Europe endures the rise of a rising far-right and Pedro Sánchez also resists in some european elections that the PP has proposed, at the national level, as a plebiscite between the president of the Government and the leader of the opposition, Alberto Núñez Feijóo. A query of which both PP and PSOE look like winners in the electoral hangover of 9J.

The elections, which ended with an increasingly stronger far-right within the European Union, although the pro-European parties they still have the majoritythey leave in Spain a victory of the ‘popular’but for the minimum and at the cost of Citizensafter obtaining 22 seats, two above the PSOE.

Relief from a PSOE that saves the furniture

In Ferraz there are feeling of relief. PSOE sources acknowledge that they were confident of a tie based on their internal data, but They think they have saved the furniturebecause Sánchez resists with 30% of the votes and they are the government party that has the best results in Europe.

Thus, the socialists claim to be a brake on the extreme right and celebrate results that, they claim, they make Feijóo the loser of the “plebiscite” that he himself had raised in these elections. Despite not having won, they are happy with the results of these European elections, in which they have only dropped one seat compared to 2019 and won in three communities: Catalonia, Navarra and the Canary Islands.

In fact, after recognizing the victory of the PP, the socialist candidate, Teresa Riberaassured that “Feijóo has insisted on presenting these elections as a plebiscite against the president of the Government” and that “It is very clear that he has lost the plebiscite“. “It has been a resounding failure,” declared the head of the PSOE list.

“It’s obvious that we would have liked to win, but I think it’s a satisfactory result“, he stated, already this Monday, in statements to ‘TVE’. “I think it is a good result,” he insisted. “We have been left with practically the same photo as a year ago when in reality there were those who were proposing these elections playing with all the tools, I would say that with foul play, as a challenge to the Government“, has added.

Along the same lines, the second vice president of the Government and number two of the PSOE, Maria Jesus Monteroinsisted that those who “tried to make these elections a national plebiscite they have lost“There is a progressive government for a while and the socialists led by Teresa Ribera will go to the European Parliament to defend the Europe of social justice and stop the reactionary wave,” he added on the social network ‘X’.

Sánchez, for his part, has defended his party’s role as a brake on the right and the extreme right after congratulating the PP on its result. “The PSOE becomes the the only government option capable of confronting the far-right wave that travels through Europe and Spain. “We are going to continue working to consolidate a Europe of advances and progress,” he wrote on his social networks.

Feijóo sees himself as the winner of the next general elections

The PP makes a different reading, which it sees in the results of the European elections “a new political cycle” and the prelude to an electoral victory in Spain. “We have turned the score around,” Feijóo celebrated after learning the results. “Not only we are going to win the general electionsbut we are going to govern after the next general elections,” he proclaimed.

The leader of the PP thus celebrated a narrow victory against a PSOE that is retreating, but shows resistance, after starring in his party’s electoral campaign, marked by the investigation into Begoña Gómezwith the head of the list, Dolors Montserrat, in the background. A campaign in which he has insisted that the Europeans were the prelude to change in Moncloa.

However, the result has finally been tighter than the initial expectations of the ‘popular’ and the PSOE has managed to retain 20 MEPs. The PP, which started as the second force with 13 seats in the European Parliament, has taken the eight seats in Citizenswhich thus certifies its total disappearance, and has added one more representative.

In any case, in Genoa they are happy with the four points advantage that they have removed the PSOE and Feijóo has managed to avoid the feared tie that regional barons were warning about.

Furthermore, ‘popular’ sources remember that Sánchez called early general elections last year with a smaller margin even in the municipal elections. They also emphasize that in July 2023 there were four seats missing for a Feijóo government alone and today, they maintain, there would be no alternative investiture to theirs. In addition, they claim that this is his biggest victory in European competitions in 25 years.

Along these same lines, the ‘popular’ spokesperson in Congress, Miguel Tellado, has described the electoral result as “unappealable”, “even though the PSOE has now taken it upon itself to celebrate defeats”. “We have won the elections,” she claimed, ensuring that Sánchez “was seeking judicial immunity for Mrs. Begoña Gómez”, but that “citizens are not what they have endorsed”.

“We are satisfied with the result,” insisted Tellado, who boasted that “the PP has been winning all the electionswhile “Pedro Sánchez’s PSOE only loses elections.”