On the Harvard campus on 24 September 2026, Pedro Sánchez began his speech on techno-oligarchy and the threats artificial intelligence poses to democracy. But already in the first question, a student named Peter, with an American accent, asked about corruption in the PSOE and the cases involving the president's wife and brother.
Sánchez kept a calm tone, contrasting with the tension in the room. He acknowledged: 'We suffer from certain cases of corruption... the cases of corruption are real. Unfortunately, my government and my party have suffered losses.' At the same time, he immediately separated those cases from the investigations into Begoña Gómez and David Sánchez: 'These are not cases of corruption and not scandals. This is different. The opposition and certain far-right associations have crossed red lines.'
Over two decades of political career, Sánchez has repeatedly demonstrated one and the same line: to acknowledge the party's individual failures, but categorically deny personal or family involvement, explaining the investigations as political revenge. In 2025–2026, when the courts sent the wife's case to a jury and handed down a verdict against the brother, the president repeated the same formula in parliament and at press conferences.
At Harvard, the same tactic worked differently: the audience of students, many of them Spaniards, asked questions not only about corruption, but also about Pegasus, Ceuta and Venezuela. Sánchez replied that the phone had been hacked, but the culprits were unknown, and that the position on the Sahara was dictated by national interests. He did not dodge the topic, but he also did not add any new facts — he only repeated arguments already heard in Spain.
This moment shows not an accidental glitch in the script, but a consistent strategy: under the international spotlight, the leader seeks to preserve the image of an effective manager who fights corruption, but himself becomes a victim of 'dirty politics.' For Sánchez, whose coalition rests on a fragile balance, any admission that the family cases were corruption would mean the loss of moral authority within the party and beyond it.
As a politician who came to power on a wave of anti-corruption sentiment after the Gürtel case, Sánchez is now forced to constantly draw a line between 'our' mistakes and 'their' persecution. The question is how long this line will seem convincing not only to Spanish voters, but also to those watching from across the ocean.
