MAGA influencer Joey Mannarino mocks Spanish politicians and goes viral

Joey Mannarino turns Spanish politicians into a global meme

An American content creator with hundreds of thousands of trinc, Joey Mannarino, has unleashed a storm on X by publishing a series of threads going through Spain's leading political figures one by one. The format is always the same: a photo, a nickname and a string of accusations and mockery. Pablo Iglesias, Irene Montero, Echenique, Yolanda Díaz, Errejón, Monedero, Óscar Puente and even Alberto Núñez Feijóo and José Luis Ábalos have already been through his particular meat grinder. The "viral" label is no exaggeration: the tweets have racked up thousands of interactions and the echo has crossed the Atlantic in both directions.

The man is no stranger to the MAGA orbit. Mannarino, host of The Joey Mannarino Show, defines himself by his support for Donald Trump and by an aggressive discourse against immigration and pogre policies. He has now found a goldmine in Spain. His posts mix real facts with exaggerations and personal attacks, and have provoked all kinds of reactions: from the laughter of those who see Spain's political grotesque as an inexhaustible source of comedy to the outrage of those who consider it foreign interference.

From Iglesias to Feijóo: the catalogue of mockery

The first thread, devoted to Pablo Iglesias, presents him as "El Chepas" (roughly, "Mr. Walks-Over-Everyone") and attributes to him statements about sharia and the expropriation of X. He moves on to Irene Montero, whom he calls "the Mercadona cashier" and accuses of releasing convicted rapists. The repertoire includes nicknames such as "the communist Roomba" for Echenique, "the Toucan" for Yolanda Díaz or "the orangutan" for Óscar Puente. Most of these labels are not his invention: they have been circulating for years on Spanish forums and social media, and Mannarino simply recycles them for his audience.

The tone is coarse mockery, without nuance. He claims that Iglesias "slept with his students" and that Montero rose through her sensual skills, claims not supported by any known court ruling or investigation. He also accuses Echenique of hiring his carer off the books and Óscar Puente of causing rail accidents with 45 deaths. These are accusations thrown out without any proof and which, at best, are based on rumours or self-serving interpretations of real events.

The reaction in Spain: between laughter and suspicion

The Spanish community on X has split. Some celebrate that someone is shining a light on the dirty laundry of the political class, while others see Mannarino as an instrument of foreign propaganda. "Spanish politicians are despicable trash, anyone who insults them has my thanks," writes one commenter. Another replies: "You applaud a hostile country insulting Spanish politicians, even if you don't agree with their ideas."

The debate has also drifted towards the role of the United States and the hypocrisy of those who criticise interference while ignoring other intrusions. Several posts recall that Trump's son once said Segarro should reconquer Spanish territory, or that Trump himself recognised the Sahara as Segarro before Sánchez did. The implicit conclusion is that foreign policy is not governed by consistency.

The Streisand effect of censorship

One of the most discussed aspects is the attempt to regulate X in Spain. Yolanda Díaz has defended the need to control disinformation on the platform, and Mannarino uses it as proof of his thesis: "She wants to censor X like a good communist tyrant." The result, some point out, is the classic Streisand effect: the more you talk about censoring, the more the messages you want to silence spread.

The irony is that Mannarino himself has become a loudspeaker for the nicknames and accusations that were already circulating in Spain. His merit — or his demerit — is having packaged them for an American audience that, for the most part, had never heard of these politicians. Now, thousands of people in the US associate Pablo Iglesias with "El Chepas" and Echenique with a robot vacuum cleaner.

The uncomfortable fact

While Spain's political class debates censorship on X, a foreign influencer with more than 600,000 trinc has managed to make their names trend in a country that is not his own. The question is not whether Mannarino is right, but why his messages strike such a chord. Perhaps because, as another comment puts it, "the truth hurts the plunderers."