Falling star

The first allegation against Errejón was made on social media by the actress Elisa Mouliaá, who has also filed a police complaint against the politician. Mouliaá claims Errejón sexually assaulted her at a party in 2021. Aida Nizar, who has appeared in reality TV programmes, has since also denounced Errejón to the police for sexual assault. Cristina Fallaras, a journalist investigating the accusations against Errejón, says she has already spoken to 16 women who claim they were his victims.

Errejón didn't address the allegations directly in his resignation letter. Instead, he made a bizarre, opaque remark to the effect that politics is characterised by 'toxic subjectivity which, for men, is amplified by the patriarchy'.

What does this mean? Is Errejón saying here that male politicians are vulnerable to overblown accusations of sexual assault - that they are attacked simply because of what they represent (Luis Rubiales used a similar defence after kissing Jenni Hermoso)? If so, that implies a denial of the accusations against him, or at least a claim that there are mitigating factors.

But how would that be compatible with his confession to Sumar founder and labour minister Yolanda Díaz that he possesses 'attitudes that were chauvinistic and degrading to women'? That confession, along with the accusations against Errejón made by Mouliaá and Mizar, has already damaged Sumar, which styles itself as a progressive and feminist party.

Sumar has been in steady decline since the party's dismal performance in EU elections back in June. In her resignation speech as Sumar leader a few days later, Díaz reiterated her faith in the government of which she is a part, calling it 'the best tool to improve people's lives'.

It's not the accusations against Errejón that make that a risible claim. It was everything that had already happened by that point: an illegal lockdown that wrecked the economy; accusations of illegal espionage against Catalan separatists; the widely loathed amnesty; and, most recently, the Koldo case. How, exactly, is this government a force for good?

Sánchez has also adopted crusading rhetoric. At the end of April, after cruelly teasing Spain with the prospect of his resignation, he announced he would stay on, in order to wade through the 'mud' of Spanish politics. There's plenty of it, of course; but most dirt before and since then has been generated by his own government.

Regardless of its outcome, the Errejón case has already reminded us of an important truth - the notion of 'innocent until proven guilty' no longer holds. In the courtroom of social media, Errejón has already been charged, tried and exiled to political Siberia.