It’s the best thing for me and for the Popular Party,
or to put in another way, it is the best for the Popular Party and for me,
and I think also for Spain
and the rest doesn’t matter.

With these typically bumbling words Mariano Rajoy said goodbye to his seven years of presidency after losing a no-confidence motion in Congress. After many depressing months in which the new Spanish right — Ciudadanos (C’s) — had helped push mainstream politics rightwards, a more interesting political phase has begun.

The Popular Party (PP) administration has been replaced by a fragile center-left Socialist Party (PSOE) government led by Pedro Sánchez. Under Rajoy, Spain took almost no refugees from the recent crisis — despite its commitments otherwise — something that led to big protests. The new administration has promised to take in hundreds abandoned by the new anti-immigrant Italian government, but otherwise there are plenty of reasons leftists are skeptical about its intentions.