The protagonism of Pedro Sánchez in the Catalan electoral campaign is being paramount, despite the fact that it was not released until yesterday, at a meeting in Sant Boi de Llobregat. The beginning of the dispute, monopolized by Carles Puigdemont and the decision to return to Catalonia whatever the result of the elections, has given way to a debate on democratic regeneration and judicial lawfare in Spain for the “harassment” he says what the president of the central government and his family are suffering; a debate that Sánchez fueled yesterday by claiming “clean politics” against the “mud machine” that he attributes to the right and the ultra-right.

In the first major political act with the socialist militancy since he announced that he remains in office “with more force”, Sánchez reaffirmed his readiness to stand up against those who have not yet accepted the result” of the July 23 elections. It was a harsh message, far removed from what Illa a Catalunya promotes, focused on management and the improvement of public services.

But yesterday was 145 years since the birth of the PSOE, which Sánchez celebrated with a letter to the militancy, with content that he then reiterated at the Sant Boi rally. The president highlighted the task of socialism in Spain “for dignity before those at the top” and warned that democracy “is not the territory of the powerful, but the lever of the humble people that we represent”. And in the face of the “dirty game” of the PP and Vox, he proposed that on 12-M “we win the mud by voting for Salvador Illa”.

Sánchez admitted that his debt to Catalonia and the PSC “is eternal” as a result of the result of 23-J and promised to “work with Illa for the well-being, progress and progress of Catalans” after 12-M.

The socialist euphoria was unleashed yesterday in Sant Boi, a municipality governed by the deputy first secretary of the PSC, Lluïsa Moret, one of the mayoresses with the most leadership in the metropolitan red belt. Sánchez’s participation in the Catalan campaign has been expected, but it is gaining momentum these days, first with the surprise visit to the Feria de Abril in Barcelona, ??yesterday in the Baix Llobregat and tomorrow in Montmeló. And it is not futile that the first leader he went to see after the reflective parenthesis was Illa, especially in the middle of the debate about his succession to the PSOE.

Yesterday the president vindicated his policy in favor of coexistence, the preservation of rights and social and economic progress. But the message of fighting against the “mud machine” has no parallel in Catalonia and is only translated into the red line that the PSC candidate draws in front of Vox and Aliança Catalana, and the fear of a possible pact between Junts and the Catalan ultra-nationalist formation with the aim of elevating Puigdemont to the presidency of the Generalitat.

The PSC candidate raised this fear yesterday in an interview with Ser, in which he opened the door to an agreement with Junts after the elections if the post-convergents do not prioritize independence. A barren possibility – Pugdemont immediately rejected it yesterday – but consistent with the policy of pacts of the PSC that has broken the blocks after the process. “It is the policy of an outstretched hand; we want to agree with everyone”, they justify to the party, although it also obeys the position of strength of the Puigdemont formation in Congress.

Illa calls for a “strong” government, but prioritizes “stability, social democracy and putting public services first” as criteria to agree, and Junts “is not characterized by its social democratic policies”, he recalled yesterday number two on the PSC list, Alicia Romero.

Yesterday, the aspirant praised the “courage”, “bravery” and “work” of Sánchez “so that Catalonia returns to normal”. “You played for Catalonia and Catalonia will not forget it”, he guaranteed. But the candidate’s message had a different tone than the president’s, less harsh, in a positive way.

Illa called for efficiency and good governance and warned that on May 12 “we will not choose who opposes Sánchez in Madrid”, but “who governs” in Catalonia. “For the first, anyone is good, to govern Catalonia, we have already seen that not”, he concluded.