the two packages of emergency measures, the PSOE-led government has the votes to pass the first, and basically zero chance of passing the second.

• The winner. A €5bn plan with 80 measures aimed at pretty much everyone (20 million households, 3 million businesses). The highlights: cheaper energy (electricity taxes slashed 60%, a gas tax cut of up to €0.30/liter), protections for vulnerable households (no cutting off utilities), and aid for industry, farmers, and transport. Plus more love for renewables, because Spain is all-in on the whole energy independence thing.

• The loser. An obligatory two-year extension of rental contracts and a temporary 2% cap on annual rent rises. Landlords (and many normal people are landlords) were not having this.

• And the surprise! In exchange for backing decree #1, Catalan separatists got Sánchez to agree to adopt an EU rule exempting autónomos earning under €85,000 from charging VAT. As autónomos ourselves, we have never felt more pro-separatist.

Now, the fun part. Highlights of the fighting.

• Worst ever. The PP’s parliamentary spokeswoman, Ester Muñoz, called departing Finance Minister María Jesús Montero, “the most arrogant person in history and the worst Finance minister our country has ever had.” Montero fired back, “They bark, as we ride on.”

• Nice sticker. PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo mocked an Iranian propaganda clip showing a missile tagged with Sánchez’s face and “Thank you, Prime Minister” in reference to his opposition to the war: “Hard to defend peace when Iranian propaganda puts you on a missile.”

And then… everyone said ‘No to war.’ Sánchez revived the Iraq-era slogan, and parliament promptly remixed it:

• Alberto Nuñez Feijoo (PP): “No to war, and no to you [to Sánchez].”

• Santiago Abascal (Vox): “No to the war of one brave man with everyone else’s balls.” (Whatever that means❓)

• Verónica Martínez Barbero (Sumar): “No to war, yes to renewables.”

• Maribel Vaquero (PNV): “No to war like a Game of Thrones.”

• Néstor Rego (BNG): “No to war, but with actions, not words.”

Aw, look, they’re all against the war. They just disagree on literally everything else.

4. 🚔 Potential terrorist attack in Mallorca stopped and jihadist arrested

The 2000’s are back. A potential jihadist attack in Spain may have just been stopped before it even began. Yesterday, Spanish police, working with Moroccan intelligence, said they dismantled a suspected jihadist cell that was allegedly planning an attack.

• Three people were arrested, one in Palma de Mallorca, no less, right in the center of one of Spain’s biggest tourist hotspots, and two more in Tangier, Morocco.

• The operation was carried out by Spain’s Policía Nacional and Morocco’s DGST, in a coordinated cross-border investigation led by Spain’s Audiencia Nacional.

The man arrested in Mallorca is believed to be the leader of the cell and was allegedly already moving beyond radicalization into actual planning.

• Investigators say he was preparing an attack in the country inspired by “lone-wolf” terrorism (i.e., the kind that’s designed to be harder to detect and prevent).

• The two suspects arrested in Tangier, were reportedly involved in financing and logistical support for jihadist groups linked to ISIS, particularly in regions like the Sahel and Somalia that have become global terrorism hotspots in recent years.

Yikes. What do we actually know? Not much beyond that. The investigation is still ongoing, officially under secrecy, and police haven’t disclosed targets, timelines, or how advanced the alleged plan really was.

This didn’t turn into an attack, but it’s a reminder of something Spain knows all too well.

• Spain has long been on the radar of jihadist terrorism, most notably with the Madrid train bombings in 2004, the deadliest attack in the country’s recent history, and the 2017 attack at La Rambla in Barcelona.

Spanish security forces since then have focused on prevention, monitoring networks, tracking radicalization, and working closely with partners, especially Morocco.

5. 🪦 Another American tourist died on vacation in Barcelona. Is Spain dangerous?

The tragic death last week of American tourist James Gracey has drawn massive attention in both the U.S. and Spain, after new details emerged about his final hours in Barcelona.

• Spring breaker. Gracey, a University of Alabama student, was in the city for spring break when he was reported missing on March 17, sparking a search by friends and family.

• Tragic finale. Two days later, his body was found in shallow water near the beachfront nightclub he had visited the night before. A local thief had his phone, but authorities say the death appears accidental. Surveillance footage reportedly shows him falling into the water, where he drowned.

Gracey was not the first. Over recent years, several American visitors have died in Spain under tragic circumstances — usually involving risk, bad luck, or both.

Murder on the Camino. In 2015, Denise Thiem, 40, disappeared while walking the Camino de Santiago. She was last seen on April 5 in the town of Astorga, after attending Easter celebrations and continuing her journey along the trail.

• No worries at first. Pilgrims often go off-grid. But as days turned into weeks, fears grew. Months later, her body was discovered in a rural area, and Spanish authorities arrested a local man who later confessed to killing her.

Deadly mountain adventure. Another case is that of Cole Henderson, 27, who disappeared while hiking in the Pyrenees. Five days after putting his cell phone into airplane mode to begin hiking in the Ordesa y Monte Perdido National Park (Huesca), and two days after missing a flight to the Netherlands, a search was launched.

• Sad discovery. The next month, Henderson’s body was found on the north face of Monte Perdido, the third-highest peak in the Pyrenees. The route to the top is rated as “Peu Difficile” (PD), meaning “somewhat difficult”, but that route — the level sometimes requires ice axes or crampons — was still covered in snow in early July,

Dangerous tides. A young American student, Alan Patrick, died in early 2026 while visiting the Canary Island of Lanzarote. Patrick, just days short of 21, was swimming with friends in the natural rock pools of Los Charcones, an area known for its dramatic volcanic landscape.

• Weather warnings. Strong Atlantic swells had already prompted warnings, and parts of the area had been closed. Despite this, Patrick and his group were swimming in one of the rock pools, and a powerful wave swept them into the ocean. While his friends were able to escape, Patrick was carried out to sea. His body was recovered two days later by a Guardia Civil dive team.

So, is Spain dangerous for tourists? Members of the commentariat have suggested that it is (because that’s what they do). But the data says otherwise.

• The real danger in Spain isn’t human. Thiem’s death is the exception, not the rule. Spain’s homicide rate, at 0.7 per 100,000 people, is one of the lowest in the world (and ⅛ that of the U.S.). The danger here is nature and bad decisions. So maybe pay attention to the sea and mountains — and ease off the tinto de verano.

🙏 Once again, please remember to share this newsletter with your friends on social media. The more we grow, the more information we’ll be able to offer each week.

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Coming to America

🇲🇽 King Felipe VI almost says sorry for that conquest thing

Surprise! King Felipe VI (aka F6) raised a few eyebrows this week after casually acknowledging that there was “a lot of abuse” and “ethical controversy” during the Spanish conquest of the Americas.

• Audible gasp. He made the comments in passing during a low-key visit to an exhibition on pre-Hispanic cultures at Madrid’s National Archaeological Museum, alongside Mexico’s ambassador, an appearance that wasn’t even on his official agenda but carried very clear political weight.

• That's reasonable. On paper, it sounded like a fairly balanced, almost academic reflection. As in, yes, there were abuses, but historic acts should be judged “in their proper context, not with modern moral lenses, but with an objective and rigorous analysis.” In practice, it worked like a diplomatic flare sent over Mexico.

• Tough times. Relations between Spain and Mexico have been tense for a few years, ever since former Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) formally asked the King in 2019 to apologize for the conquest (and, not surprisingly, got radio silence in return). Things escalated when current president Claudia Sheinbaum didn’t invite F6 to her inauguration. ☹️

King knew what he was doing. By publicly acknowledging “abuse” this week, the King is inching closer to the kind of recognition Mexican leaders have been demanding, without actually issuing an apology. Like, “We're sorry that you're upset.”

• Why now? Some believe this isn’t just about revising history, it’s actually about saving the Iberoamerican Summit taking place in Madrid later this year, which is supposed to bring together leaders from across LatAm and Spain — and there was a risk that Sheinbaum might skip it. (Ah, now we understand.)

Better than nothing. Sheinbaum, commented that she “recognizes and values” the King’s gesture, and added that, “It wasn’t everything we would have liked, but the truth is that it’s a gesture of rapprochement.” So, coming to the Summit, Claudia?

• In the loop. Spain's PSOE-led government said it “fully endorsed” the King’s remarks and that it was aware of what he was going to say.

But not everybody was so happy. In case you don’t know the Leyenda Negra (“Black Legend”), it’s the idea that Spain’s imperial history has been unfairly portrayed as cruel and oppressive. So for many in Spain, criticism of the conquest isn’t just about history — it’s accepting a centuries-old misrepresentation of the country. (Many of those same people are not fans of PM Pedro Sánchez, you will be shocked to hear.)

• Absurd time shift. The leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, talked up his pride in the Spanish legacy in the Americas. Plus, like, timeline? “To examine events that occurred in the 15th century in the 21st century is absurd,” he said.

• No, you. Madrid’s regional presi and troll artist Isabel Díaz Ayuso let it all hang out, suggesting Sheinbaum might look closer to home: “Abuses are what were committed against the native population by the Aztecs and Mayans, who used sacrifices as part of their rituals.”

• Far-right Vox got even puffier with Spain pride. Its parliamentary spokeswoman argued that the Spanish Crown carried out “the greatest evangelizing and civilizing work in history.” No apologies here!

This will probably blow over quickly, and there's a good chance that Mexico's president will attend Spain's summit. But the big winner of this whole kerfuffle is probably the King: after his non-apology apology, Sheinbaum invited F6 to attend this summer's World Cup in Mexico.

• Considering how hard it is to get those tickets, we suspect that might have been F6's angle all along. 🤔

More news below. 👇👇

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💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1.🗳️ Castilla y León votes, the PP wins, little changes

Oh, look. More elections. Castilla y León voted this weekend and, spoiler alert, nothing really changed, but also everything did. The PP (currently in power there) won the election with 33 seats, improving its result but still far from the 42 needed for a majority, which means regional president Alfonso Fernández Mañueco is back where he started — needing Vox to govern.

• This is beginning to become the PP’s theme song. This also happened to them in the last three regional elections — Extremadura, Aragón, and now Castilla y León.

• Booby prizes. The PSOE came second with 30 seats (gaining two in a small recovery after recent defeats), while Vox got 14, gaining just one seat and failing to break the symbolic barrier of 20% of the vote. Regional parties held their ground (ish), and the farther left basically died disappeared from the map.

Half full, half empty. Sure, the PP is still dependent on Vox despite their victory. But Vox’s growth was smaller than expected. In fact, the PP almost doubled Vox in votes, effectively clamping down on the far-right party in a region where they expected to surge.

• Mañueco wasted no time reading the room. He’s already calling for a “four-year parliamentary agreement” with Vox, but with a twist: he’d prefer they support him without joining the government.

• Meanwhile, the PSOE has made it clear it won’t play along. Candidate Carlos Martínez flat-out rejected facilitating Mañueco’s investiture, essentially hoping for a repeat election rather than helping the PP govern.

It’s bleak for the left. The right dominates in Castilla y León and has been in power since 1987. Governing from the left would require something close to a political miracle.

Next stop. The next big regional elections are in Andalucía in three months, although they may bring elections forward to May 31 to avoid the Pope’s visit in June hijacking the campaign. Get ready, that one is going to be a shitshow fun.

2. 🏘️ Is the new rent-control system working, 2 years in?

On March 16, 2024, Catalonia instituted the first rent controls under a new law allowing regions to cap prices in “stressed areas,” passed by the PSOE-led government after years of fast price increases (rents in Catalonia had risen 60% in a decade). So now we ask, with two years of data, did they actually work?

• Caveat emptor. Like with everything in Spain, whether you think they worked tracks closely with whether you like the party that passed them. But hey, that’s why we’re here!

Top line: prices cooled. In Catalonia’s “stressed zones,” rents rose just 0.8% over 18 months, well below inflation (3.1%), while unregulated areas saw a 5.7% increase.

• In Barcelona, prices actually fell 3.3%. As urban researcher Jaime Palomera says, the caps “broke the previous trend” of runaway increases and helped stabilize prices. In Navarra, prices fell 8.8% between the second and fourth quarter of 2025. Even critics concede some downward movement.

But, but, but… Don’t pop the cava yet.

• Lies, damned lies, and statistics. Prices spiked right before the caps came in (landlords raised their prices while they could), making the subsequent “drop” look bigger than it really was. Adjust for that, and a study from the Instituto Juan de Mariana (a libertarian-leaning think tank) says the decline is basically a rounding error.

• What you get has shrunk. Average apartment sizes are down (in Barcelona, from 75m² to 71m²), while the price per square meter has stayed high or even hit records. In other words, you’re paying more for less space. Which is cozy!

• And then there’s the supply (or lack thereof). Across regulated cities, rental listings have dropped sharply — about 26% in Pamplona, 21% in A Coruña, and 15% in Barcelona, according to Idealista data. In some places, registered rental contracts have fallen by as much as 50%.

So where did those rental apartments go? 🔎 Well, they escaped. Seasonal rentals (which do not have price caps) have exploded — in Barcelona, they jumped from about 7% of contracts to over 23% in two years.

• Others have been sold off, with institutional landlords fleeing the “stressed” markets.

Our take? Rent caps are a sugar fix. They feel great at first — prices stop rising, politicians take a bow — but they don’t solve the underlying problem.

• Spain is short some 800,000 homes (and growing). If renting stops being profitable, fewer homes get built or offered for rent. Which means even less supply in the places that need it most.

• And allies of the governing coalition are talking about new limits. “We see that the supply is decreasing, but prices are not falling,” says Montserrat Junyent, who runs the real estate agents’ lobby of Catalonia. “And all that is being adopted are new regulations that exacerbate the housing problem.”

So yes, prices stabilized (ish). But at the cost of fewer homes, more loopholes, and a market that’s increasingly weird. Short term? We’re all a bit screwed. Long term? Maybe we can build our way out. Maybe.

• And if you already own a place? Smile. Quietly. And for the love of God, don’t brag about it. Angry Gen Zers stuck at home forevs may show up with pitchforks.

3.🎬 Spain has a new “president” (and it’s Torrente)

The Spanish box office has a new (and deeply horrible) president, and his name is Torrente. After more than a decade away, Torrente presidente (“Torrente for President”), the sixth installment of Santiago Segura’s legendary saga about the worst person imaginable, hit cinemas this weekend and absolutely blew up the box office, pulling in around €7m in just a few days.

• That makes it the fourth biggest opening in Spanish film history, and, because this is Spain, three of the top four are Torrente movies. At this point, Segura is competing with his own past self.

Wait, who? For the uninitiated (shame on you), Torrente is one of the most iconic and controversial characters in Spanish pop culture.

• Think of a deeply corrupt, outdated, ex-police officer who embodies every bad stereotype imaginable. Like, sexist, racist, homophobic, islamophobic, lazy, loud, and proudly wrong about everything. In other words, the ultimate “cuñao.”

• The more you know. A cuñao (a mispronunciation of brother-in-law) is Spain’s version of the crazy, racist uncle. He is that guy at the bar who talks bullfighting, soccer, and sevillanas, and has an opinion on absolutely everything that he delivers loudly, confidently, and usually incorrectly over a chupito.

A pretty topical movie. In Torrente presidente, the titular character joins a fictional ultra-nationalist far-right party called Nox (subtle, we know) and climbs his way into power, exposing corruption, incompetence, and hypocrisy along the way.

• The film makes fun of everyone (left, right, and center) and clearly has fun skewering populism, media spectacle, and the general circus that politics has become. The uncomfortable part? A lot of the jokes feel a little too close to reality, which is exactly why they land.

• It’s filled with cameos from real-life political figures and guest appearances such as former PM Mariano Rajoy (we’re not kidding), Alec Baldwin, and Kevin Spacey (again, we’re not kidding).

Numbers as ridiculous as the premise. The film has already passed 1 million viewers in record time, is dominating more than 70% of the total box office, and has become the highest-grossing Spanish film of 2026 in a single weekend.

4.😳 It’s Spanish culture shaming week!

Maybe it was war stress? Or Oscar nerves? Whatever the cause, it’s been a cranky week in Spanish culture. Let us count the ways…

We’re going to start on the fútbol pitch. Because if you don’t think fútbol is culture here, you don’t know Spain.

• Spain v Argentina. The continental champions were supposed to play a Finalissima on March 27 for ‘Best in the World’ bragging rights. Great. In Doha. Less great (the war and all.)

• They needed a new location. So they negotiated. And then on Sunday, the European soccer federation, the UEFA, announced that the game was off.

• What? The UEFA blamed Argentina — loudly — laying out all the offers they made that were rejected, and how a last minute change by the Argentine federation made the cancellation inevitable.

• The conspiracies went wild. Clarín suggested that the Argentine coach, Luis Scaloni, didn’t want to play and risk a loss that could break the team’s confidence ahead of the World Cup. Or maybe it was because Argentine federation boss Claudio Tapia, who is facing a fraud investigation with links to Spain, was afraid of being arrested in Europe? 🤔

And then there’s poor Rosalia. Rosi probably thought she was doing her fans a solid when she sat for a chat with Argentine writer Mariana Enriquez for Spotify Presents.

• Rosi said some things. While discussing Pablo Picasso, Rosalía said that while she might not have liked Pablo had she met him, “I’ve never had a problem with differentiating between the artist and the work,” and that, unless she’d had a real experience with him, “Who am I to judge?”

• The interwebs attack. The social media commentariat was not amused and noted that biographers had documented Picasso’s psychological violence and emotional manipulation, and two of the painter’s partners later committed suicide.

• Modern self-flagellation. A chastened Rosalía set herself on fire on stage recorded a contrite TikTok in which she apologized to her fans and said they were right that she should have known more about Picasso, and please don’t cancel her.

Finally, Yolanda Díaz. You’d think the retiring leader of a party of small and decreasing importance could be ignored on a nice work trip on the government’s dime. But you’d be wrong.

• Gallegos of the world unite. Díaz grabbed a commercial flight to Los Angeles for the Oscar ceremony Sunday, apparently at the invitation of a fellow gallego, Óliver Laxe, who directed the Spanish film Sirāt that was nominated for best international picture (and lost).

• But that ticket! Spanish media dug up that her business class ticket and that of her assistant each cost €7,700, and they stayed at a hotel where rooms cost about €500. So, you know, scandal.

• Fashion press piles on. Trade journal Fashion United noted that Díaz attended the Oscars in a dress from Purificación García, whose stores in Galicia are being picketed by striking members of the union that makes the clothing. Which maybe is a bad look for a leftish Labor Minister.

Feeling superior yet? Good. Next story.

5.🏰 Spain just lost a piece of a medieval castle

Boom. The surreal moments in the footage above look as if they belong in a disaster movie rather than in a sleepy town in Castilla-La Mancha. What happened? On Saturday, the Albarrana tower, part of the Escalona castle, in the province of Toledo, suddenly collapsed.

• Thank god for social media. Tourists standing nearby captured the whole thing on video as the tower collapsed in a very dramatic cloud of dust. The good news is that no one was injured, though a few unlucky cars parked nearby ended up taking some stone souvenirs home.

Sad face. The Castillo de Escalona is not just another crumbling ruin in rural Spain; it’s one of the most historically significant fortifications in the Toledo region.

• Old… Parts of the complex date back to the 11th century, when the original tower was built during the Islamic period, while later expansions in the 15th century turned it into the imposing medieval stronghold locals know today.

• And new again! The castle remained closed for decades and was largely neglected until 2024, when the town council bought the site and began reopening it to visitors, allowing people back inside for the first time in more than 50 years.

The culprit. According to local authorities and heritage experts, the collapse was caused by water damage. Spain has experienced intense storms recently, and the rainfall appears to have seeped into the tower’s interior walls.

• Oh, the irony. The collapsed tower was slated for restoration, but the works hadn’t started yet. One small piece of good news in this architectural tragedy is that the original 11th-century core of the tower remains standing, which means part of the structure may still be preserved.

Not an isolated incident. Spain has one of the largest concentrations of castles in the world, with more than 10,000 fortifications scattered across the country.

• In theory, they’ve been safe since 1949, when Franco issued a decree to protect them. In practice, this often meant little more than good intentions.

• Historians of Spain’s fortifications are blunt about the situation. Miguel Sobrino, author of Castillos y murallas, describes the overall condition of many castles as “calamitous, catastrophic.”

Many were destroyed during the Napoleonic wars in the 1800s, and later, in the 20th century, others were literally sold off stone by stone, before modern heritage protections existed.

🙏 Once again, please remember to share this newsletter with your friends on social media. The more we grow, the more information we’ll be able to offer each week.

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European beef

🥊 Spain goes after the EU (and wins-ish)

You know what they say: When you’re on the moral high ground…start shooting! Okay, fine — nobody actually says that. But politicians seem to believe it. And it certainly seems to be the rule allies of Spain’s government have followed since PM Pedro Sánchez climbed atop the Moral High Ground last week — telling the U.S. it couldn’t use Spanish airbases to hit Iran (though the ’mericans might be doing it anyway), declaring “No to war,” and getting all mano-a-mano with the Orange Menace himself 😡.

• It's been Spain's Week of Beef with Europe. And honestly, it hasn’t gone badly (at least for now). Let us count the ways…

It all began on Monday. That's when Second Deputy Prime Minister Yolanda Díaz (has a job title ever sounded so much like both a promotion and an insult?) unloaded on German Chancellor Friedrich Merz for sitting silent like a scared niño in the Oval Office while Donald Trump called the Sánchez government “terrible” and threatened to cut trade ties with Spain over the airbase drama.

• “What Europe needs today is leadership, not vassals who pay homage to Trump,” she said. Ouch! 🔥

• Not good enough. Earlier, Merz had tried to explain that he stayed quiet to avoid “aggravating” the Orange Menace. Nobody was buying it. Foreign Minister José Luis Albares bashed him, and pro-Sánchez media labeled him a "coward.”

• "Funny” moment. Merz apparently tried to call Sánchez to explain his silence. But Mr. Handsome never responded. The Moncloa later said Sánchez had simply changed his phone number. We prefer to imagine him whispering: “Talk to the hand.” ✋

And then the beef escalated. Spanish pols from one end of Iberia to another slammed European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen for declaring in a speech that Europe “can no longer be a custodian for the old world order”, which many Spaniards heard as international law is for weenies.

• Díaz again. Yolanda told off Ursula, saying, “We must demand respect for international law. Anything else is barbarity. That’s why what Ursula von der Leyen just said falls short.”

• “No to war, yes to international law,” said Iratxe García, the Spanish leader of the Socialists & Democrats group in the European Parliament. “You, Mrs. von der Leyen, have said Europe cannot be a custodian of the old world order. But the problem is not whether the world order is old or new, the problem is who you allow to violate this order.”

• And then there was Teresa Ribera. Spain’s former deputy prime minister and now a vice-president of the European Commission, was also not thrilled with Von der Leyen’s tone: “I think that it is fair to say that maybe it was not the most adequate manner to express herself.” Ouch. Round 2.

Now, part of this may be personal. Von der Leyen has reportedly been telling people she has two big problems in Europe: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Spain's Sánchez, both of whom, in her view, are being pains in the ass butt internationally in order to boost their own local electoral chances. 🤔

But hey — Spain suddenly has a new BFF. And that BFF is (wait for it) Turkey. Over the past week, Iran launched ballistic missiles toward Turkish territory, and those missiles were intercepted twice, thanks in part to Spanish support.

• Spain has had a Patriot missile battery in southern Turkey since 2015 to help protect the region’s airspace. In both incidents, Spanish radar systems tracked the missiles and fed the data into NATO’s command network, helping allied defenses destroy them before they could do damage; the brains of that system sit in Torrejón de Ardoz, near Madrid.

Turkish social media has exploded with memes celebrating the unlikely alliance. Users posted Spanish and Turkish flags side by side with captions like “Brother country Spain.” Others leaned into absurdity: AI images of bald Spanish celebrities like Andrés Iniesta suddenly sporting luxurious Turkish hair transplants, accompanied by jokes like “No Spaniard will be bald ever again.” 🧑‍🦲

The usual frenemy. You know who still doesn’t love Spain? U.S. Republican senator Lindsey Graham, who has spent the past week publicly fuming about Madrid’s refusal to let American forces take off from the Rota and Morón bases.

• There were complaints. Graham went on Fox News to argue that Washington shouldn’t keep “our air bases in a country that won’t let us use them”. Translation: if Spain won’t help bomb Iran, the U.S. should pack up its toys and go home. Waaaaah. 🙄

More news below. 👇👇

🔔 But first, check out our sponsor — Bureaucracy.es

We’ve teamed up with our friends at Bureaucracy.es to bring you more resources about immigration and life in Spain. Check out our guides on how to get a Spanish Digital Nomad Visa or Non-Lucrative Visa.

• If you’d like their help with the paperwork to apply for these visas, or need someone to guide you through the Spanish citizenship application process, you can hire them using this link (and, in the spirit of full transparency with our subscribers, The Bubble will receive a small commission).

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🗣️ Sánchez unveils Spain's new online hate shamer

Pedro Sánchez just unleashed the latest salvo in his war on tech bros, online hate, and people who say things he disagrees with. Yesterday he announced a new digital tool that will “systematically measure the presence, evolution and scope” of hate speech on online platforms used in Spain and publish reports naming the baddies. Oh, and its name is an acronym!

• The acronym is HODIO. That stands for Huella del Odio y la Polarización — Hate and Polarization Footprint. But we feel bad that polarization is being left out, so we’re going to call it HODYPO, which is definitely more fun than just saying “hate” in Spanish with a silent H in front of it.

One more step. The announcement, made at the Cumbre contra el Odio (Antihate Summit) in Madrid, follows Sánchez’s speech last month in Dubai, where he laid out a package of five measures to regulate social media, including a ban on minors and a plan to subject tech bros executives to criminal liability if illegal or hateful content isn’t removed.

• Not totally clear how it works. The HODIO tool hasn’t been released yet, but when it’s live it will apparently be used to generate a “public and transparent” ranking that will allow users to see which platforms — Instagram, TikTok, X, YouTube and Facebook will be measured — contain the most hate-inciting content, so that people know “who is blocking this content, ⁠who ​is looking the other way, ​and who is profiting from it.”

• Smart people. Oh, and academics and experts will be involved to make it “rigorous.”

The trust in Sánchez issue. The interwebs, as we know, can be super-toxic these days, and we would be thrilled to face less angry garbage online. But if you think HODIO sounds eerily censorship-adjacent (like, what's "hate", and what's "disagreeable"?), you’re not alone. Some experts weren’t happy when Sánchez mentioned it in Dubai, calling it “dangerous” because it could be used to clamp down on political dissidence. And critics (largely on the right, obvi) are not happy now either.

• And then there’s that EU thing. EU representatives told El Mundo last month that under the bloc’s Digital Services Act, Spain cannot impose extra obligations or criminal liability that go beyond EU law — like jailing Elon Musk for allowing hate speech to flourish. (Though it would be hilarz to see Elon in Soto de Real.)

Proof in pudding. For now, the new HODYPO tool (we’re sticking with it) is 💯 theoretical, so we can’t judge. Though it stands a better chance of coming to fruition than Sánchez’s more “vaporware” announcements — remember the 100% tax on foreign real estate buyers? — because it doesn’t require a parliamentary vote.

2. 😨 The “House of Horrors” trial begins

A trial began Tuesday that will remind us all that green and mountainous Asturias — the Spanish Ireland — is not just home to (literally) mind-blowing Cabrales cheese and gobs of cider-drinking implements. There are also weirdos. Which brings us to the Casa de los Horrores — a chalet in the village of Fitoria outside Oviedo — and the discovery in it that blew Spain’s collective mind (even more than Cabrales cheese).

• The House of Horrors. The story begins in April 2025 when a suspicious neighbor alerted police that there might be, you know, kids being hidden in the house. When officers entered the chalet, they discovered three children — two eight-year-old twins and a 10-year-old sibling — who, according to prosecutors, had barely stepped outside since (drumroll, please) December 2021. 🤯

What they found inside sounds less like a family home and more like a very bleak pandemic bunker.

• Gross. The kids were reportedly wearing masks and living among piles of garbage and animal waste 🤮. They slept in cribs and on a mattress without legs, wore diapers, and had shoes that hadn’t been replaced since 2019. The windows were kept closed, and air barely circulated. The kids had no schooling, no medical checkups, and almost no contact with the outside world — not even TikTok.

Extreme disease fear. When police removed the kids from the house, investigators concluded the parents — a 53-year-old German man and a 48-year-old woman with joint U.S.-German nationality — had kept them isolated out of an “insurmountable fear” of disease outbreak after contracting coronavirus. (Yes, COVID panic rides again.)

Enter the trial. The proceedings opened Tuesday at the provincial court in Oviedo — behind closed doors, given that the victims are minors and the allegations are f’ing grim. (The parents have been in preventive custody since their arrest.)

• Prosecutors accuse the couple of habitual psychological abuse within the family and three counts of illegal detention, with the aggravating factor that the victims were their own children.

• If convicted, the parents could face more than 25 years in prison.

And the children? The kids, meanwhile, are now under the care of the regional government of Asturias, receiving intensive psychological support and — in what must be a very strange adjustment — attending school and learning Spanish.

But the defense says: hold your horses. The parents’ lawyers claim there was no “house of horrors” at all. Instead, they say this was simply a family that chose to isolate itself from the world — perhaps in a way that was “extravagant or heterodox,” but not criminal. You know, just weirdos.

• Their argument? What prosecutors describe as unlawful imprisonment, the defense describes as, um, very committed homeschooling. 🤔

3. 🤳 More beef: Spanish cinema vs. influencers

It’s the fight we didn’t know we needed (but love anyway). The Spanish film world is once again asking a question that feels both ancient and extremely 2026: why are people who don’t seem to know, like, or even vaguely follow Spanish cinema showing up at its biggest events just to flutter their eyelashes and giggle for the cameras?

• The scandal exploded at the Goyas and the Málaga Film Festival, where actors, directors, and film people found themselves watching skin care and travel influencers glide down the red carpet with the serene confidence of people who know they absolutely do not need to name a single nominated film to be there.

• The whole thing caught fire thanks to influencer Ona Gonfaus (1.8m followers on TikTok), who was asked on the red carpet in Málaga to recommend a Spanish film and, after buffering for a few secs, came up with “the latest Ocho apellidos movie”, a film from 2023 that is very much not the hot festival pick of the moment.

Cue the outrage. The reaction from actors and people in the film industry was not great.

• Actress Yolanda Ramos (whom you may know from Paquita Salas!) noted, while cooking and doing the laundry in her pyjamas, that she was at home while influencers were at the Goyas. And the legendary Carmen Maura cut straight to the point: influencers “don’t make cinema.”

• Norma Ruiz reminded everyone that the Goyas are supposed to be the party of Spanish film, not a general gala for people with ring lights. Director Isabel Coixet said that “we’ve built a world where creating something lasting matters less than accumulating followers”. and added that influencers don’t move people to cinemas so much as they move them to buy acne serums. Ouch.

The influencers, naturally, defended themselves. Their argument is simple: they bring reach, visibility, younger audiences, and free publicity to Spanish cinema.

• Influence Inés Hernand took the broader view and argued that influencers are simply the new celebrities, useful for bringing fresh eyes to culture.

• A matter of national concern. Even Culture Minister Ernest Urtasun tried to calm things down by saying that everyone has a place in these events (while politely reminding everyone that the invitation system is not his circus).

Plot twist not so much. And that gets us to the actual reason these people are there in the first place: the sponsors send them (because, of course).

• The Spanish Film Academy has repeatedly said that the influencers at the Goyas were invited by partner brands, not by the institution itself. In Málaga, some were invited by the festival, while others also came through commercial partnerships.

• So the mystery is less “why are they here?” and more “why are brands convinced that an influencer who can’t name a current Spanish film is the best ambassador for Spanish cinema?” The answer, obviously, is followers.

4.🤬 Even more beef: Politicians really need to take a chill pill

As Spain inches closer to elections (yay!), the political class appears to be entering what can only be described as the “please, everyone, calm the fuck down” phase of the pre-campaign season.

• This week alone delivered a remarkable series of incidents that show that tempers are rising, patience is wearing thin, and political careers are, um, ending.

The first meltdown occurred in Collado Villalba (Madrid), where a PP councilwoman decided that a feminist monologue titled Being a Woman had crossed a line.

• Happy International Women’s Day. Ten minutes into the performance, she marched onto the stage and announced the show was over because she considered it “disrespectful” (see video above, it’s unclear what triggered the interruption, but it sounds like somebody said the word “penis” 🍆 😱).

• The audience, understandably confused about how a performance could be shut down like it was 1958 Francoist Spain, started protesting immediately.

• The video went viral, the backlash was instant, and even the PP itself rushed to condemn the interruption, reminding everyone that freedom of expression applies to theater too. In a few hours, the councilwoman apologized, admitted her reaction “was not appropriate,” and resigned from her position.

The second episode took place in Aranjuez (Madrid) and had a bit more (literal) caffeine involved.

• In a tense municipal meeting, a PSOE councilman lost his temper during an argument with a Vox representative. Insults were exchanged (“fascist,” “gilipollas,” the usual parliamentary poetry), and the socialist councilman decided the next logical step was to throw his cup of coffee at his opponent’s face.

• The Vox councillor dodged it, but the scene quickly escalated into a full political scandal. Outrage followed, complaints were filed, and the PSOE councillor acknowledged his behavior had been inappropriate, so he resigned. Sad!

And just when things couldn’t get any more chaotic, there was a third political surprise. Carlo G. Angrisano, the secretary general of Nuevas Generaciones, the youth wing of the PP, suddenly announced he was quitting the party (and not quietly either).

• The 29-year-old declared in a video statement that young Spaniards are fed up with immigration, bureaucracy, and “wokism,” and then did the unthinkable for someone in his position: he publicly asked people to vote for Vox instead.

• The PP quickly distanced itself (like, obvi), suggesting Angrisano had already been inactive for months and implying his resignation was less dramatic than advertised. (Still, pretty dramatic, right?)

If this is just the warm-up, the election year (2027 or…2026?) promises to be a shitshow entertaining! 🎉

5.🏺 Architects recover a Roman ship off one of Mallorca’s busiest beaches

Sounds like the plot of one of the National Treasure movies (look it up, Gen Z!), but it’s not. While German tourists were peacefully cycling along the seafront at Playa de Palma (one of the busiest tourist traps beaches in Mallorca), only a few meters away, archaeologists were starting the recovery of one of the most important underwater discoveries in the Mediterranean: a Roman ship that sank more than 1,600 years ago.

• The operation to recover the vessel, known as the Ses Fontanelles shipwreck, began this month, marking the start of a months-long archaeological project that experts say could transform what we know about Roman maritime trade.

“It belongs in a museum!” What makes the discovery so exciting is its astonishing state of preservation. The vessel, which dates back to the 4th century (!!), has essentially been frozen in time after being buried under a protective layer of sand that protected it from erosion and looting.

• When divers examine the wooden hull, they say it still sounds solid when tapped, almost as if the ship had sunk yesterday.

• Inside, archaeologists have found more than 300 amphorae, many still perfectly sealed and filled with wine, olive oil, and garum, the fermented fish sauce that Romans considered a delicacy. Even more astonishing, researchers have found vine branches used to cushion the cargo that still look freshly cut.

The location makes the story even more surreal. The ship lies just 65 meters from the shore and only about two meters underwater, directly off a beach where more than a million people swim every summer.

• It was only rediscovered in 2019 by a local snorkeler, who noticed part of the structure sticking out of the sand.

The ship itself is relatively small by Roman standards (about 12m long and roughly 6m wide), with a cargo that originated in Carthago Spartaria (modern-day Cartagena) when a storm sank it.

• The amphorae inside are labeled with ancient commercial inscriptions. There are also personal belongings from the crew, rope, and even a carpenter’s drill used for repairing the ship during voyages.

Divers will carefully remove the wreck piece by piece over the next four months, so it can be studied and preserved on land. The goal is to eventually exhibit the finds in Mallorca, which has a super busy history as a Mediterranean crossroads used by Phoenicians, Romans, and beyond.

🙏 Once again, please remember to share this newsletter with your friends on social media. The more we grow, the more information we’ll be able to offer each week.

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Two men enter; one man leaves

🥊 The “war” alongside the war

Pedro Sánchez has been spoiling for a fight with Donald Trump for more than a year. And now, at long last, the Orange Menace 😡 has noticed the Spanish PM and punched back — and their spat has been super entertaining, like a dinosaur duel in Jurassic Park: lots of blood and gnashing teeth but you know it’s CGI.

• But let’s not mock. This is a proper international incident and while we have severe doubts it will end with U.S. Navy Seals rolling up on the beaches of Málaga, this is the biggest diplomatic blow-up Spain has had in years. So… Party! 🥳

Let’s get into it. The ruckus started Sunday when El Independiente reported that the U.S. had withdrawn 15 tanker aircraft from its bases in Rota and Morón and moved them to Germany and France.

• Why? It soon became clear that Spain had refused to let the U.S. use its bases in the attacks on Iran. Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares said the bases couldn’t be used for operations outside Spain’s agreement with the U.S. and international law, and later said the "logic of violence” the world was seeing only led to “unilateral military actions” with no “clear objective.”

• The pushback was swift (and weeny). 😩 Trump pal Sen. Lindsey Graham bravely wrote on X that Spain’s government was “becoming the gold standard of pathetically weak European leadership.” Which is saying something, coming from a guy who has such a long, personal experience of being pathetically weak.

• No surprise. Also on Monday, Israel’s Foreign Minister accused Spain of “standing with Iran” and said similarly it had supported “all the tyrants of the world, as it did with Venezuela.”

That’s when things got hairy. The 🍊 Menace himself had a tantrum weighed in on Tuesday, threatening to cut off all trade with Spain (no more Fruit Loops? 😭) and even suggesting the U.S. might ignore Spain’s restrictions on the bases: “We could just fly in and use it.” Diplomacy at its finest.

• The nice fella’s words. Trump said he told Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to “cut off all dealings” with our “terrible” Iberian country: “We don’t want anything to do with Spain.” Subtle.

But not as hairy as they would get! On Wednesday, the Handsome Fellow (you know, Sánchez) got all Churchill (ish) and delivered a soaring address of his own defending his government’s refusal to support the U.S.-Israeli military offensive against Iran.

• Sánchez revived a phrase with political weight: “No a la guerra” (No to war). The slogan was used during the mass protests against the Iraq War in 2003 (which Spain took part in), and he repeated his argument that Spain wouldn’t back what he called a dangerous violation of international law.

• Without mentioning Trump by name, he pushed back against Washington’s threats. “We’re not going to be accomplices to something that is bad for the world, simply because of fear of reprisals from some,” he said (hint, hint).

• Not that we like Iran’s leaders. He also condemned Iran’s theocratic regime… but insisted that military escalation was not the answer. “Repudiating the ayatollahs does not mean supporting a war.”

The warnings kept coming. The White House escalated its rhetoric yesterday morning, as Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent accused Spain of “putting American lives at risk”. (He also called Spain a "freeloader” for failing to meet NATO’s defense spending target of 5% of GDP, but who's counting…)

So what’s really going on? Mr. Handsome, as we know, is unpopular inside Spain, and his government is drowning under a sea of corruption investigations. But with Trump being even crazier and more unpopular in Spain (and the rest of Europe), rebranding oneself as Mr. Handsome, Global Progressive Hero™ could trigger the so-called “flag effect” surge of domestic support in the face of adversity.

• Plus… As annoying as many find Sánchez, he looks to be on the right side of history on this one. And his speech made total sense.

But then the whole situation got even stranger. At a D.C. press briefing yesterday, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt claimed Spain had “agreed to cooperate militarily in recent hours”.

• Huh? While we were all scratching our heads about the sudden change of heart, Foreign Minister Albares, issued a denial, saying the statement was “categorically false.” So there’s…that?

Someone, please, think of the influencers. To end on a funny note (though not really ha-ha funny), influencers have discovered geopolitics the hard way and the internet doesn’t forgive.

• Spanish “content creators” who moved to Dubai to dodge taxes enjoy the rich local culture, suddenly began posting videos of explosions after Iranian strikes on their new home and commenting on their Instagram stories about uncertainty and fear.

• No sympathy. Instead of solidarity, many of the reactions online were brutally sarcastic, with comments like “Now let the Spanish embassy rescue you with the taxes you don’t pay.”

Let's just say that the internet’s patience for tax-friendly influencer lifestyles is… limited.

More news below. 👇👇

🔔 But first, check out our sponsor — Bureaucracy.es

We’ve teamed up with our friends at Bureaucracy.es to bring you more resources about immigration and life in Spain. Check out our guides on how to get a Spanish Digital Nomad Visa or Non-Lucrative Visa.

• If you’d like their help with the paperwork to apply for these visas, or need someone to guide you through the Spanish citizenship application process, you can hire them using this link (and, in the spirit of full transparency with our subscribers, The Bubble will receive a small commission).

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 👑 Spain (or at least part of it) wants its ex-King back

Clearly, no one ever told Alberto Núñez Feijóo that you can’t go home again. After last week’s declassification of the 23-F papers showed former king Juan Carlos I — aka JC1 — playing a decisive role in stopping the 1981 coup attempt, the PP boss has been calling for the ex-monarch to return from his comfortable exile (and occasional Iranian bombing target) in Abu Dhabi.

• But, um, there are a few obstacles.

Bring him back. Feijóo went into full reconciliation mode on X, arguing that the documents “should reconcile Spaniards with the person who stopped the coup.” Yes, he’s made “undeniable mistakes,” Feijóo conceded — but someone who sustained democracy at a key moment deserves to spend his golden years “with dignity and in his own country.”

• Madrid regional president Isabel Díaz Ayuso quickly chimed in that this is what “the immense majority of Spaniards” think. (Considering how often it is invoked, Spain’s immense majority must be exhausted by now.)

About those ‘undeniable mistakes.’ JC1 didn’t exactly leave Spain because he craved desert heat. In 2020, amid investigations into opaque offshore foundations, alleged commissions, and a $100 million Saudi-linked transfer, he decamped to Abu Dhabi.

• To be fair, he later paid more than €5 million to Spain’s tax man to regularize previously undeclared income. Prosecutors closed their cases, but the reputational damage was done.

• Bad boy. His son, Felipe VI, cut his allowance (€200,000 per annum!) and has spent the last decade trying to rebrand the monarchy so squeaky clean as to be almost Nordic.

Wait a minute. So not everyone is polishing the welcome mat. Especially the leftish parties opposed to the PP and/or monarchy in general.

• Minister of the Presidency Félix Bolaños welcomed JC1 to adulting, saying that “One thing does not erase the other.” As in, heroics in 1981 don’t prepay for later behavior.

• And ERC’s ever-quotable Gabriel Rufián was even clearer: “Criminals are better off outside than in.”

There are other problems beyond a shortage of welcome mats. Even if Juan Carlos wanted to return tomorrow, it wouldn’t be as simple as booking a one-way Iberia ticket.

• The Royal Household has delicately noted that while he is free to return, if he did, he would “in any case” need to reestablish tax residency in Spain — to safeguard both his own reputation and that of the Crown.

• 183 days. Spend more than that in Spain, and you’re a tax resident again. That means answering uncomfortable questions about who pays for all your private jets.

• The fact that the Casa Real is the one publicly reminding him about tax obligations suggests that, shall we say, enthusiasm for Dad’s triumphant return is not universal inside the palace walls.

And the family home. Then there’s Palacio de la Zarzuela itself.

• Juan Carlos has reportedly made returning to Zarzuela — his home for 57 years — a matter of principle. But it’s not just a family house. It’s the headquarters of the Spanish head of state.

• But, no. Back in 2020, it was agreed that he would not stay overnight there, precisely to shield the institution from further reputational damage. Reversing that now would require a massive small rethink.

Our guess? He’ll stay out of Spain 183 days a year. The rest of the calendar? Regattas in his beloved Sanxenxo. Medical visits. Long private lunches. We expect to see lots of JC1 — just not quite enough to interest Hacienda.

2. 🧑‍🔬 Is Spain really becoming a startup capital?

Spain has long wanted to grow its own Silicon Valley. Looking at the wealth boom in the original one south of San Francisco, who wouldn’t?

• But Silicon Valley is a brutal act to follow, and Europe is stuck in a low gear. London, Paris and Berlin have made a mark, and Barcelona is making a serious push, but still… Let’s just say there’s probably more VC money in one breakfast at Buck’s in Woodside than in Barcelona, Madrid, and the rest of Spain combined.

But that may be changing 🥳! The Financial Times just rolled out their 2025 ranking of Europe’s leading startup hubs, and not only is Iberia showing up — Spain and Portugal host 24 of the 150 ranked hubs — but an accompanying article (by our very own Friend of Bubble Lucas Laursen) lays out the shifting landscape in Spain.

• The simple message. The startup boom is leaking out of the usual suspects. Yes, Madrid and Barcelona still dominate the money (they accounted for 29 of 33 funding rounds/deals in January, per El Referente), but the FT–Statista 2025 ranking puts Valencia, Málaga and San Sebastián ahead of the big two — with Valencia’s accelerator Lanzadera landing in the top 10.

And the winner is… The article zooms in on Málaga, where founder Félix Martín-Aguilar is building Alqindoi (a “device as a service platform” — we love a good tech buzzword) out of BIC Euronova — an incubator founded in 1991 that has survived every apocalypse since the dotcom era — and is now plugged into Berkeley SkyDeck, a start-up accelerator at UC Berkeley, which gives Málaga startups a direct line to California without the “move to Madrid first” step.

• Why Málaga? It’s cheaper, it has engineering talent, local institutions are unusually supportive, and foreign founders are a bigger share of the ecosystem than in Madrid/Barcelona.

• The catch. Funding is still thin in smaller markets like Málaga, and weak English skills can sludge things. Still, as regions move into their second generation of founders, experience gaps should shrink — and Spain’s startup map gets more compelling.

Still, a ways to go. There were 654 venture capital investments in Spain last year, for a total of €1.7bn, up 54% from 2024 and the third best year ever, according to the industry association SpainCap. Which is great — until you consider that Europe overall got $68bn, while the U.S. pulled in $328bn 😱.

• And don’t count Barcelona and Madrid out! They also show up plenty in the FT ranking, led by Madrid’s Tetuan Valley. Which, incidentally, did not accept our application for the latest cohort. NOT THAT WE’RE BITTER. (We will absolutely apply again because, you know… cough... We need funding.)

3. 😔 Five students die on Santander’s coast after a walkway collapse

Late Tuesday afternoon on Spain’s northern coast, a quiet walk along the cliffs of Santander suddenly turned catastrophic.

• At around 4:45 p.m., a group of seven students in their late teens and early twenties was crossing a wooden walkway along a coastal trail near Playa de El Bocal, a scenic stretch of shoreline just west of the city. The path winds along steep cliffs between the beach and the nearby oceanographic institute, offering sweeping views of the Cantabrian Sea.

As the group stepped onto one of several wooden platforms built along the cliffside, the structure suddenly gave way beneath them.

• The collapsing walkway sent the students plunging several meters down onto jagged rocks and into the rough water below.

Emergency services arrived quickly. Within minutes, rescuers spotted two bodies floating about 25 meters offshore. Both young people had already died. Over the following hours, firefighters and maritime rescue teams recovered three more victims from the sea and the rocky shoreline. One young woman remains missing.

• The victims, aged between 19 and 22, came from regions across Spain, including Cantabria, the Basque Country and Almería.

• One survivor was pulled alive from the water and taken to the Hospital Universitario Marqués de Valdecilla, where she is being treated in intensive care for hypothermia and injuries.

The collapse occurred at Punta Cortada, a remote and rugged section of coastline along a popular walking route between the Cabo Mayor lighthouse and the fishing village of La Maruca.

• The wooden structures along the trail were installed more than a decade ago as part of a coastal path project intended to make the cliffs accessible to walkers.

• But their condition has long been questioned. Environmental groups and local organizations had repeatedly warned that several of the platforms were deteriorating and should have been removed years ago.

Search operations continued yesterday as firefighters, maritime rescue units, police and a government helicopter combed the rocky shoreline for the missing student.

• The effort has been complicated by strong waves and the jagged coastline, which make it difficult for divers to reach parts of the area safely. Authorities are also waiting for low tide, when the receding water could expose crevices and cavities among the rocks where the missing woman may have been swept.

4.🌡️ Relax, Pedro Sánchez is not dying (or so he says)

I'm not dead yet! Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has been forced to deny one of the weirder political rumors circulating in Madrid this week — that he is secretly suffering from a serious heart condition and he may be dying. 🩻

• The whole thing began in a pretty surreal way. Sánchez has long been known for his unusually polished appearance. People gave him the nickname “Pedro el guapo” (“Pedro the handsome” or, as we like to call him, Mr. Handsome).

• But in recent months, observers have noted that he looks… skinnier. And that visible weight loss quickly became political speculation.

Some media outlets began publishing stories noting that the prime minister looked “demacrado” (gaunt) and suggesting the physical changes were the result of stress or health problems after years of governing amid scandals and political battles (which, if you read us, you will probably know are many).

• And the Marias said… Only a few weeks ago, a bunch of ladies who were greeting him at an event went full Spanish grandmother on him and told him he had to eat more because he was “too skinny”.

The rumor escalated when a popular right-wing online publication of dubious reputation (the kind we’d prefer not to link to here) claimed Sánchez had been receiving treatment for a serious cardiovascular condition at Madrid’s Ramón y Cajal hospital.

• From there, it spread rapidly across social media (of course) and talk shows. Soon, PP MP Cayetana Álvarez de Toledo (our very own Ice Queen — which we say with love) mentioned the story during a parliamentary session and demanded the government “declassify” the PM’s medical records (obvs a reference to the recent 23-F declassification).

The government initially tried to ignore the claims. But as more media outlets seemed to pick it up, Sánchez himself finally responded with a statement on X.

• Ye olde mud machine. “The far right and the right have been predicting the end of this government since day one,” he wrote, referring to the "mud machine” of criticism from the right (a fave complaint of his). “Now they are spreading hoaxes about my health.”

• Sánchez insisted he does not suffer from any heart disease, and said that even if he did, it would hardly be unusual, as millions of people live normal lives with such conditions thanks to public healthcare. 👩🏻‍⚕️

So there you have it. For those of you who miss the times when Sánchez didn’t look “gaunt” (which, to be honest, he does), here is a photo of him from back in the day. You’re welcome.

5. 🎬 Susan Sarandon got all political at the Goyas (and she got an award too)

Awards season. It was the 40th edition of the Goya Awards (the Spanish Oscars) this weekend, and Susan Sarandon received the International Goya, one of the Spanish Film Academy’s highest honors.

• The annual award recognizes a figure whose career has had a global cultural impact. In previous years, it has gone to actors like Cate Blanchett, Juliette Binoche, Sigourney Weaver, and Richard Gere. This year, it went to one of Hollywood’s most outspoken actresses. (More on that in a sec…)

Let us praise Susan. Sarandon may be known for films such as Thelma & Louise and Dead Man Walking, but she’s really in our hearts for the kitsch masterpiece that is The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Haven’t seen it? Well, you have an assignment. Tonight.

• Loving herself some Spain. At the Goyas, she used her acceptance speech (see video above) to praise Spain’s cultural life and what she described as the “moral clarity” of its public figures.

Cue the controversy. Sarandon has long been a lefty icon, and her political activism is widely known, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that she praised Pedro Sánchez (who, btw, was sitting in the audience 😉).

• Pouring it on. Wearing a pin in support of the Palestinian people, she contrasted the current political climate in the U.S. with what she sees in Spain. “In these days when the world is so dominated by violence and cruelty,” she said, “I look around and see your president and many artists speaking with such clarity, and it gives me strength.”

• But there’s more! Sarandon had already praised Sánchez a day before during a press conference in Barcelona, where she said he was “on the right side of history” for his criticism of the situation in Gaza.

• Awww…and a diss. Sanchéz tweeted that he was “moved” by her words in Barcelona, and the PP reacted by saying that the two have something in common: “They both act better than they govern”. Ouch 😂.

Whoopsie! Quoting historian Howard Zinn, Sarandon spoke during the ceremony about hope in difficult times, insisting that it is neither romantic nor naïve but rooted in historical truth.

• But there was a brief moment of awkwardness when a live translation slip mixed up the words “textual” with “sexual” while Sarandon was quoting Zinn, but the mistake was quickly corrected, and everyone sighed in relief.

Anyway, who won? The big winner was Los domingos (Sundays), a movie about a brilliant 17-year-old who shocks her family by abandoning university plans to become a cloistered nun. It’s directed by Alauda Ruiz de Azúa, who took Best Film, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and two major acting awards — basically, Best Everything.

• Our own Oscar hopeful. Sirât, directed by Oliver Laxe, collected six awards, largely in technical categories, strengthening its momentum ahead of the Oscars, where it is nominated for Best International Feature Film.

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Not quite the Epstein Files

👨🏻‍🏭 23-F gets its day in the sun

Maybe Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez was jealous of the attention the White House got around the Epstein Files document dump. Maybe he wanted to distract from the corruption clouds hanging over his government. Or maybe he genuinely believes history should be free. Whatever the reason, we’ll take it!

• Dirty laundry, aired. PM Sánchez announced Monday that the government would declassify documents related to the famous 23-F — the attempted military coup d’état against Spain’s fledgling democracy, 45 years ago.

For Spanish Boomers, 23-F is pretty much the biggest domestic event in their lifetime — followed by the 11-M Atocha train station bombings and David Bisbal not winning the first season of Operación Triunfo.

• The coup. On Feb. 23, 1981, Lieutenant Colonel Antonio Tejero, along with 200 armed Guardia Civil officers, stormed the parliament in Madrid during a vote to swear in Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo as prime minister (and yes, it’s all on video). The officers held the MPs and ministers hostage for 18 hours, hoping that King Juan Carlos I would back a return to strongman rule.

• Spoiler: JC1 didn’t. Democracy survived. And Javier Cercas wrote a great chronicle of the incident, Anatomía de un instante, that recently came out as a TV miniseries.

Let’s get the politics out of the way. PM Sánchez would undoubtedly like to talk about anything but the performance of his administration, so it is not surprising that the opposition parties on the right, Partido Popular and Vox, both called the move a “smoke screen,” while an ally on the left, the ERC Catalan separatists, said it was meant to “cover up” Sánchez’s problems.

• But honestly, we don’t care about politics right now. We really want to know the juicy nuggets in the documents, who was in on the coup, and whether King JC1 thought, even for a second, “You know, I’d like to be a real King, not a wimpy ‘constitutional monarch.’” So let’s get into it!

Did the King know? For decades, critics have speculated whether JC1 knew more than he let on. These documents won’t put those speculations to bed, but they don’t make him look bad.

• One handwritten internal analysis of the coup states that one of the main mistakes for its failure was “leaving the Borbón [aka JC1] free,” criticizing the decision to treat the King with respect and concluding that he should have been neutralized as an obstacle.

• A Defense Ministry record describes a tense phone call from the Zarzuela Palace at 8:20 p.m. that day, in which the King’s secretary ordered Tejero to immediately stand down and repeatedly asked why he said he was doing it “in the name of the King”.

• Tejero, however, insisted he only obeyed Lt. Gen. Milans del Bosch (another mastermind of the coup) before hanging up.

• JC1 later ordered Milans del Bosch to comply. “For Spain first, and for the Crown second, you must obey”. (Around 6 a.m., the uprising was over, and Milans announced the withdrawal of his troops.)

How close did Spain come to bloodshed? The most chilling revelations concern how narrowly Spain avoided catastrophe.

• Massacre averted. Authorities considered storming Parliament with a GEO (Spain’s SWAT) operation — estimates suggested 80 to 110 deaths.

• Another document describes the orders given to soldiers during the takeover of Spanish public television RTVE — they were told to “shoot to kill” if necessary, with weapons ready and safeties off.

Who was really involved? The intelligence services did not emerge spotless.

• A declassified report from Cesid (Spain’s former intelligence service) admits that six of its agents were involved in the coup and reveals that after the failed attempt, internal mechanisms were activated to cover up their movements.

• Thank you for your service. Meanwhile, an internal Policía Nacional memo from November 1981 claims the force was the main “dam” that stopped the coup.

The human farce. Then there’s the tragicomic layer.

• Fool’s errand. Transcripts of recorded calls show that during the coup, Tejero’s wife repeatedly insulted him, calling him “a fool” and “a disgrace,” and lamenting that he had been abandoned by his peers.

• Even Washington seemed unsure what to make of it at first. Early U.S. cables called it an “internal matter.” Later, President Reagan personally praised JC1 for defending democracy.

And now he’s dead! Oh, and in an unexpected twist of cosmic irony, Tejero died yesterday at 93 years old. Sentenced to 30 years in prison for rebellion, he was paroled in 1996 and had been living quietly in Málaga — a nostalgic symbol for parts of the far right to the end.

• Tejero will be forever remembered for getting the attention of the MPs by shooting the ceiling of Parliament and shouting “¡se sienten, coño!” — “Sit down, dammit!”

More news below. 👇👇

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💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. ⛷️ Spain has its best Winter Olympics in 90 years

The boos and cheers heard round the alps. The big news from the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy was arguably the U.S. men’s and women’s hockey teams both winning gold in thrilling overtime victories over Canada.

• Or the U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance being roundly booed at the opening ceremony.

• Or maybe Sturla Holm Lægreid, a 28-year-old Norwegian biathlete, breaking down in tears during a live TV interview as he apologized to his ex-girlfriend for having an affair.

• Or the immortal American skier Lindsey Vonn coming back from age, surgery and broken joints to crash so hard she almost lost her leg to amputation.

But around here, the news was a record-breaking performance from Spain. “Spain?” you ask. Yes, Spain…

• Historic Olympics. Spanish athletes won three medals in the Italian games. One gold. Two bronze.

• Spain received all three in ski mountaineering events (trust us — it’s hella difficult).

• Oriol Cardona delivered Spain’s first Winter Olympic gold in more than five decades. Ana Alonso followed up by receiving bronze for her efforts. Together Cardona and Alonso won another bronze in the mixed relay.

Accomplishment? Of course, this feels historic partly because Spain isn’t exactly a winter-sports dynasty. Or a winter sports country.

• In nearly 90 years of Winter Olympic participation, Spanish athletes have built a résumé that, at best, felt like a footnote compared with Norway’s. Before this year, Spain’s total in winter medals could be counted on one hand (i.e. there were 5), with a few stray bronzes and one gold from Paquito Fernández Ochoa back in… 1972. Pre Tiktok, pre internet, pre color TV.

So why does Spain struggle in the Winter Olympics? In the words of the president of Spain’s winter sports federation, May Peus, “The tradition of ice and snow in Spain is what it is.” Winter sport in Spain has long been a minority activity, historically the playground of the wealthy, the aristocratic, the nouveau riche, or families who worked at ski resorts.

• Spain has 35 ski resorts. Sounds decent. Except many can’t guarantee snow all winter. And the ones that can? They often lack the large-scale facilities needed for elite training and competition.

• The high-performance centers? They’re built for summer sports (and fútbol!). They have no winter simulators, no specialized infrastructure, and no deep development pipeline.

So Spain isn’t built for winter dominance. Fine. But hey, where does everyone in the Great White North escape for sun and joy? Exactly. Spain. We bet Sturla Holm Lægreid and JD Vance will visit. Just so they don’t cry.

2. 🧯 Vox vs. 🌎: The far-right picks fights with… everyone

Vox is having one of those weeks where you can practically hear the shouting from party HQ. In just a few days, Spain’s far-right force has managed to pick fights with itself, with the PP (again), and even with its beloved Catholic Church.

Vox vs. Vox. Madrid City Hall is hosting a full-blown family feud. Javier Ortega Smith — Vox co-founder, longtime enforcer, and former secretary general — is refusing to step down as the party’s spokesperson in the city council.

• The awkward bit? Party leader Santiago Abascal has suspended Ortega Smith and begun the process to expel him. But he can’t simply fire him from City Hall. The spokesperson is chosen by the five-member municipal group, and it’s split — three back Ortega Smith, two back Abascal. The numbers aren’t on the boss’s side.

• A more awkward bit? Ortega says he’ll only leave if councillors vote him out. But they won’t. If Abascal expels the rebels, they could remain on the council as non-attached councillors, costing Vox resources and influence.

Why the drama? This isn’t ideological. It’s a power struggle. Ortega Smith is casting himself as a victim of Abascal’s dictatorial top-down control, while the leadership line is simple: the direction decides, everyone obeys. But Ortega Smith says he’ll go to court, if necessary — and is hinting that he knows a lot about how the party works behind the scenes. 😉

Vox vs. the PP. Meanwhile, the PP still needs Vox to govern in places like Extremadura and Aragón, and negotiations are proving… difficult.

• PP boss Alberto Nuñez Feijóo tried to impose order this week by publishing a national “framework” laying out the PP’s red lines for deals with Vox: He wants proportionality, approval of all budgets, lower taxes, institutional respect… you know, the whole “we’re the adults in the room” deal. (It’s also a preview of how Feijóo wants politics to look if he ever becomes PM).

• Abascal bristled with pure indignation because he hated the power dynamic, saying that the PP is treating Vox like a wild animal that needs to be “tamed.”

• His argument? If you need our votes, you don’t get to hand us a rulebook like we’re interns. The PP then tried to walk its document back, but the damage was done.

Vox vs. the Catholic Church. In the oddest subplot, there were reports that Pope Leo XIV (who, btw, just confirmed he’ll be in Spain June 6-12) privately warned bishops that his biggest concern in Spain was the far right trying to “instrumentalize” the Church and “win the Catholic vote”; multiple outlets insisted he explicitly mentioned Vox.

• Vox’s leadership tried to defuse it at first, but then Abascal dismissed the supposed comment as an invention fed to the press by “a bishop who collaborates with immigration.”

Either way, it’s a headache. Vox wraps itself in Catholic identity, but the Spanish Church hierarchy has been publicly supportive of migrant regularization and has pushed back on Vox’s anti-immigration rhetoric.

3. 🪩 You can use Spain’s youth card for clubbing, right? Um, no

Kids these days. TikTok has discovered what may or may not be a loophole in Spain’s Bono Cultural Joven — and the internet has decided that Pedro Sánchez is now personally funding 18-year-olds’ tequila shots. Spain’s Ministry of Culture? Not happy about the turn of events.

• Party = art. Over the past few days, viral videos have claimed that young people can use the €400 cultural allowance they get from the state to get into nightclubs. In one widely shared clip, a guy confidently explains to a group of teenagers how the prepaid card can be used at a Madrid club because “people don’t realize it works for nightlife.”

Revolutionary scholarship. Some of the teens brag that they’ve still got €150 left on their cards. In other words, they’re ready for a long night out. The meme spreading online is simple and irresistible: “Pedro pays for your party.” But not quite…

What the card actually is. The Bono Cultural Joven gives 18-year-olds €400 to spend on cultural goods and “experiences.” It’s split neatly into buckets: €100 for physical products (lol, imagine an 18-year-old buying a physical magazine 😭); €100 for digital products (subscriptions, video games); €200 for live cultural events (theatre, cinema, museums, concerts)

• It’s valid for one year, usable in 3,800+ registered establishments, and backed by a €170 million budget. This is not pocket change.

The problem? Nightclubs are not culture. At least not under the program’s rules. The money is meant to get teens into museums, not into the VIP. And certainly not for bottle service.

• So how are these payments going through? The suspicion is that some venues are processing transactions under categories that technically qualify — for example, labeling events as “live music.” That bureaucratic gray zone is where this whole thing gets spicy.

The government response? Yeah…not amused.

• The Ministry of Culture has warned that anyone using the card fraudulently “must reimburse those amounts to the Administration.” Businesses that allow improper use could face penalties — or be kicked out of the program entirely.

No fun! The government is planning to ban the sale of energy drinks to the under 16 set too. 😭

4. 🫵 Julio Iglesias strikes back in lurid sex assault scandal

If you thought Julio Iglesias would quietly huddle with his lawyers, hoping that the explosive stories of his alleged sexual assaults published last month would blow over, you would be wrong.

• Take it back! This week, he struck back pretty dramatically, demanding that Yolanda Díaz, the deputy prime minister, “rectify” comments she made about the case that suggested that she, well, thought he did it.

The backstory, briefly. In January, El Diario published an explosive investigative piece in which two former employees of Iglesias’s Caribbean mansions accused the well-tanned crooner of sexual assault, coercion, and what they described as conditions akin to sexual slavery.

• On to court. Their claims — involving alleged abuse in the Dominican Republic and the Bahamas — were filed before Spain’s National Prosecutor’s Office with the backing of Women’s Link Worldwide.

• But no love from the law. The prosecutor ultimately archived the complaint, citing lack of jurisdiction: the alleged events took place abroad, and Spanish courts, post-2014 reforms, are picky about such things. It was a procedural dead end, not a declaration of innocence.

Enter Yolanda. On Jan. 13, just after the investigation dropped, Díaz shared the headline of the El Diario story on Bluesky and added her own gloss: “Chilling testimonies… Sexual abuse and a situation of slavery with a power structure based on constant aggression.”

• And then, more. The next day on state TV, she doubled down, saying the investigation “is terrifying, it’s panic-inducing,” and that the women were in a position of “extreme inferiority.” She did, to be precise, use the word “alleged” at one point. But the overall vibe was less “alleged” and more “resounding condemnation.”

Julio would like an apology. Through his lawyer, José Antonio Choclán, the 82-year-old icon has filed a demanda de conciliación — the obligatory prelude to a criminal complaint for slander or libel. He wants Díaz to “publicly rectify,” to acknowledge the “gravely offensive and slanderous nature” of her statements, and to compensate him “in the amount to be determined based on the serious social damage caused.”

• Presumption of innocence guilt. The filing accuses Díaz, a “high ranking public official,” of broadcasting “clear prejudices of guilt” and trampling his presumption of innocence. Iglesias, his team notes pointedly, has “never had the condition of a person under investigation or a suspect.”

And if you thought Yolanda would back down? Think again. Her response Tuesday, also on Bluesky: “I defend working women… With or without complaints,” she wrote, “women will no longer be silent.”

• A quick translation. See you in court. And Díaz might have time for the fight: She announced yesterday she wouldn't run for reelection.

5. 🐶 Are teens turning into animals? Inside the Therian frenzy

Move over, Punch the monkey! Therians are the latest internet “identity panic” to go mainstream in Spain: Teenagers (and some young adults) are posting videos in animal masks, sometimes moving around on all fours, smelling each other’s butts (lol gross), and describing how they identify with a (non-human) animal on a psychological or spiritual level.

• The term comes from therianthropy (Greek for “beast” + “human”). Crucially, it’s not actually new — it’s been floating around since the 1990s — but in the past two weeks it’s exploded because it’s perfect algorithm bait. It’s visually absurd, easily mocked, and tailor-made to travel fast from tiny subcultures to mass audiences on TikTok and Instagram. And the media is loving it.

Local excitement. “Therian meetups” are happening in Madrid and Barcelona, with similar flareups in Latin America (where they are all over Argentina and Mexico).

• But when journalists and gawkers showed up expecting hordes of masked teens, they mostly found… influencers, hecklers, and people hoping to film something weird enough to go viral. The Therians themselves? Harder to spot.

The Therians who dare to speak publicly insist this isn’t a cosplay trend. They describe their identity as involuntary and internal and often very private.

• Here’s an example. Ivy, a 22-year-old data administrator in Catalonia who says she was a ram in another life, told El Español, “A therian is someone who involuntarily identifies as an animal on some level.” Her realization emerged, she said, like a “spark” — with, “small flashbacks, lucid dreams, and behavioral signals.”

Cue moral panic. The media and pearl-clutching broader society have treated the trend either as curiosity or civilizational collapse — and that gap is where controversy thrives.

• Parts of Spain’s extreme right have latched onto the trendlet. Analysts say therians are useful for the “anti-woke” right because they can serve as “proof” that society has gone insane and we live in a decadent world where boundaries don’t exist. Oh and they can then link it to trans people and LGBTQ+ rights (because, you know, first trans pronouns, then animals).

If it feels familiar, it should. Remember the Satanist panic in the U.S.? We do. That’s the period in the 80s and 90s when people reported thousands of unsubstantiated cases of Satanic ritual abuse (mix the expansion of daycare centers with fears of Satanism and it sorta makes sense?), culminating in Missouri passing House Bill 1370 in 1990, which increased penalties for crimes involving ritual or ceremony. This panic is like that, but cuddlier.

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Fashion police

🧕 Europe's burqa (and niqab) ban wave comes to Spain

The fight over the burqa and niqab just landed in Spain with a big ‘thud’. Arguments over the garments worn by some Muslim women that (respectively) cover the entire face or all but the eyes have been raging across Europe for years, but Spain’s current political weather meant that, well, right now was the time for it to burst on the scene, wet, confused, and screaming like a newborn child.

• The trigger? Yup, it was the far-righties of Vox, who brought a law to Parliament this week framed as “protecting women’s dignity” and “citizen security,” with a preface that warns darkly about “mass immigration” from countries with “strong Islamist influence” and the supposed “normalization” of people “circulating with their face covered.”

What’s actually in it? Well, a lot. Vox’s text pushes (1) fines for wearing the niqab/burqa in public spaces—starting around €600 and escalating (with repeat offenses) up to €30,000 — (2) prison sentences for anyone who “imposes” the garment through coercion (Vox proposes up to three years, higher if the victim is a minor or otherwise vulnerable), and (3) changes that would make it easier to expel foreign nationals for certain “very serious” infractions.

• Why did the PP back it? And not just kinda, but enthusiastically. Because the PP is in the awkward position of needing Vox as a coalition partner in two regions (Extremadura and Aragón) — and, more broadly, needs to keep the coalition math viable ahead of Castilla y León’s March 15 regional election. The burqa vote is something the right can agree on without having to talk about things like climate policy, Europe, or whatever else Vox is currently trying to set on fire.

• The standard reasoning behind a ban comes in two flavors. One is security and identification: a state can’t identify you if it can’t see your face. The other is women’s equality. As in, the full-face veil is cast as a symbol of coercion and erasure, especially when worn under pressure from family or community. Vox leans hard on both, but peppers it with civilizational language that makes it clear that they’re not, like, super “Pro-Muslim.”

That cultural squirreliness is a basic reason why everyone else voted it down. The outcome: Vox and the PP (and one small ally) were outnumbered; the proposal was rejected 177–170, with one abstention.

The PSOE position was basically, “Nice try, but no.” Socialists argued the Vox text collides with constitutional protections — particularly religious freedom and non-discrimination — and, in any case, is transparently designed to “feed” a xenophobic narrative rather than solve a real problem (the number of women wearing niqab/burqa in Spain is pretty small).

• The right-wing Catalan separatists of Junts, meanwhile, rejected Vox with its usual left-right punch. That is, no to the burqa bill… but even more no to Vox. They insisted they will “never” support Vox because it’s “anti-Catalan” and, well, politically radioactive.

But, but, but… It’s not that black-and-white. Because, you see, every party has reasons to entertain a ban, from public pressure to political competitors.

• Junts actually introduced its own ban bill. Their text prohibits the use of garments that “totally or substantially” cover in public spaces, with some exceptions. So what’s the difference? For one thing, their bill delegates the powers over the “security and identification of persons” to the regional government so it can police its own immigration (separatists 🤷). Plus, Junts is fighting its own Islamophobic-adjacent competition on the right — Aliança Catalana.

• Even inside the PSOE world, you could hear the faint sound of gears turning. Barcelona mayor Jaume Collboni said the burqa should be “regulated” and called it a denial of women’s identity — while warning that a flat ban could backfire if it effectively pushes women out of public space.

• In fact, just after voting down Vox’s proposal and saying it “stems from racism and the criminalization of those who are different,” PSOE congressional spokesman Patxi López praised Junts’ proposal because “it hasn’t adopted the far-right’s framework,” and said the socialists would “study” the initiative and “open that debate.”

That brings us to the awkward ending. Some kind of restriction feels inevitable. Not necessarily Vox’s culture-war version — but something. Immigration anxiety (justified or not) has been turbocharged in Spain lately, and it spiked further after the government launched its extraordinary regularization process for people who can prove residence before Dec. 31, 2025 (applications April–June 2026). The right has promoted a cinematic narrative about floods of immigrants waiting outside the Moroccan and Pakistani consulates, sometimes faking documents.

• Crucially, Spain isn’t inventing this debate. Across Europe, bans or partial bans on full-face coverings already exist — France led in 2010, followed (in various forms) by Belgium, Austria, Denmark, the Netherlands, Germany, Bulgaria, Portugal, and others.

Spain joining the list seems largely a matter of time.

More news below. 👇👇

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💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🔴 Spain’s left scrambles to unite as Vox keeps rising

Extreme Mild Makeover. Spain’s non-PSOE left is making its latest attempt to join forces and avoid irrelevance as the right — especially the far-right — climbs in the polls. The recent drubbing in Aragón — where the PSOE plunged, the PP stagnated, and Vox surged from 11% to 18%, doubling its seats — was a wake-up call.

• The read for leftists is brutal. The mainstream right is treading water, the radical right has momentum, the PSOE fell off a cliff, and the further left looks fragmented and tired.

Wake-up call. Last week, Gabriel Rufián, MP from the leftist Catalan separatist ERC, gave one of his bluntest warnings yet: “Either we talk to each other, or we’re f*cked” (see video above).

• Rufián — articulate, permanently online, and fond of trolling everyone — argued that forces to the left of the PSOE can’t afford turf wars. What’s coming, he warned, isn’t politics as usual but a European version of the authoritarian drift seen in the U.S.

A new name to learn. A group of leftist parties is now launching an alliance under the slogan Un paso al frente (“A step forward”). Izquierda Unida, Más Madrid, Comunes and Movimiento Sumar are backing it.

• Their goal is to rebuild a broad progressive front before the next general election and stop Vox.

• But this also reflects panic. They know they are losing ground not just electorally, but emotionally. Fewer people feel excited by them, and the right currently monopolizes the energy.

• Consider Second Deputy Prime Minister Yolanda Díaz. Founder of the Sumar coalition (vaguely left in a marshmallow blobish way), she remains the best-known figure to the left of the PSOE. But she’s the junior partner in an unpopular socialist government, and increasingly questioned after poor results and falling popularity.

Organizing is proving messy, however. A big launch event in Madrid this Saturday is meant to show unity. But Díaz herself won’t attend, fueling speculation about whether she even wants to lead again.

• Far-left Podemos is staying away too, nationalist/separatist parties aren’t joining the photo, and even inside Sumar there’s confusion about what comes next: A new name? A new brand? The party has an unclear program, and no obvious successor to Díaz.

• Meanwhile, Rufián’s separate public talk yesterday with Más Madrid’s Emilio Delgado generated media buzz — but without any formal party backing it, it looks more like a symptom of the vacuum than a concrete strategy.

Looming over all of this is the brutal reality of the polls. The left knows it’s not doing well: voters are unmotivated, leaders have burned through political capital quickly, and Vox is thriving on rural and economic discontent and cultural resentment.

• Stay away, Pedro. Many (if not most) on the left also don’t want this reorganization tied to PM Pedro Sánchez. A recent El Español poll suggests that his unpopularity could drag the broader left-wing bloc toward its worst result in decades.

The state-run CIS offers the PSOE a more optimistic picture. But then again, the CIS is run by a former member of the PSOE executive committee whose rosy poll numbers for his party have been wrong so often that they mostly qualify as wish fulfillment.

2. 💣 Police no. 2 resigns after bombshell rape accusation

Hard to keep up. Oh, look. Another explosive scandal hits Spain, this time landing right at the top of the National Police. José Ángel González Jiménez, the Director Adjunto Operativo or DAO, of the Policía Nacional, resigned on Tuesday after a Madrid judge admitted a criminal complaint accusing him of rape. González has been summoned to testify on March 17 and is formally under investigation as a suspect.

• González was no mid-level official. He was the highest-ranking operational commander in the National Police, appointed in 2018 by Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska, and widely seen as one of his most trusted men. His sudden fall has triggered shock inside the force — and yet another headache for the government.

What happened. The complaint was filed by a female police officer who dated González for a while and who says she was assaulted by him in April 2025, while she was on duty.

• When the boss is an ex-boyfriend. According to her lawyer, she received repeated calls ordering her to leave her post, pick González up in an unmarked official vehicle, and drive him to his official residence.

• Asymmetrical relationship. She says she was pressured to enter the house, where he assaulted her sexually, including penetration with his fingers (despite her verbal refusals). The complaint says González used the authority of his position to intimidate her and overpower her.

• She also claims that afterwards she faced months of pressure to keep silent, and even an attempt to “buy” her silence through professional favors in exchange for not reporting what happened. She is currently on psychological leave.

González has denied wrongdoing and insists he stepped down voluntarily as soon as he learned of the complaint. The government, meanwhile, maintains that the Interior Ministry forced his departure once the court formally admitted the case.

• The PP used the scandal as a political weapon. Party boss Alberto Núñez Feijóo yesterday accused the government of protecting González until the story became public; demanded Interior Minister Marlaska’s resignation; and questioned how Marlaska could plausibly claim ignorance about such a serious accusation involving his own police chief.

• Marlaska, however, said he was “deceived” and “deeply disappointed,” insisting he knew nothing about the complaint until this week. He even said he would resign if the victim herself felt “he failed her”.

Even PM Sánchez got involved (while he was in India), calling the accusations “very serious” and insisting his government acted immediately with “forcefulness, coherence and empathy” once they learned of the case.

• More bad news for PSOE. This is yet another brutal scandal in an area where public tolerance is thin. The PSOE and its orbit have faced multiple sexual misconduct controversies recently, and each new case reinforces a story of institutional decay and impunity.

3. 📈 Spain closes in on 50 million residents

Spain is approaching a big, round number: 50 million residents. According to the latest data from the Instituto Nacional de Estadística (INE), the country hit 49.57 million people on Jan. 1, a new record.

• There was even a kind of Baby Boom. No, it’s not a 1960s comeback tour. But in 2025 Spain’s birth rate increased — according to INE — for the first time in over a decade. In 2025, 321,164 babies were born — 3,159 more than in 2024.

Just the facts. Overall, Spain added around 450,000 people in the last year, and almost all of that growth came from migration. In fact, for the Spanish-born population, natural change (births minus deaths) remains negative. So the Baby Boom was undone by a bigger Death Boom. Without immigration, Spain would be shrinking.

Here’s another big number. 50 million may seem like a major achievement, but the real milestone isn’t just the total. The most eye-catching fact is that for the first time, more than 10 million residents were born abroad (10,004,581, to be exact). That’s just over 1 in 5 people in Spain.

The young and the restless. Here’s where it gets even more interesting. In cities like Madrid and Barcelona, nearly half of residents aged 25–39 were born abroad, according to recent INE breakdowns. In some inland provinces, that figure is closer to 10%.

• Let’s translate that. Spain’s big urban labor markets are being powered by people who weren’t born here. And they’re overwhelmingly of working age. Nationally, about 42% of foreign-born residents are between 30 and 49, and another big chunk are in their 20s.

Back-of-the-envelope math. Migration is helping Spain grow faster than much of the eurozone because it’s expanding the workforce. JPMorgan and the Bank of Spain have both noted that immigration has contributed meaningfully to recent GDP growth.

• But, but, but… If Spain’s GDP grows around 2.5–3% and the population grows roughly 1%, then the GDP per capita rise is closer to 1.5–2%. That’s still solid. But it’s not “economic miracle” solid.

• Which goes a long way toward explaining people’s frustrations. More workers means more people competing for the same resources, especially housing. You may have heard people complain about housing prices?

Enter politics. The right-wingers of Vox has denounced the social and economic impact of this recent achievement, stating that this “increases insecurity in neighborhoods, and terminally overloads essential public services”.

• Here’s the paradox: Without immigration, Spain’s economy would likely be weaker and its population declining. With immigration, growth looks better, but competition for apartments in Lavapiés looks worse.

The verdict? You’re allowed to brag about the growth numbers. Just maybe don’t do it in front of someone paying €1,400 for a 45m2 flat.

4. 🖼️ The Canaries are going for baroque

This is an only-in-Spain story about art, taxes, and how politics can sometimes allow you — or force you — to pay your inheritance bill with a mythological kidnapping.

• It begins with the Condado de la Vega Grande de Guadalupe, the bluest of Canary bloodlines, a title granted in 1777 — the year after the country that would later give us Pop Tarts, Fruit Loops, and Donald Trump declared independence.

• For centuries, the family controlled vast swathes of Gran Canaria, pioneered tomatoes and tourism (hello, Maspalomas!), and generally behaved as if they owned the island. Which, at times, they basically did.

Fast forward to 2020. The ninth count dies. The inheritance clock starts ticking. And thanks to the left-leaning “Pacto de las Flores” government then in power, the Canary Islands had just scrapped the near-total 99.9% inheritance tax break for close relatives. Big fortunes would now pay actual money. Revolutionary stuff.

• The family’s bill? It reportedly came in around €4m. 🫢

Liquidity, however, is not always the strong suit of old aristocracies. (Land? Yes. Titles? Totes. Weird intra-cousin marriages? Absolutely. Cash? Not so much.) So in 2021, the tenth count and his siblings reached a very Spanish solution with Hacienda: payment in paint.

• Enter baroque drama. A dozen paintings — including two monumental canvases by Luca Giordano, plus works attributed to Bartolomé Esteban Murillo and Juan Carreño de Miranda — were handed over to the Canary government. Neptune flexing. Persephone being abducted. Seventeenth-century mythological chaos, now serving the Tax Agency.

Market estimates suggest the bundle could be worth somewhere between €3.5m and €5m. We imagine the appraisal meeting between the family and the tax man was lively.

The paintings are now public property. The two Giordanos — Neptuno and El rapto de Proserpina, each over three meters wide — are being restored in Madrid at state expense (humidity, fungi, wood-munching insects… even gods suffer).

• They’re expected to hang in the future Museo de Bellas Artes de Gran Canaria in Vegueta when it opens (we hope) later this year. Which is poetic, given they once adorned the family dining room a few streets away.

It's all in the timing. In 2023, a new right-leaning Canary government restored the 99.9% inheritance tax break for close relatives. Under today’s rules, that €4m bill would likely have been reduced to something… decorative.

• Yeah, irony. Had the count died a few years later, Neptune might still be looming over the soup course in Vegueta.

5.🪩 Benidorm Fest 2026 crowns Tony Grox & LUCYCALYS in the most controversial edition yet

Gays Music fans, rejoice! Benidorm Fest has crowned its new champions, and this year, the victory comes with a big asterisk.

Tony Grox & LUCYCALYS, a duo from Cádiz, won this year’s edition of the popular music festival with their song “T AMARÉ,” (see video above), finishing with 166 points thanks to overwhelming audience support.

• Catchy tune. Their track is built around an irresistible contrast: flamenco emotion on one side and sleek electronic minimalism on the other, creating a fusion that feels both classic and modern.

• Their presence on stage helped, too. A DJ table placed inside the fountain of an Andalusian patio (‼️), became instantly iconic.

• Thank you for the music. Musically, the night was a clash between the jury’s taste and public passion (when is it not?). While the professional jury’s top choice was Asha, with her song “Turista”, the public vote belonged to Tony Grox & LUCYCALYS, who dominated the televote and ultimately took the title.

For the love of money music. The win comes with the festival’s signature trophy (the Sirenita de Oro, or Golden Mermaid) and a cash prize: €100,000 for the performers plus €50,000 for the songwriters, as well as a boost from Univisión, which will take the winners to the U.S. to record with a top Latin producer.

A big f*cking deal. The Benidorm Fest is Spain’s pop obsession. It’s also the national contest that chooses the country’s representative for Eurovision, aka the Gay World Cup.

• Even if you don’t care about Eurovision, the Benidorm Fest has turned into something enormous that acts as a showcase of Spain’s music industry, its queer cultural energy, and its internet fandoms.

• The final was the most-watched program of the day, reaching more than 4.1 million unique viewers, with especially huge figures among younger audiences.

The big asterisk. The 2026 edition hit different, though, because it was the first Benidorm Fest to be officially disconnected from Eurovision.

• Remember? Spain, alongside several other countries, announced last year that it would not participate in Eurovision if Israel remained in the contest.

So while it was fun to watch, the controversy cast a shadow over the entire week as the usual “road to Eurovision” narrative was… absent.

🙏 Once again, please remember to share this newsletter with your friends on social media. The more we grow, the more information we’ll be able to offer each week.

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Wet enough for ya?

🌧️ In Spain, the rain falls mainly… f’ing everywhere!

Rain, rain, go away. Leonardo, Marta…we never invited you, nor did we invite your friends who showed up earlier — you know, Francis, Goretti, Harry, Ingrid, Joseph and Kristin.

• Seriously, enough. The only thing more demoralizing than living through January — the rainiest in 25 years, they say, after the contributions of the six alphabetically named storms Frances through Kristin dumped an average of 119.3 liters on each and every square meter of Spain — was the first week of February, when Leo and Marta poured about 20% more than in the previous week.

For those wondering why we’re talking about the weather instead of something “important,” we’d like to remind you that weather is the original safe space.

• Research suggests Brits spend about two days a year — more than four months over a lifetime — talking about it. And it’s been called “conversation’s last refuge,” because it’s the only thing we can still half-agree on. Of course, we’re not British. But after this much rain, we emotionally qualify for citizenship.

But how crazy is it? Let’s visit Grazalema, a “Pueblo Blanco” in the hills north of Cádiz. There, over the last three weeks, some 2,000 liters fell per square meter — more than a year’s worth of rain, or what meteorologist Nahel Belgherze called on X “hydrologically absurd.”

• That causes…problems. Grazalema’s approximately 2,000 residents were evacuated during Leonardo due to fears that the ground was unstable. “This situation is completely abnormal,” said Juanma Moreno, president of Andalucía’s regional government. “The ground is literally spewing water."

• And that’s only one part of the 11,000 people who had to leave their homes over the risks of floods and mud slides. On Sunday, flooding forced the closing of some 179 highways, mostly in Andalucía, according to the DGT traffic authority, as well as local and long-distance trains. And, in the biggest news (kidding), one La Liga fútbol game was postponed ⚽.

• Deaths have been reported. Five have died in Spain and Portugal, according to reports. (The precipitation is not just rain: one victim was a snowplow driver who plunged down a slope in a mountain pass.)

There is good news, though, right? Indeed, there is. Spain, as you know (right?), often struggles with drought conditions. Just a few years ago, a church tower re-emerged from a rapidly depleting reservoir in Catalonia, where boats had to remove fish from oxygen-starved waters to protect drinking supplies.

• Now there’s water aplenty. Over the last two weeks, the rains added more than 10,000 cubic hectometers (a.k.a. a lot) to Spain’s reservoirs, breaking 30-year-old records, according to the Ecological Transition Minister Sara Aagesen.

• Just look at this graph. With 43,341 hm³, Spain’s reservoirs are now more than 77% full, about 24 percentage points higher than the 10-year average, according to our fave site Embalses.net. Many dams have had to dump overflow water for the first time in decades. (Only Murcia — poor Murcia — is still super dry.)

• Amen. “The main implication is that the recurring sword of Damocles of drought has been postponed for months and even more than a year if it doesn’t rain anymore,” Javier Martín-Vide, emeritus professor of physical geography at the University of Barcelona, told ABC.

On the political front. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez promised aid for distressed farmers who’ve suffered massive crop damage, which his government can do; he’s also called for all political parties to join together to create a national climate change pact, which, considering he doesn’t have the votes to pass basically anything, his government cannot do.

• Want more rain? You may be in luck: Storm Nils has arrived.

More news below. 👇👇

🔔 But first, check out our sponsor — Bureaucracy.es

We’ve teamed up with our friends at Bureaucracy.es to bring you more resources about immigration and life in Spain. Check out our guides on how to get a Spanish Digital Nomad Visa or Non-Lucrative Visa.

• If you’d like their help with the paperwork to apply for these visas, or need someone to guide you through the Spanish citizenship application process, you can hire them using this link (and, in the spirit of full transparency with our subscribers, The Bubble will receive a small commission).

💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties

1. 🗳️ Vox surges in Aragón as Extremadura heads toward political deadlock

Tough to swallow. Aragón just delivered an election result that feels like deja vu all over again: the center-right Partido Popular (PP) came first in regional polls, but not nearly far enough to govern alone.

• Incumbent regional president Jorge Azcón won the election, but actually slipped slightly compared to 2023 (from around 35% to 34%), leaving the PP well short of a majority. In other words, the right won big… just not the PP.

The real winner is Vox. The far-right party surged from 11% to 18% of the vote, doubling its seats from 7 to 14 and turning itself into the unavoidable kingmaker.

• Vox boss Santiago Abascal not only campaigned; he basically treated Aragón like a national battleground, and voters responded with what Vox called “more than double the Vox.”

The big loser was the center-left PSOE. The socialists, led by Pilar Alegría, dropped hard, falling from 30% to 24% and losing five seats. It’s one of the party’s worst results in the region’s democratic history, and it confirms a broader pattern: Aragón, like Extremadura before it, is drifting rightward.

• That drift. Since 2023, the combined right-wing bloc has jumped from 47% to 55% of the vote, the strongest conservative showing in decades.

So why did Vox do so well? Part of it is simple voter migration: polls suggest the PSOE lost about 16% of its 2023 voters to the PP or Vox, and the PP itself bled around 10% of its support directly to Vox. Plus, the youths like Vox. 🤷

• Vox also pulled in new voters who didn’t participate last time. And they’ve been tapping into very specific anger in Aragón: frustration in the farming sector over the Mercosur trade deal from Brussels, immigration, and the general sense that rural Spain is being ignored.

So what happens now? Well… The PP has almost no path forward without Vox. There is no viable center-left coalition.

• That leaves Azcón dependent on Vox (and Vox knows it). Abascal has already signaled he will demand a high price this time: real power. He wants leadership of several ministries and further right policies on immigration, climate, and public spending.

That’s not all. After recent elections in Extremadura, the PP and Vox are locked in a standoff that could end with voters being sent back to the polls.

• The PP won the elections last December, and María Guardiola (the current regional leader) is the candidate again, but she doesn’t have the numbers to govern alone. Vox’s support is essential (shocker), and Abascal’s party is refusing to simply abstain or back her from outside the government.

• The investiture vote is set for March 3, and negotiations have gone nowhere, with both sides now fighting publicly as much as privately. If Guardiola fails the first investiture vote, the region enters a two-month countdown before new elections.

Fun times ahead. 🎉

2. 📉 Spain slips down the global corruption rankings (not a great look, people)

Oh, the humanity! According to Transparency International’s 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), Spain dropped three places in the global classification this year, landing at 49 out of 182 countries, with a score of 55/100.

• That puts Spain in the same bracket as Cyprus and Fiji, just above Italy, and below countries like Saudi Arabia and Rwanda.

• FYI, The CPI is the world’s most widely cited corruption benchmark. It doesn’t measure corruption directly, but rather perceptions of corruption in the public sector, using data from institutions like the World Bank and the World Economic Forum.

So what’s the tea driving the decline? Transparency International points to a familiar mix: weak political consensus on reforms (no surprise there), insufficient transparency in public procurement (naughty!), and a string of high-profile scandals that have dominated headlines.

• We don’t talk about Koldo. The past year has been marked by turmoil inside the governing PSOE party, including the imprisonment of former party organization secretary Santos Cerdán, and the jailing of ex-minister José Luis Ábalos and his former adviser Koldo García.

• Spain did launch a 15-measure anti-corruption plan in July, and even though Transparency International called it an “important step”, it also warned it was ultimately limited and insufficient without deeper structural change.

• Those were the days. The last time Spain actually improved its CPI score was in 2019. Since then, it’s been a slow downward drift, suggesting that without a long-term, cross-party national anti-corruption strategy — not just emergency plans after scandals — we may keep sliding.

We’re not the only ones. Spain’s slide is part of a broader European problem. The report warns that most EU member states are stagnating or declining, with accountability mechanisms weakening across the bloc 🫠.

• Spain itself fell from 16th to 17th within the EU, as countries like Portugal and Slovenia edge ahead.

3. 🏘️ Are tourist apartments really going away?