Ayuso's opaque trip to Mexico: the Community only declares 623.28 euros and leaves unclear who and how the rest was paid

Three months after Isabel Díaz Ayuso's controversial trip to Mexico, the Community of Madrid has only declared 623.28 euros in expenses. The figure appears on the autonomous Transparency Portal, but does not include any plane tickets, accommodation, subsistence, or travel expenses incurred during the ten-day stay.

The only two charges published correspond to the use of the authorities' lounge in Terminal 4 of Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas airport. The first invoice amounts to 220.89 euros and is dated May 2, before departure. The second includes another 402.39 euros for the same service on May 11, upon return to Madrid.

The documentation offers no other details about the trip. Nor does it allow knowing how much Ayuso's and her delegation's flights cost, who paid for the hotels, what subsistence expenses were incurred, or what part was assumed by Mexican companies and institutions.

The void contrasts with other official trips by the president. On her trip to Brussels on April 16 and 17, the Community did separately register 1,072 euros for the plane ticket and another 310 euros for accommodation, in addition to the use of the authorities' lounges. Flights also appear itemized in previous visits to Lisbon, Malaga, or Seville.

Ayuso assured upon her return that she had been invited for a good part of her stay. "I am invited by the state of Aguascalientes, I am invited by the organizers of the Platino Award," she explained in a television interview. The president also did not detail then what expenses each organizer covered or the value of the invitations received by her and the rest of the entourage.

Ten days, several cancellations, and an agenda that was never fully known

The Community initially presented the trip as an institutional visit aimed at strengthening economic and cultural ties with Mexico. The announced program extended from May 3 to 12 and included events in Mexico City, Aguascalientes, Monterrey, and Xcaret, in the Riviera Maya.

Among the scheduled appointments were business meetings, meetings with international companies, academic events, a tribute to Hernán Cortés in the Metropolitan Cathedral, and attendance at the Platino Awards gala. A significant part of that agenda ended up canceled or modified after the protests provoked by Ayuso's speech about the Spanish conquest and the indigenous peoples.

Tension reached its peak on May 8. The Community accused the Mexican president, Claudia Sheinbaum, of boycotting the visit and of pressuring to prevent Ayuso's presence at the Platino Awards. The hotel group hosting the gala denied these pressures and explained that it had asked to withdraw the invitation to prevent the event from being used as a political platform.

Ayuso then announced the suspension of the final stretch of the tour, although she remained in Mexico until Sunday the 10th and landed in Madrid on Monday the 11th. The president never made public a complete list of the activities carried out during the last few days or of the people with whom she held meetings.

When later asked about that agenda, she refused to identify the businessmen and media she had met. "I am not going to give Claudia Sheinbaum's Government the pleasure of telling them which media or which businessmen I saw so that they can continue persecuting them," she stated on June 9.

The lack of information about the expenses now adds another unknown to a visit that had already been questioned for its duration and public interest. The Portal also does not clarify which part of the stay was financed by the Madrid budgets, which was covered by the hosts, and whether there were private operators who assumed expenses for the president or her team.

Más Madrid and PSOE ask who paid the rest

Más Madrid believes that the publication leaves two possibilities open: that the Community has omitted expenses or that it has not yet identified who financed the rest of the trip. Deputy Marta Carmona has asked "who and in exchange for what" paid for Ayuso's "frustrated tour" and her supposed "vacations disguised as an institutional trip".

The spokesperson for the party in the Assembly, Manuela Bergerot, has also denounced that the only two known expenses occurred in Barajas. "Ten days at full throttle through Mexico and the Riviera Maya, without a public interest agenda and without a single euro justified," she criticized.

The PSOE-M has focused its criticism on the boxes that remain empty. Its spokesperson in the Assembly, Mar Espinar, has accused the Community of having "forgotten" to publish the rest of the expenses and has stated that "the president is living it up" while Madrid residents still do not know the real cost of the trip.

The regional government defended in May that the international trips of its officials are paid for by the budgets of the corresponding administrations. Ayuso later maintained that most of her stay had been covered by invitations. None of these explanations appear itemized in the documentation published now.

The Transparency Portal only allows following Ayuso to the Barajas VIP lounge and registering her return through the same place. Three months after the trip, there is still no public document identifying who paid for the flights, hotels, subsistence, and delegation expenses during her ten days in Mexico.