From Page to Sánchez: two very different responses to the Urda rail disaster

Emiliano García-Page has managed the emergency response to the Urda rail crash with an institutional presence and support for the victims, while Pedro Sánchez had not contacted him five days after the disaster. The difference in behaviour between the two Socialist leaders has become evident in the worst possible circumstance.

The Madrid–Seville AVE accident occurred on Wednesday 28 October 2026, when a Renfe train collided with an Iryo train also heading to Andalusia, leaving at least **69 bodies** and more than a hundred injured on the tracks. The tragedy placed **Emiliano García-Page**, president of Castilla-La Mancha, at the centre of the regional management of the emergency. And there, at the Advanced Command Post in Urda, the Socialist regional leader has shown behaviour that contrasts with that of his party chief.

## The emergency response in Urda

Page chaired every emergency meeting convened after the crash. He answered journalists with prudence and rigour. He attended to every authority who came to the scene: the King and Queen, the prime minister and the leader of the opposition. Also **Óscar Puente**, the transport minister, with whom he has a public feud and who has repeatedly criticised him on social media. There was Page, shaking the minister's hand. As it should be, whatever the grievances.

The Castilla-La Mancha premier spoke with the victims. He listened to them, answered their questions, empathised with their suffering. He showed a minimum of sensitivity towards those who had just lost relatives or been injured. It may seem obvious to point out what should be a duty for any responsible politician, but in today's Spain it no longer is.

**Alberto Núñez Feijóo** stressed that Page accompanied him and briefed him in detail on the rescue work. The leader of the PP and the Castilla-La Mancha premier have enjoyed a good rapport since both dealt with the pandemic management in their regional roles. The contrast with Sánchez is hard to ignore: five days after the massacre, the prime minister had not contacted Page nor passed on any information about the tragedy.

## A history of rifts with Ferraz

Page's trajectory in recent years has been marked by a thick line separating him from his Government colleagues. He challenged the amnesty law before the **Constitutional Court**. He voiced his absolute disagreement with Sánchez's pacts with independence supporters. He publicly censured the Government's handling of the mass arrival of migrants in **Ceuta**.

It is true that the regional leader has often deserved criticism for his ability to hedge his bets on sanchismo. He has at times doled out gentle pinches to the leader to please his base over Moncloa's decisions, without neglecting his MPs' unwavering support for Ferraz whenever the party sounded the alarm. But it is also fair to recall that that thick line separated him irreconcilably from his Government colleagues.

Alongside the late **Javier Lambán**, he grew tired of harshly criticising his secretary general's concessions, antiestéticarful that that toxicity would contaminate his electoral prospects. In recent months he demanded that Sánchez call a general election before next year's regional elections, so that the top brass would suffer the wear and tear before the foot soldiers. That is how it has finally turned out.

## The Urda metaphor

Seeing him now in Urda attending to Sánchez, the very man who has snubbed him within the party and silenced him at Federal Committees, is quite the metaphor for the antagonism between the two. However much they may look alike in an official vest. The Federal Committees have become a placated pen of docile lambs, but Page has shown that another PSOE is possible.

The Toledo-born Socialist is a shrewd politician with great instincts, and he knows the land of Don Quixote inside out, where voters appreciate politicians who put the public interest ahead of their party colours. His conduct during the Urda tragedy has dignified his office and shown that politics can still be practised with humanity, empathy and statesmanship.

The abysmal difference between a vocation for the common good, with whatever mistakes along the way, and pettiness made flesh. That is the distance from Page to Sánchez. The tragedy has left at least **69 dead** and more than a hundred injured, and has exposed two opposing ways of understanding public office.