At a Europa Press breakfast in Toledo, Miguel Tellado introduced the city’s mayor, Carlos Velázquez, while criticising Pedro Sánchez over the prime minister’s absence from the state funeral for the victims of Urda. Tellado said Sánchez had chosen to record an interview while the ceremony was taking place. The memorial was held at Toledo Cathedral on 10 November 2026, at 19:00, for the 69 people killed in the rail disaster. The crash occurred in the municipality of Urda on 25 October.
Tellado, the PP’s secretary general and campaign director, accused Sánchez of showing a lack of respect for victims. He said the absence echoed the response to the Adamuz tragedy, in which 46 people were reported killed. Telemadrid reported that Sánchez was expected to record a podcast with YouTuber Jordi Wild during the ceremony. The Urda disaster has also featured in earlier Urda reporting.
King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia attended the Toledo service, presided over by Archbishop Francisco Cerro Chaves. The archbishop described it as an official funeral. El País noted that the religious ceremony was not a secular state funeral in the formal constitutional sense. The government was represented by Carlos Cuerpo, first deputy prime minister and economy and transport minister, and Milagros Tolón, education minister. The five bishops of Castilla-La Mancha and Luis Javier Argüello, president of the Spanish Episcopal Conference, also attended.
Tellado said a prime minister should face the public and accompany people when they are suffering. He also called for a change of government on 29 November, saying Spain needed to restore decency in public office. PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo said he would attend the Toledo service and contrasted his attendance with Sánchez’s absence.
Tellado’s criticism also covered the corruption allegations surrounding Sánchez. He mocked the prime minister’s stated revulsion at corruption, portraying it as inconsistent with his record in office. Those remarks were his political assessment, not an independent finding about the allegations.
Tellado also attacked a strike called by UGT and CC.OO., describing it as electoral. He accused the unions of acting against the expected democratic alternative rather than the current government. He said the unions had been inactive since 2018 and claimed their leaders were aligned with Sánchez.
He presented the PP as the party representing workers and said Alberto Núñez Feijóo would pursue a programme of change for them. Tellado blamed Sánchez’s government for making workers’ lives harder and reducing their economic prospects.
Tellado introduced Velázquez as the PP’s lead candidate in Toledo for 29 November and described him as an effective mayor for the whole city. He contrasted Velázquez’s record with that of socialist Tolón, whom he criticised over Spain’s PISA results.
