{"id":43539,"date":"2026-06-20T18:52:20","date_gmt":"2026-06-20T18:52:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/43539\/"},"modified":"2026-06-20T18:52:20","modified_gmt":"2026-06-20T18:52:20","slug":"spanish-prime-ministers-wife-ordered-to-face-corruption-trial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/43539\/","title":{"rendered":"Spanish prime minister’s wife ordered to face corruption trial"},"content":{"rendered":"

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) \u2014 A judge on Saturday ordered the wife of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro S\u00e1nchez<\/a> to face trial on charges of influence peddling and corruption, and to surrender her passport.<\/p>\n

Investigative judge Juan Carlos Peinado issued the ruling, arguing that Bego\u00f1a G\u00f3mez represented a flight risk. In addition to surrendering her passport, she must also appear before a court every two weeks. A trial date hasn\u2019t been set.<\/p>\n

The decision touched off a heated political confrontation, with calls from the opposition for Sanchez\u2019s Socialist government to resign.<\/p>\n

G\u00f3mez is accused of using her position to influence government contracts given to a group of technology companies. The judge also accused her of the misuse of public funds in the hiring of a consultant, and the inappropriate use of software while she was a professor at a public university.<\/p>\n

G\u00f3mez has denied any wrongdoing. S\u00e1nchez has called the case against her part of a smear campaign by conservative political opponents to topple his left-wing government, which has been in power since 2018.<\/p>\n

Peinado said that a businessman who allegedly benefited from the government contracts and the consultant that worked for G\u00f3mez will also stand trial.<\/p>\n

S\u00e1nchez, a critic of U.S. President Donald Trump<\/a>, is facing legal trouble on multiple fronts before a general election due by next year.<\/p>\n

Earlier this week, a former Socialist prime minister, Jos\u00e9 Luis Rodr\u00edguez Zapatero, appeared before a different judge in connection with his alleged role in a government airline bailout and to explain the discovery of high-end jewelry<\/a> during a police raid on his office. He denies wrongdoing.<\/p>\n

Government officials sharply criticized Saturday\u2019s decision as politically motivated, while the Socialist Party called it \u201can absolute scandal for democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBego\u00f1a G\u00f3mez is innocent,\u201d the party said. \u201cFor two years now, she has been the target of a political and judicial witch hunt. Today\u2019s development is just the latest escalation.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Spain\u2019s conservative opposition went on the attack, urging the government to call an early election.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

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\u201cLawmakers and the architects of our constitution could never have imagined that the threats to our democracy could originate from the Spanish government itself,\u201d said Miguel Tellado, secretary-general of the main opposition People\u2019s Party.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow we see how the government attacks judges, prosecutors and the media while attempting to silence opposition parties,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is unthinkable in any modern democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n

The two-year investigation into G\u00f3mez was launched following accusations by the pressure group Manos Limpias, or Clean Hands, which has pursued multiple legal cases, many linked to conservative causes.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Derek Gatopoulos contributed to this report from Athens, Greece.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BARCELONA, Spain (AP) \u2014 A judge on Saturday ordered the wife of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro S\u00e1nchez to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":43540,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1093,2883,194,1220,15160,15161,19882,19883,19881,205,24,5689,17,913,19880,394],"class_list":["post-43539","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-spain","tag-business","tag-corruption","tag-donald-trump","tag-general-news","tag-indictments","tag-jos-luis-rodrguez-zapatero","tag-juan-carlos-peinado","tag-manos-limpias","tag-miguel-tellado","tag-pedro-sanchez","tag-politics","tag-socialism","tag-spain","tag-spain-government","tag-trials","tag-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43539","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43539"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43539\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43540"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43539"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43539"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43539"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}