Villanueva de Gumiel (Burgos) 1951.

Graciano Palomo

is considered partly responsible for the fall of Pedro Sánchez's chief of staff after the revelations of his book 'Iván Redondo.

The manipulator of emotions' (The Sphere of Books).

What have been the causes of the fall of Iván Redondo?

The one that has had the most weight has been that Sánchez played the leading role. That was final. The second, the enmity within the Socialist Party, basically Adriana Lastra. And the third was that Sánchez knew things that he did not know about his Rasputin, such as the issue of charges by Bárcenas.

Explain the latter a bit more, please.

The motion of censure was devised, put together and executed by him. Curiously, Rajoy is shot down for the roles of Bárcenas. And it turns out that in Bárcenas' papers Redondo appears charging 130,000 euros more than in Rajoy. A crack.


What do you think of the praise that has appeared in the media for Redondo these days?

His 'relatives' have responded. That is to say, all the ones that he has put on radio, public television and other mamandurrias. They bought his story, although they are aware that he is still a popular publicist: I love you out of interest, Andrés.

What future awaits you?

Felix Bolaños stabbed him. And Sánchez has cut his throat in the public square and the blood continues to flow through the sewer. It has been very bad because the worst of him is remembered: the failure against Ayuso, the 'paseíllo' with Biden and the pressure on the media. So instead of going out as Julius Caesar in Gaul, he has come out as Manolete in Linares.


What is left of him?

His most determining mark is that Pedro Sánchez continues. Because, deep down, Sánchez is a character that he did. Thus his spirit will survive: the destruction of the adversary, his obsessions for the maintenance of power ... that continues there.

In the long run, will it be good for Sánchez to have freed himself from him?

I see it very difficult. The main European leaders are with a magnifying glass on Spain. And in addition, distrust of Sánchez has been installed in the Government, because if he did that to the man who made him president, you will tell me what he can do with others.

How has the relationship been between you and Redondo?

From the first moment he seemed a disturbing man. Ten days after settling in Moncloa - staying in the broad sense of the term, because you could see that he was in charge there - he called me, like other colleagues, to sell me a donkey that I already knew, because I have met all the who had been heads of the 'plumbing' since Adolfo Suárez.


What was the key to this man's success?

When he is unemployed, after having camouflaged himself with a firefighter (Monago), with his ambition intact to be president of the Government, as he used to say as a child, the uncle presents himself to a beheaded Sánchez and offers to recover the General Secretariat of the party . "And I am going to make you president of the Government," he tells him. We are talking about a guy who had been 'fucked' by his friends. That it had 82 seats, the worst result in the entire history of the socialist party. Well, the General Secretariat recovers him and eight months later makes him President of the Government.

How would you define your role in high places?

He was the de facto Prime Minister of the Government. Without changing a comma of the Constitution, the uncle in three years managed to place his boss as head of state bis, for that reason the collisions with the Zarzuela, and he to become 'de facto' prime minister with a parallel government. He has left the Council of Ministers, which is the constitutional basis of the Executive Power in Spain, in an obscene lot of undersecretaries who do not know anything. They go there with all the fish sold. The only power benchmark of such a Rasputin, of a 'spin doctor' of this caliber, is Antonio Pérez, Felipe II's all-powerful Secretary of State. Of which 430 years have passed.

Please summarize the 'ivanredondista' creed.

First, the man gets excited. Then think and vote. That image of the helicopter in Cuelgamuros raising Franco's coffin excites the low passions of the losers of the Civil War. But with Monago he did the opposite and stirred up the passions of the populist right. And with Albiol he used "Limpia Badalona" ... Almost xenophobic. Then, he has a goal learned from Karl Rove and Roger Stone: the adversary must be liquidated.

In what sense?

He tried to do it with Fernández Vara: he created seven 'fake' accounts saying that the money from the Junta de Extremadura was spent through the visa on 'putrenques' and whiskey. The "IDA" thing is his invention, repeating that Ayuso is crazy and unbalanced. That is why he gives so much importance to the media. And that is why all, or some or many, have come to ask him. And he has tried to change the direction of them. The press has him obsessed. As a working journalist, I did notice his breath here [points to the back of his neck].

How would you draw your relationship with the president on his happy days?

Sánchez never thought that he was going to be president of the Government. That was a great advantage for Ivan. Another is that he got up at five in the morning, read everything, called the columnists saying they had no fucking idea or that they had no information. And when the president had eaten the croissants and jogged through Moncloa, he had everything in order. So he: "Ivan, what do I do?"

And how would you define your relationship with power?

He is very hard-working, very ambitious, very skilled and, above all, I believe that in the three years that he has been in power, he has taken a liking to him and has exercised it to the full. He, who told me that he was going to go to the US or Europe soon with his cabinet.

Would you say it's smart?

I've never said be smart. To begin with, it has the shortcoming that it does not know the history of Spain. He has the advantage in the face of power that democratic forms don't give a damn and that he's a political 'killer': Two shots instead of one.

Ironies of life.

But he didn't realize why he was in a cloud. In other words, the Moncloa syndrome was, if you hurry me, much more in Iván's marrow than in his boss. It was corrupting him. I already saw that his end was near. I believed that his future is in Miami, in New York. Things like that. He would love to preside over a big media conglomerate where this is the fucking master; He does not know how to work if he does not command.

Would you say it grew?

How could he not be emboldened if with the free world's health minister with the worst management of the pandemic - according to reports from the WHO, Oxford and Harvard - he wins the elections in the middle of the pandemic. But Ivan is very short-term. Because emotion is short-term and he is a specialist in manipulating emotions.

Is Iván Redondo 'fachilla'?

On one occasion he told Nacho Varela: "My great goal is to make someone from the center-right president." He already tried with Rajoy in 2011 and Jorge Moragas, who was director of the cabinet, 'threw him out the window', he did not allow him to work with Rajoy because they understood that he was too right-wing. He is, be careful, a consultant who drinks from the sources of the North American extreme right.

Let's go back to the chief executive.

Redondo does not believe in the reputation of politicians. That is what basically united Sánchez, who agree that the objective is power. I do not know another president more personally discredited than Pedro Sánchez. Nobody believes him. He is the king of lies. But he starts from a fact, which is that the Spanish people suffer from collective Alzheimer's.

Will History absolve you?

When Sánchez leaves Moncloa I think there are going to be really very serious things about the use of power in an obscene way. The moment we get to know everything in depth, that's going to be squeaky.

If the fall did not take place, could nothing have stopped the president and his chief of staff?

The Redondo-Sánchez tandem had a problem, which is Europe. Europe is, for them, the enemy.

What do you think about the pardons by the Government to the pro-independence leaders?

Pardons are good if those who are pardoned are good. They are 30,000 square kilometers and we are 500,000. We are 47 million versus seven. If they respect Spain, the Spanish people - who do not respect it - their institutions, the Head of State - I am not saying they share it - and they do not waste their money, I have nothing against it. But none of that has happened. Upside down.

How do you assess the impact of the covid on Spanish society?

It has been a historic turning point. What I have seen is a submissive, frightened people, especially in confinement. It was terrible to see. My book is dedicated to journalists who did not get under the table. That they were very few.

And politically?

I think that in the Government - mainly, Iván - they were more interested in using the pandemic for their political and image benefit than in fighting it.

They broke all the rules and it came to them to do things.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

Know more

  • Mariano Rajoy

  • Spain

  • Ivan Redondo

  • Pedro Sanchez

  • Badalona

  • Jorge Moragas

  • Burgos

  • Adriana lastra

  • Francisco Franco Bahamonde

  • Final Interview

  • HBPR

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