Recapture Barcelona and Valencia, retain the jewel in the crown that is Seville, and even “give a scare” to the Popular Party in Madrid. These are the main objectives that Pedro Sánchez has in his electoral target in this 28-M campaign, in which he also expects to recover other capitals, such as Zaragoza, Vitoria, Pamplona and even Malaga. The head of the Executive thus goes on the attack, but he also has much more to defend than Alberto Núñez Feijóo, because his priority is also to revalidate the presidency of the nine communities governed by the PSOE.

Sánchez plans to share the stage with all the regional presidents of the PSOE, close or distant, until the appointment with the polls. Also with the two less similar and more discrepant with some of their decisions and parliamentary alliances, such as the Castilian-Mancheque Emiliano García-Page and the Aragonese Javier Lambán.

But on the first day of the start of the official campaign, next Friday, the president of the central government will dominate the entire political agenda thanks to his planned first meeting with Joe Biden at the White House. Sánchez is ready to take the initiative and impose his agenda on Feijóo throughout the campaign. And being the current tenant of La Moncloa makes this task all the easier.

“Our management of the Government is our best electoral guarantee”, repeats Sánchez at every meeting, in which he has been stringing together announcements about new measures to be adopted by the Council of Ministers, especially aimed at young people and the most vulnerable. Thus, in Pamplona he announced an investment of 1.3 billion euros to promote professional training; in Málaga, an injection of 478 million in tourism projects; in Alicante, around 560 million more to strengthen public education; in Murcia, financing and discounts for young people to travel this summer, and yesterday, in Tenerife, guarantees of up to 20% of the mortgage for the first home of young people and families with minors in their care.

The intention of the leader of the PSOE is to transform the “Fridays of pain” that he attributed to the weekly meetings of the Executive of Mariano Rajoy, “to apply economic and social cuts and devaluations of rights”, into new Tuesdays, a day on which the Council of Ministers meets, “of social progress”. “We are leading the campaign, with announcements and initiatives in social and rights matters, in defense of dignity, in the face of a PP without a campaign, with no message other than insult and no other initiative than disqualification”, they emphasize in the management of the PSOE.

28-M is not a general election, but it looks like it. Alberto Núñez Feijóo thinks that it can be the first step to become president of the Government of Spain. This is the goal that led him to leave the presidency of the Xunta and move to Madrid. He has been touring the country for a year but now, in twenty days, he will have fifty events in all the autonomous regions.

In the last week of the campaign, he will visit nine, and some he will visit on several occasions. No destination is accidental. The opening and closing events of the campaign set out their aspirations: rally in Valencia, poster hanging in Extremadura and the first day of the campaign, Castilla-La Mancha.

There is a lot of gambling in these places. Nothing is certain, but everything is possible. As Feijóo says, “the ball is in the post”, whether it goes in or out is up to you. If Pedro Sánchez loses one of these governments, it will be a triumph for the PP, and although the elections are played by his candidates, Feijóo is there to help and has already told the leaders that he will take responsibility for the results.

Feijóo wants to win and rule in more places than now. In this campaign, the PP sees the PSOE defending the seats won in 2019. A victory would give the leader of the PP the push to have the majority that would allow him to govern without Vox.

That will be later. Now the goal is to win. His aspiration is for Spain to be dyed blue on election night to be able to say, after seven years, that the PP has won an election that affects all of Spain. The PP has not won for a long time. Neither general, nor European, nor municipal. He lost the last municipal ones by seven points.

Governing will be something else because he needs allies. But if he does not govern where he wins, he will have a speech made for the generals: it is not enough to win, he needs a large and broad majority because otherwise Sánchez will continue with Podemos and the pro-independence parties.

Feijóo’s campaign speech will focus on Sánchez. In the consequences of the law of only yes is yes; the repeal of the crime of sedition, the reduction of penalties for embezzlement that Europe is now questioning. He will also try to rebut the economic policy instead of recalling the increase in taxes and the inflation that is suffocating families.

Feijóo aspires to add to the faithful vote of the PP those who abandoned them “because of the mistakes we made”, that is to say, the voters who switched to Vox. He knows that most of the Cs electorate has already opted for the PP and he aspires to attract socialist voters who “feel betrayed”.