Felipe González has once again announced that he will not vote for the PSOE in the general elections on November 29. The former president of the Government reaffirmed this Thursday in Malaga his intention to vote blank, considered "inevitable" an agreement between the PP and the far-right Vox if they gather enough support to govern, and directed new criticisms against Pedro Sánchez for the housing decrees and the lack of new budgets.
"I don't hear anything that truly represents me," he stated during the 'Leadership and Global Vision' meeting, organized by the Malaga Business Circle. His rejection also extends to the opposition's offer, which he reproaches for its project consisting "exclusively of removing Sánchez." "I would like, even if it wasn't to my liking, to see an alternative country project," he added before an audience of businessmen, executives, and institutional representatives.
The announcement prolongs the historical leader's distancing from the current socialist leadership. González, president of the Government between 1982 and 1996, already defended in February that he would vote blank with the current candidates. In previous elections, he had explained that he supported the PSOE despite his disagreements, both in the general elections of July 2023 and the European elections of 2024. Now he publicly maintains his refusal to support Sánchez's candidacy.
"It is a vote that explains what I feel, the lack of representation," he pointed out, while assuring that he will continue to go to the polls. A blank vote counts as valid and is excluded from the distribution of seats. In elections to Congress, it is also included in the total on which the legal threshold of 3% necessary for a candidacy to participate in that distribution within its constituency is calculated.
A PP-Vox pact and the irony about Milei
González sees it as "inevitable" that PP and Vox will agree on a government if the results allow it. He stated that he does not like the far-right, but he resorted to the PSOE's agreements with EH Bildu and Catalan separatism to justify his position on possible pacts. Referring to the former, he accused the socialists of "whitewashing ETA," and again criticized the amnesty. He also demanded that the separatist leaders be tried for the embezzlement crimes they have been accused of.
Asked about Sánchez's options, he warned that "there is never an electoral process that is decided beforehand". In that context, he introduced his comment about the Argentine president, who visited Madrid on Wednesday and lashed out at the head of the Government. "If Milei visits us 15 more times, it is possible that Sánchez will win," he ironized, considering that the repetition of these visits could encourage the socialist vote.
The former president described Milei as "an ill-mannered person who insults everyone" and questioned his going to another country to launch disqualifications. "How can you go to a country just to insult?" he asked, before reproaching him for his lack of civic and political education. He also questioned his economic management, stating that Argentina is in recession. His words come after a day in which Sánchez linked the Argentine president to the cuts he attributes to Feijóo and Abascal, while Ayuso received him in Madrid and the Vox leader backed his attacks via video call.
González's objections to the lack of an alternative project in the opposition coexist with his support for one of Feijóo's main promises on housing. The former president considers it viable to build one million homes through a public-private plan involving the central administration, autonomous communities, and city councils. To do this, he has advocated reducing bureaucracy, facilitating land, and resorting to positive administrative silence, whereby certain requests are understood to be accepted if the administration does not respond within the established period.
The offensive for housing and budgets
The housing decrees have concentrated some of his harshest criticisms against Sánchez. González has said he feels "ashamed" to bring new rules to the Permanent Deputation after the Congress Plenary rejected the previous ones on October 2. He described this procedure as "undemocratic" and accused the Government of not respecting "the rules of the game." In his opinion, this body should intervene in matters of utmost urgency, for which he gave as examples the DANA storms or the situation in Ceuta.
The Constitution attributes to the Permanent Deputation the validation of decrees when the Cortes are dissolved. Article 78 entrusts it with assuming these functions, regulated in Article 86, which requires justifying the extraordinary and urgent need for the norms. In this case, the Council of Ministers approved on October 6 two new housing texts with modifications regarding those previously rejected. Their parliamentary validation is still pending. González's criticism is directed, therefore, at the use of this procedure to recover measures that had lost the Plenary vote.
The former president has also placed the absence of new budgets among the most serious errors of the Executive and has presented it as a constitutional breach. The accounts that remain extended are those of 2023, approved in December 2022 and extended to the fiscal years 2024, 2025, and 2026. Article 134 of the Constitution establishes the annual nature of the budgets and obliges the Government to present them before Congress at least three months before the previous ones expire; it also provides for their automatic extension when the new accounts are not approved at the beginning of the year.
On migratory matters, González has defended an agreement between Sánchez and Feijóo to modify legislation and expedite returns from Ceuta, with the participation of Morocco and the involvement of the European Union in border protection. In addition, he has shown himself in favor of regularizing foreign people, although he has disagreed with the way it is being done and has estimated the potential beneficiaries at 600,000. He has asked to promote their incorporation into private employment and has used the expression "the handout and a botched job" to describe what, according to him, happens "in some cases."
