The PSOE avoids commenting on Enma López's candidacy against Reyes Maroto: "Let her run and that's it"

The spokesperson for the Socialist Party, Montse Mínguez, has tried to lower the internal attention generated around the decision of Madrid councilwoman Enma López to take the step to compete in the primaries that will define the socialist candidacy for the Madrid City Council in 2027. In that context, she framed the debate within the party's organic structure and avoided evaluating her colleague's move. "These are internal matters," she summarized, without entering into interpretations about possible tensions within the party. 

López's move also has a direct impact on the structure of the Federal Executive. Her departure from the Secretariat of Studies and Programs has led to that area passing into Mínguez's hands, who thus adds a new responsibility to those she already holds as party spokesperson and general secretary of the Socialist Group in Congress. The deputy spokesperson position of the Executive, which López also held, remains without a replacement for now, at a time when the party is preparing to organize the primary process in the capital.

Without entering into controversy, Mínguez insisted that the process is part of the party's internal normality. "That is an internal organization issue, a primary process opens, and everyone, if they have the vocation to run, then they should run and that's it," she said, distancing any political interpretation from the move.

Even so, socialist sources acknowledge that Enma López's decision to make her candidacy public before the primary calendar is formally activated has generated some surprise in the federal leadership's environment.

Two profiles in dispute for Madrid

The deputy spokesperson of the Federal Executive Commission,  Enma López, has confirmed to 'El País', her intention to run in the PSOE primaries to be candidate for Mayor of Madrid, in a process where the current municipal spokesperson, Reyes Maroto, will also compete.

López is not a newcomer to municipal politics; her name has been mentioned repeatedly as one of the great bets of Madrid socialism. In 2023, she ran for the City Council as 'number three' on Maroto's list and served as coordinator of that candidacy. A year later, Pedro Sánchez appointed her federal secretary of Economic Policy of the PSOE, and in 2025 she also assumed the Deputy Spokesperson of the party.

For her part, Maroto has reiterated on several occasions her willingness to run again as a candidate. After assuming the General Secretariat of the PSOE in the city of Madrid, she has defended that her experience in the municipal sphere supports her to continue leading the electoral project.  "Without a doubt, these three years have given me experience in the local sphere and knowledge," she expressed the last time she publicly confirmed her intention to run in the primaries.

According to sources from the Madrid Federation, in statements to 'Europa Press', the move has generated internal surprise and is considered “hasty.”