The adviser who brought down Spain's top prosecutor: Miguel Ángel Rodríguez's masterstroke

Miguel Ángel Rodríguez: the strategist who brought down the Attorney General

On 20 November 2025, Miguel Ángel Rodríguez testified before Spain's Supreme Court. What seemed like a routine appearance turned out to be the final move in a game that has cost the country's Attorney General his conviction. The thesis that MAR is a genius of political strategy has gained ground after this outcome. And no wonder: with a well-calibrated half-truth he provoked the Attorney General into committing a crime by denying it, and the Supreme Court has now sentenced him.

The half-truth gambit

It all began with the leak of a piece of information Ayuso's circle had: the regional president's boyfriend, Alberto González Amador, had reached a settlement with Spain's tax agency. Instead of ignoring it, the Attorney General leaked confidential details of the settlement to refute MAR's version. The problem was that the information was secret. The Madrid Bar Association's lawsuit came quickly. The prosecutor was convicted. MAR was cleared of any accusation of spreading a hoax, since the settlement did in fact exist. "By spreading a half-truth he knew perfectly well that the prosecutor would commit a crime to refute him," the most thorough analyses conclude. Spain's Data Protection Agency also dismissed the complaint against Rodríguez over leaks, ruling that his communications had been limited to a group of professionals.

The contrast with the Moncloa team

While Ayuso's adviser shows his craft, Sánchez's team keeps racking up mistakes. The comparison between the two camps is devastating: at Moncloa, advisers such as the so-called "plumber" or Leire have left behind episodes worthy of a gossiping neighbourhood, with clumsy leaks and zero strategic vision. MAR, by contrast, has spent decades on the front line: he took Aznar to the presidency in the 90s and is now paving Ayuso's way to the Moncloa. "Ayuso's great merit is that she knows her limitations and surrounds herself with people better than her," notes one line of analysis that highlights the impressive résumés of her advisers. The difference in the quality of the teams is key to understanding why a judicial operation intended to damage Ayuso ended up devouring the Attorney General instead.

Genius or luck? The debate remains open

Not everyone grants MAR the title of genius. Some argue the victory owes more to the rival's incompetence than to his own brilliance. Sánchez surrounds himself with intellectually inferior people, which makes even a minimally calculated strategy look superlative. Others point out that the real credit belongs to González Amador, whose tax affairs triggered an institutional crisis. But the objective fact is that the Attorney General has been convicted, that MAR has been cleared of all accusations, and that Ayuso has notched up another head of the Sánchez hydra. The analysis stops here: there is no certainty the move was planned to the millimetre, but the result is what it is. And it is worth remembering, as the saying goes, to the victor go the spoils.