The allegations against Paco Salazar, former advisor to Pedro Sánchez and a key figure in Moncloa for years, have uncovered a case that mixes harassment, abuse of power and internal failures in the PSOE. Two women, both socialist militants and workers in the Presidency, filed formal complaints through the party’s internal channel. Five months later, the writings disappeared without anyone responding to them. Only now, after the publication of the testimonies by elDiario.es, Ferraz admits that nothing was processed “due to lack of diligence”.
“I have worked for Paco Salazar in Moncloa and what is said is true”.
The first complainant filed her complaint on July 28. He began with a strong sentence: “I have worked for Paco Salazar in Moncloa and what is said is true”.
She describes an “unbreathable” work environment and behaviors that mixed misogyny, humiliation and constant sexualization: “Her behavior exuded misogyny and sliminess in every comment disguised as a joke she made. His language was hypersexualized even to say good morning”.
One of the episodes recounted is particularly graphic: “He would come out of the bathroom he had in his office half-dressed and wouldn’t zipper up until he was near your face (because you were sitting and he was standing).” At another point, he states: “One day, in the middle of the office, he staged a fellatio in great detail and out of the blue”.
The woman confesses that she decided to file a complaint despite her “panic”, even moving to another province and using someone else’s computer so that there would be no trace: “I’m still afraid”, she says in her letter.
Harassment, sexual comments and workplace punishments
The behaviors described go beyond inappropriate teasing. The complainant points to intimidation and retaliation tactics:
And he explains the consequences of trying to set limits: “If you set limits, you paid the consequences. Suddenly, you had nothing to do because he would pull you out of projects. Or he’d call the whole team into meetings and you’d be left out.”
“Show me the cleavage you’re wearing today.”
The second complaint was filed on July 8. It also comes from a young, highly qualified worker: “We all had two degrees, an exceptional résumé and were strikingly educated for our age. And that job was our dream.”
Her testimony confirms a clear pattern: “He would come in the morning and tell you what a great ass those pants made you or ask you to show him your cleavage.” He adds that the humiliating comments were constant and always public: “If he saw you looking bad, he would ask you in the middle of the office if you had slept too little because you had sex”.
And he talks again about fear: “He subjected us to humiliating situations that for many of us were traumatic. He said they were jokes, but I never heard him say similar things to men”.
The men on the team, he says, were warned: “They were discouraged from approaching Paco’s girls”, and adds that in Moncloa “Paco likes ‘girls’ and that is something that absolutely everyone in the Presidency of the Government knew”.
Complaints that disappear from the internal system
Both complaints coincide on one point: the feeling of lack of protection within the party. The first one expresses it crudely: “Is this the party and the government that is going to protect us?
The second one states it in her own terms: “I have to see a group of ministers half-heartedly defending this gentleman using the argument that no woman had previously filed a complaint (…) That argument hurts me as much as if they told me that we were wearing our skirts too short”.
The two complaints, filed through official channels, disappeared from the internal channel. Ferraz now maintains that it was a problem of computer “obfuscation”.
After the journalistic investigation, the PSOE has acknowledged that: “neither of the two has been processed or instructed in these five months ‘due to lack of diligence'”. And that no support was offered: “Therefore, neither of the two women has been offered any support or response”. Only when elDiario.es contacted Ferraz did the writings reappear in the system.
“I am not leaving the party. My values are those of this party, not his.”
One of the complainants explains why she remains in the PSOE: “No, sorry. It’s just that my values are those of this party and the one who acts against those values is him”. The other asks for something simple: “Just that the one I always thought was my party be up to the task.”
elDiario.es has been able to confirm that Paco Salazar maintains an external consultancy with Salvador Illa, something that several women describe as “inconceivable”. The PSC denies: “It does not ‘currently’ have a ‘contractual relationship’ with the party”.
