If Sánchez has an opportunity to be invested again as Prime Minister, the PP will exploit every last resort to torpedo that hypothetical legislature from the start and force a new electoral call as soon as possible.. Feijóo is determined to fight for Moncloa despite the fact that arithmetic is stubborn, but first he will fight to try to control the Congress Table, a key institution that can hinder the legislative agenda of an eventual Sánchez Executive, without forgetting that the popular They already have an absolute majority in the Senate. In the PP they separate this vote —which will be held on August 17, the same day the Parliament is set up— from the negotiation to form a government, and they look to the PNV to try that, at least in this case, the balance tips in your favor. The jeltzales have already closed the door to sit down and negotiate an investiture for Alberto Núñez Feijóo, but the popular ones have an ace up their sleeve and are even open to giving up a seat on the Board to the Basque nationalists.

It is a “difficult” scenario, they admit several popular sources consulted, but “not impossible”. The measured optimism of the PP is based on the belief that the PSOE could not match that offer and cede some of its seats in the governing body of the Cortes, not only to the PNV, but also to the rest of the pro-independence forces.. In the first opposition party, they take it for granted that Sánchez will use other tricks to tie up support in this vote, but they do not take the battle for lost. “They do not usually enter into these types of issues”, they trust the PP.

After the first electoral call of 2019, Meritxell Batet was elected president of the Congress Bureau in the second vote, for which only a simple majority is required. ERC, Junts, Bildu and the CUP cast invalid votes. In December, after the repetition of the elections, the Catalan nationalists followed the same tactic and their votes were not counted, writing the word llibertat on their ballot papers together with a yellow ribbon, alluding to those convicted of the Catalan process.. They are the same forces with which Sánchez intends to build a new legislature, with the difference that, in this case, repeating the same play could cost the PSOE losing the presidency of the Chamber in favor of the PP.

The vote on August 17 requires in the first instance an absolute majority of one of the candidates for the presidency of the Chamber, but neither of the two large groups has the necessary majority to achieve it.. The sum of PP and Vox is 170 seats, while in the case of PSOE and Sumar it only reaches 153. The cooperation of the nationalist forces in this last case is essential.

The PP wants to attract the PNV to its bloc, at least in the vote on the constitution in Parliament, but even if the Basque nationalists side with the PSOE on this issue as well, both parties would be tied at 171 seats. The only vote of the Canary Coalition, which remains indefinite, and the step that Junts takes, with seven seats, will decide the color of the presidency of Congress.

Chances of success are limited, but there is room for hope in Genoa. The PP has begun to move the board, and the first “unofficial” contacts have already begun. Feijóo's team has several weeks to also start talks with Vox, in whose ranks they also hope to have a place in the organ despite the drop in seats. This circumstance could alienate the PNV, but the popular ones insist that, in this case, the Basque nationalists would have room to explain eventual support for the PP at the Congress Table, although they later refuse to repeat this dynamic to invest Feijóo. In an interview in El País, the Peneuvista leader, Andoni Ortuzar, complained about the “legislative techniques” used by Sánchez in the previous legislature, with the approval of the Table, for the abuse of the decree-law during his term.. “He blurred all the contours at will, used all legislative techniques to his advantage: that cannot happen again,” he warned..

In a context in which a single vote can mean the difference between everything and nothing, the PP has the support of UPN and will also try to strengthen the favorable vote of Coalition Canaria. The regionalist party only has one representative in the Lower House, Cristina Valido, who can undo the tie between blocks if Junts ignores the negotiation with Sánchez. Despite the fact that only two months ago the PP and CC signed an agreement to govern together in the Canary Islands, the formation has revealed its doubts regarding a possible investiture. Your vote, Valido inferred, will be sold to the highest bidder.

All in all, the PP does not plan to reveal the seams of some negotiations that it intends to carry out discreetly until August 17. The strategy is to “wait” and patiently watch the moves to your left to “let them burn” and not make any false steps. “If Junts makes a move, there is nothing to do anymore,” the party ranks insist. They also assume that they are facing a “heart attack” vote, in which the last ballots can be negotiated in extremis. At the moment, the PP has not decided who will be its candidate for the presidency of the Cortes, although Carmen Navarro, Feijóo's proposal to occupy the fourth secretary of Congress after the resignation of Adolfo Suárez Illana, is gaining weight in the pools.