The government responded in writing to the Cortes, two months after Moncloa employees denounced Paco Salazar for inappropriate conduct and possible sexual harassment, that the seat of the government presidency is “yes” “a place where workers can feel safe”.
This is indicated in a written response, to which this newspaper had access, sent to the Senate on September 24.
However, in the same battery of questions asked by the PP, he was asked to confirm the existence of a specific anti-harassment protocol At Moncloa, the government’s responses were “evasive”, parliamentary sources explain, and without any details.
The ambiguity of these responses, to which EL ESPAÑOL had access, calls into question the effective existence of such a protocol in the working environment of the presidency.
Furthermore, neither the government nor the PSOE have confirmed that they will file a complaint with the public prosecutor. And it was one of the specific questions that the Popular Parliamentary Group of the Senate addressed to the Executive as soon as the case became known.
In this regard, President Pedro Sánchez affirmed on Saturday that the government cannot report the facts to the prosecutor’s office, because they are anonymous complaints. But he assured that the victims will have the support of the party if they decide to do so.
La Moncloa recently publicly demonstrated its rejection of the conduct attributed to Paco Salazar, but the leadership of the PSOE, for the moment, prioritizes closing its internal investigation first.
According to the complaints, the Moncloa workers who denounced Salazar described behavior of an explicit sexual nature: “The fly in your facestaged fellatio and asked see our neckline“.
They also reported comments about their bodies, abuse of power to keep their job if they do not have access to their advancesand a working environment described as “unbreathable”.
When these behaviors were published by The newspaper this week, the minister’s spokesperson Pilar Alegria He publicly described them as “vomiting.” Surprisingly, just a month earlier, Alegría had been discovered sharing a restaurant alone with Salazar, in an encounter she herself described as “personal.”
The Popular Parliamentary Group in the Senate presented a battery of 16 questions to the Government on July 23, 2025a few days after the affair broke out publicly.
Two months without response
He demanded information and written explanations on the situation and the functioning of the safety protocols in Moncloa. The answers did not come until September 24two months after the questions.
Among these 16 questions, two particularly stood out. The first of them asked directly: “Does the government consider Moncloa to be a place where female workers can feel safe?” The government responded with a laconic “yes”without nuances or additional explanations.
The second asked: “Since when has the Protocol against Sexual Harassment been operational in Moncloa? To this direct question, The executive did not respond specifically.
Although in July Moncloa said it had sent an email to all its workers reminding them of the procedures for filing a complaint, the government’s official response was limited to referring to four general legal textswithout confirming the existence of an operational protocol specific to Moncloa.
He cited the Organic Law 3/2007 for the effective equality of women and menwhich expressly prohibits sexual harassment and harassment based on gender. He also mentioned the Royal Legislative Decree 5/2015, establishing the basic status of public officialswhich qualifies harassment based on sex among civil servants of the General Administration of the State as a very serious offense.
In addition, the government mentioned the Royal Decree 247/2024, which approves the Protocol of Action against Sexual Harassment in the area of the General Administration of the State and its public bodies.
And finally, he cited the Instruction from the Undersecretariat of October 4, 2024who approves the Action protocol against sexual harassment within the framework of the Ministry of the Presidency, Justice and Relations with the Cortes.
This legal text establishes in its “Guiding Principles” that “This applies to all staff of the General Administration of the State regardless of the ministerial department or the linked or dependent public body where it provides its services.”
The PSOE mailbox
Although, apparently, that would include the Moncloa. However, official sources from the Presidency of the Government consulted by this newspaper They did not confirm the existence of a specific protocol and operational in Moncloa.
And this point is relevant because of the crucial detail cited above: the Moncloa workers who denounced Salazar They used the PSOE anti-harassment mailbox, not the Moncloa one.
This circumstance, the lack of specificity of Parliament’s written responses and the lack of response to this newspaper fuel doubts. Furthermore, regarding the events reported, the Government assured that “it had knowledge through the media since there is no prior complaint to the competent authorities.”
It is for this reason that the parliamentary sources consulted insist on “doubting the existence of an anti-harassment protocol at Moncloa or an independent and clearly operational complaints channel“. And therefore, that the work environment is truly “a safe place” for women.
These same sources emphasize that the Government, which they sarcastically qualify as “the most feminist in history”, answered 14 of the 16 questions by combining them into a single answer “full of commonplaces and truisms”, without addressing their specificities.
In this generic response, the Executive declared that “it firmly promotes and defends the right to equality of women and men in all political, social, economic and cultural spheres, promote deeply feminist laws and public policies which, moreover, constitute a reference in the international context”.
The Minister for Equality, Ana Redondodescribed the events described as “disgusting”, but clarified that the Prosecutor’s Office has the power to act if there are no direct complaints in court. For his part, the Minister of Justice, Félix Bolaños, asked not to prejudge.
In an internal press release addressed to its members, the PSOE regretted on Friday “not having sufficiently supported the people who filed complaints”.
The breakup of the affair
In the same self-criticism, the party notes that “communication with anonymous complainants is not up to standard and must be improved”.
Paco Salazar, former advisor to Pedro Sanchezwas reported in July 2025 by Moncloa employees who worked under their orders. However, the complaints were presented to the PSOE Equality Secretariat, under the party’s anti-harassment protocol, and not at their workplace.
The publication of these complaints prevented Salazar from being appointed deputy to the Organizing Secretariat of the PSOEa position he aspired to after five years as one of the president’s closest collaborators at Moncloa.
However, the investigation did not progress and the complaints even disappeared from the PSOE mailbox, thus fueling the suspicions that the party wanted to put the accusations aside.