The president of the Community of Madrid, Isabel Diaz Ayuso, has been discharged Sunday after spending several hours admitted to the Jimenez Diaz Foundation. The popular leader was taken by ambulance from the mass for the patron saint of Madrid, the Virgin of Almudena, after suffering a drop in blood pressure caused, according to the medical diagnosis, by a “strong gastroenteritis”.
Sources from Ayuso’s team confirmed that the president will resume her public agenda on Tuesday, once recovered. The president had already canceled her participation in the Congress of the Andalusian PP, held this weekend in Seville, after being indisposed since Saturday.
A discomfort that worsened during the mass
The day had begun normally. Ayuso arrived at the esplanade of the Almudena Cathedral to attend the Mass officiated by the Archbishop of Madrid, José Cobo, on the occasion of the feast of the patron saint of the capital. There, before the media, he made some brief statements in which he expressed his desire to ask the Virgin for “prosperity for all, coexistence and attention for the most vulnerable people and those who are alone”.
A few minutes later, however, she began to feel unwell and had to discreetly leave the institutional act. The president was attended by Summa 112 medical staff, who took her vital signs and found a significant drop in blood pressure, which is why they decided to take her by ambulance to the hospital.
According to his entourage, Ayuso is out of danger and recovering favorably, after a few hours of observation and medical treatment.
He had already cancelled his trip to Seville due to health problems.
Ayuso’s indisposition was not sudden, since the day before she had already cancelled her attendance to the Andalusian PP Congress, where she was scheduled to speak.
According to close sources, the president woke up with the intention of traveling by AVE to Seville, but when she felt unwell she decided to go back to bed and rest. Her absence generated some speculation about possible internal tensions within the party, although the Madrid PP hastened to deny any kind of political discrepancy.
On Sunday, when he reappeared publicly to attend mass, he seemed to have overcome the symptoms, but finally the drop in blood pressure due to gastroenteritis forced him to interrupt his day.
A week marked by the case of his partner
Ayuso’s health incident comes at a particularly tense moment in the political and media sphere. This week saw the start of the trial against the state attorney general, Álvaro García Ortiz, accused of revealing an e-mail related to the defense of Alberto González Amador, partner of the Madrid president.
In this e-mail, the businessman’s lawyer acknowledged two tax crimes, a matter that Ayuso has described on several occasions as “an invasion of his private life”.
González Amador, in his statement before the Supreme Court, assured that he even considered suicide or leaving Spain when the case came to public light. At the same time, the Provincial Court of Madrid has confirmed the prosecution of González Amador for tax fraud and document forgery, accusing him of defrauding 350,000 euros in the years 2020 and 2021 by means of false invoices.
Ayuso, between defense of justice and political attack
Isabel Díaz Ayuso’s attitude towards this case has been ambiguous, alternating institutional messages with more combative statements. On the one hand, the president has expressed her confidence in the impartiality of justice, assuring that she hopes that “the whole truth will be known“. On the other hand, she has denounced a political campaign against her, even appealing to the “patriotism” of judges and prosecutors.
In her speech, Ayuso has portrayed her partner as a victim of the system, assuring that the case has been “an excuse to attack her politically”. According to her version, Gonzalez Amador’s tax problems occurred before the two began their romantic relationship, so she would not have any direct involvement.
However, the figure of Miguel Ángel Rodríguez (MAR), Ayuso’s chief of staff and main advisor, has returned to the media spotlight.
Miguel Ángel Rodríguez and the case leak
During the judicial investigation it has been confirmed that Rodriguez was the one who leaked to some media outlets the alleged offer of a compliance agreement that the Prosecutor’s Office had made to Gonzalez Amador (and which, according to him, was withdrawn due to “orders from above”), something that was later proven false.
That erroneous information led Attorney General García Ortiz to publish a press release in defense of the institution, which included sensitive information about the case. That decision is precisely the one that has led to the prosecution of the prosecutor for disclosure of secrets.
The chain of events has intensified the confrontation between the government and the president of Madrid, who considers it to be a political and media persecution.
