A football column has been enough to reopen a diplomatic crisis between Spain and France and to test the relationship of the Popular Party with its former president. Mariano Rajoy wrote in El Debate, on the occasion of the 2026 World Cup semi-final, that the French team has “a very high level, yes, but without Frenchmen”. The phrase, interpreted in Paris as a denial of the players' nationality due to their origin or skin color, unleashed a storm in less than 48 hours that has reached ministries, embassies, and Spain's own external image campaign.
The French Government was the first to react. The Minister of the Interior, Laurent Nuñez, described the comment as “absolutely unacceptable” and recalled that 23 of the 26 players on the national team were born in France. His counterpart in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Jean-Noël Barrot, went further and defined it as “stupidity, racism, or both”. The condemnation has united an unusually broad political spectrum: even Marine Le Pen's party accused Rajoy of racism and called for a unanimous condemnation.
Moncloa demands a rectification from the PP
In Spain, Pedro Sánchez's Executive has taken advantage of the episode to distance itself further from the PP. The president accused Rajoy of “shaming Spain” with “xenophobic statements” and concluded with “may the best win and racism lose”. But it was the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, who took the controversy to the ground that interests Moncloa the most: he demanded that Alberto Núñez Feijóo “disavow” and “reprimand” Rajoy, and even called the PP an “anti-French party”, linking the former president's column with the Popular Party's blockade of the Treaty of Friendship with France in the Senate. Minister Félix Bolaños, in the same vein, accused the PP of “institutional and international hooliganism”.
Génova maintains its defense of the former president
The national leadership of the PP has chosen not to yield to this pressure. Feijóo has not made any public statements about the phrase and has left the response to his spokesperson, Borja Sémper, who has described Rajoy's football columns as “sarcastic” and “without malicious intent”, framing them as “comments in favor of Spain” without any racist interpretation. At the regional level, leaders such as Alfonso Rueda have spoken of Galician “stubbornness”, while Vox has preferred to call for “not mixing football and politics”, although some of its voices have openly supported the substance of the comment.
The Treaty with France returns to the center of the debate
The result is a double front for the popular party: a crisis of image with a first-rate European partner, which also arrives in parallel to the tug-of-war over the Treaty of Friendship —blocked in the Senate and sent to the Constitutional Court—, and an internal debate about whether the party shares the criteria of its former president or not. While the World Cup continues, the controversy has dominated the Spanish political agenda, with players like Lamine Yamal advocating for football as an example of integration and without Rajoy having apologized, for now.