A resignation during the campaign

Montse Mínguez, the PSOE spokesperson, announced her resignation on the afternoon of Friday, 16 October. Columns in El Mundo place it beside earlier exits, naming a former police deputy director (DAO), a former CNI director and Paco Salazar, whom one column says were all sealed off by the same 'muro'. One column argues that scandals and poor management linked to her never brought accountability from coalition partners, and that the closeness of the election made her position untenable. Another column reads the PSOE's language of good and bad actors as the culture that now pushes figures like her out.

A grandfather's past

One El Mundo column reports findings by historian and PP deputy Pedro Corral about Sánchez's maternal grandfather, Mateo Pérez-Castejón, born in 1921. According to that account, he was 14 when the Civil War began and lied about his age to join the Popular Army. He was reported as a deserter by the Republicans in July 1938, after serving at the Teruel front in May of that year. The column says he then enlisted with the Nationalist side in Talavera de la Reina and was decorated three times as a legionnaire. The column concludes that grandchildren are not responsible for their grandparents' decisions, but should examine their own past honestly.

Pensions, expatriate votes and the census

Pensions became a flashpoint when Figaredo, Sumar's spokesperson in Congress, questioned the public pension system. PP parliamentary spokesperson Esther Muñoz then insisted that the system had collapsed, and Santiago Abascal reportedly corrected a Vox member straight away. The PP leadership moved to contradict Muñoz, a step one column reads as an admission of what she had said. In a separate dispute, columns in eldiario.es describe a Supreme Court challenge to a Democratic Memory Law instruction. The law gave nationality to descendants of political exiles, and the instruction presumed exile for anyone who left Spain between 1936 and late 1955. The court's contentious-administrative chamber considers that presumption excessive, and columns say the ruling removed these new citizens from the census of expatriates (CERA), affecting hundreds of thousands of Spaniards. According to the INE, the electoral census closed on 1 August 2026 at 38.7 million people.

A split left and a family kiss

An El Mundo column reads a public kiss between Sánchez and his wife, Begoña, cheered by party members, as a sign that family life has moved into the party's public image. Another column notes that Begoña is under judicial investigation and that the family is turning that case into a campaign argument. On the left, one ABC column describes a front of Sumar, Izquierda Unida, Más Madrid and Comuns on one side, with Podemos and ERC on the other. It adds that Adelante Andalucía, a breakaway from Podemos in Andalusia, complicates the picture further. The column says Gabriel Rufián wants unity under his own leadership, while Irene Montero and Ione Belarra are reluctant to give up their seats. It also reports that the PSOE has circulated a list of provinces where a divided left could fall below the percentage needed for a seat.

Andalusia's first hundred days

The Andalusian government completed its first 100 days under its PP-Vox pact, a period one ABC column describes as largely calm. To reach the deal, the PP accepted Vox framings such as 'national priority' and the 2030 Agenda. The most heated moment came when the regional government approved 25 million euros to cover minors in Ceuta, which Vox opposed. Vox's Gavira put his objection bluntly.

“If the competence had been held by this humble councillor, we would have opposed it.”

The column says the government's attention has since gone to preparing the budget, the instrument it considers the clearest test of any government.