Irene Montero lands in the Daily Mail and the online pile-on begins

Irene Montero in the Daily Mail UK: the criticism flies

The news is not that Irene Montero has appeared in the Daily Mail UK. The news is what happens around it: a British tabloid with space for a Spanish politician and a comments section that seizes the occasion to tear down half the local left's fruta. The result is a spectacle of mutual recrimination that nobody should mistake for political analysis.

The Daily Mail's comments section is a peculiar ecosystem, and on this occasion it has filled up with British expats in Spain (or at least that is what they appear to be) enjoying the national sport of bashing a minister. They are joined by the usual home-grown regulars, with the same venom. It is well known that in a conservative-leaning paper like the Daily Mail, nobody is going to defend Unidas Podemos' politics. What is striking is the unanimity.

The nine-and-a-half-month figure

There is one figure circulating among the comments: Irene Montero's brief spell in the labour market before entering politics. According to that version, her social security contributions would amount to just nine and a half months. Whether accurate or not, the figure has become perfect ammunition for those who question her talking about "working people". The irony is that the discussion itself, laden with personal insults and smears, is hardly a model of democratic decency either.

In the end, the question is not whether Montero has more or less charisma, but the role British tabloids can play in Spanish politics. If every appearance by the minister in a foreign newspaper ends up feeding the same circular debate, what we can expect is that the Daily Mail's editors will keep milking this rift. Predictable, though no less tiresome for it.