Santiago Abascal took to a platform that he himself described as “crammed with cynicism and demagoguery” to deliver a strident speech in which he accused Pedro Sánchez of carrying out a “coup d’état” and compared him to Adolf Hitler , whom the far-right leader referred to as “the German socialist” who also came to power through elections.
His outbursts were rebuked by Francina Armengol, who asked him to comply with the regulations and express himself with due decorum. “We are not facing a coup d’état and unfortunately here we have the signs”, replied the president of the Chamber pointing out the holes left in the ceiling by the shots of lieutenant colonel Tejero in 1981. “These words are removed from the session diary “, ruled when the socialist spokesman, Patxi López, denounced the “incitement to hatred” of the ultras’ proclamations.
According to Vox, the amnesty law means repealing the Constitution through Sánchez’s “nefarious pacts” with a “fugitive from justice” – the Junts leader, Carles Puigdemont – and this investiture will be “the beginning of the end of democracy and the rule of law” in Spain.
“Sánchez is capable of anything to cling to an armchair of which he is unworthy”, exclaimed the leader of Vox, who, instead, would make the president of the Spanish Government sit in the “bench of the accused” for “indignity” to achieve “power thanks to the enemies of his homeland”.
Although he said he would not speak with “inflamed rhetoric”, Abascal continued to resort to hyperbole: “I accuse Sánchez of liquidating the rule of law, the separation of powers, equality before the law and coexistence”, he said the ultra-nationalist leader, who accused the general secretary of the PSOE of “colluding with the separatists” to give rise to “a tyranny”.
From then on, the harangue escalated to the point of equating the “coup disguised as legality” attributed to Sánchez with the genocidal Hitler. Then Armengol called him to order for the first time.
After denying, despite the evidence, that there was violence in the protests promoted by his party in Madrid, the leader of Vox left deputies from his group the chamber to join the demonstrators in the vicinity of Congress, which is why the candidate for the presidency did not have to give him a reply.
