While Trump lashes out at Spain, US Democrats join a progressive rally in Barcelona
BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Progressive leaders from around the globe gathered in Barcelona on Saturday to try and galvanize their forces and defend the multilateral rules-based order in a world turning to the right and violently torn by superpowers.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, an outspoken critic of U.S. President Donald Trump and the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran, hosted two overlapping events about democracy and progressive politics in Spain’s second-largest city.
Democrats U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz were both present alongside the leaders of Brazil, South Africa and high-ranking officials from other left-leaning governments.
While no foreign leader criticized Trump by name in public, the staunchly unilateral position of the American president that breaks with decades of U.S. foreign policy, including his derision of NATO and the United Nations, hung over the meetings.
“We all see the attacks against the multilateral system, the repeated attempts to undermine international law and the dangerous normalization of the use of force,” Sánchez said.
Trump again lashed out on Saturday on social media at Sánchez, who has faced Trump’s scorn for not allowing the U.S. to use jointly operated military bases in Spain for operations related to the Iran war and for refusing to raise military spending from 2% to 5% of GDP.
“Has anybody looked at how badly the country of Spain is doing. Their financial numbers, despite contributing almost nothing to NATO and their military defense, are absolutely horrendous. Sad to watch!!!” Trump posted on Truth Social.
Sánchez says the right’s time is running out
Spain, like the U.S. and other developed countries, is in debt, but it has one of the world’s leading economies under Sánchez.
Sánchez told the rally of progressive politicians and party members held later on Saturday that the populist right “screams and shouts not because they are winning but because they know their time is running out.
“They know their vision of how the world should be ordered is falling apart due to the tariffs and wars,” he said. “Their embrace of climate change denial, of xenophobia, or sexism is their greatest error.
“They have tried again and again to make us embarrassed of our beliefs. That ends now. From now on they can be the ones who feel ashamed.”
Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and Colombian President Gustavo Petro, and other leaders and officials, including Cabinet members from the United Kingdom and Germany, were in attendance at the IV Meeting in Defense of Democracy that kicked off Saturday’s double-header of political events at the Barcelona convention center.
Later in the day, Sánchez, Lula and Ramaphosa stayed put to attend the inaugural Global Progressive Mobilization, where some 6,000 left-leaning elected officials, policy analysts and activists exchanged ideas.
“The far right is international, so we must be too,” German Vice Chancellor and Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil told a crowd of activists.
Democrats join rally
Sen. Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, spoke at the progressive rally and he didn’t shy away from blasting Trump while celebrating the loss of power of Trump’s ally Viktor Orbán in elections in Hungary last week.
“Donald Trump is out to end our democracy,” Murphy said. “We are not on the verge of a totalitarian takeover, we are in the middle of it.”
But, he said, “Americans are watching what is happening across the world, and the victory in Hungary just one week ago lifted our sails.”
Walz, Kamala Harris’ vice presidential candidate who has faced a violent ICE migration crackdown in Minnesota, threw barbs at U.S. Vice President JD Vance, who campaigned for Orbán and has backed far-right parties in Europe.
“Unlike our current vice president, I’m not here to arrogantly lecture or scold you, I am not here to pick a fight with the Pope or host a rally for any local wannabe authoritarians,” Walz said.
New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, former U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders all sent video messages played at the rally.
Progressives exchange ideas
Among concrete proposals to come from the events, Ramaphosa said South Africa will present a draft resolution to establish an International Panel on Inequality, aiming to tackle the growing wealth gap both within and between nations, to the U.N. General Assembly in September.
Sheinbaum plugged her idea that governments commit to spending the equivalent of 10% of their military budgets on reforestation projects.
“Each year, instead of planting the seeds of war, we will plant the seeds of life,” she said.
Sánchez argued for the importance of regulating social media to stop the spread of hate speech and disinformation. His government also said that it is working with Lula’s Brazil on a tax for the ultrarich.
Lula, who met with Sánchez in a bilateral summit on Friday in Barcelona, kept the focus on how to invigorate the progressive moment. He avoided naming Trump except when he called for U.N. Security Council members to “fulfill their obligation and guarantee peace.”
“Stop this madness of war because the world cannot bear any more wars,” Lula said.