It was six in the afternoon in Beijing when the presidential motorcade interrupted traffic near the hotel where the Spanish delegation is staying. It is easy to find out that a high-ranking leader is in the area because the Chinese authorities have put together a large device, flashy cars and young uniformed soldiers on the corners, for the security of Pedro Sánchez and his wife. Begoña Gómez—beige trench coat, smiling gesture—was getting out of one of those vehicles just a few minutes before learning of Judge Juan Carlos Peinado’s decision to prosecute her for four crimes, one less than the ones she was driving.
Sources from La Moncloa assure that the president’s wife has learned at the same time as the rest of the citizens that Peinado wants to take her to trial. It was in China, after a morning in which Gómez accompanied the president in all the events on his agenda. In the front row of the Tsinghua University hall, where Sánchez gave a lecture; at the Academy of Sciences, where he has been awarded an honorary professorship and during a visit to the Xiaomi central store. There he has been seen browsing the technological tricks of the latest electric car models. They have been together at all the events on the public agenda and, over the weekend, on the private visit to some of the city’s tourist attractions, as seen in videos from individuals on Chinese social networks.
Gómez’s presence in Beijing was public and highly publicized; and in the Government they maintain that nothing “is coincidental.” When they reported last week that Gómez would be part of the delegation that is in China, some joke was heard in the groups of journalists with “let’s see, Peinado.” His appearance in October 2024 on the official trip to India – where Sánchez’s wife was – was hovering in the air, expanding the crimes attributed to him and, a month later, when Gómez traveled to Brazil with the president, he asked to consult his accounts. He announced that he was accusing Minister Félix Bolaños of this case (that did not succeed) while all the spotlights were pointed at Sánchez at the decisive NATO summit in The Hague and when he was in New York, at the United Nations General Assembly, he ordered that a popular jury judge his wife. On all of the president’s international trips there are press conferences and, in all of them, Juan Carlos Peinado has appeared; The relevance of the international forum in question does not matter.
Those who know the president well say that, of all the fronts he has open and all the difficulties he faces in this legislature, this issue is the one that affects him the most. His responses in public so far have been confident that the courts will end up proving his innocence—also that of his brother, who sits on the bench in Badajoz in May—but since the beginning of the case, the one known as Begoña case It has been his Achilles heel. In fact, the accusation in April 2024 was the reason that led him to publish a letter in After five days of reflection and general confusion, the president announced that he would remain in office, and has not stopped publicly displaying his unconditional support for his wife, acclaimed at socialist rallies and supported without fissures by the Government, the PSOE and its partners. PP and Vox have attacked her fiercely.
Peinado began the investigation following a complaint from the pseudo-union Manos Limeas and has led a bizarre investigation that has led to almost everything. It has imposed fines on lawyers that have been eliminated by higher bodies, it has had to remove alleged suspects for whom there was no evidence and it has caused unprecedented situations such as the taking of statements in the Moncloa by the President of the Government and the current Minister of Justice. The judge’s investigations now had little room: on September 27 he turns 72 years old and, by law, he has to retire.
He had to decide and he did so on another scheduled date. Who knows if one of the most powerful men on the planet, President Xi Jinping, will end up knowing about the existence of the head of court number 41 in Madrid: this Tuesday Begoña Gómez is invited to an official banquet at the People’s Palace in Beijing.
