It's very likely that if there were to be a poll taken now of public awareness of Pedro Sánchez's ministers, the head of the foreign ministry, Josep Borrell, would come first by some distance. He must also be the first minister where Podemos and Ciudadanos agree on calling for his resignation after Spain's BOE (Official State Gazette) published the 30,000 euro fine imposed by the National Stock Market Commission for the insider trading scandal over the sale of shares in the company Abengoa, when he was on the board of directors. For the CNMV, the sanction falls on the scale of serious infractions, but there he remains, so relaxed, in the Spanish executive. He hasn't resigned and the prime minister hasn't fired him, as if nothing would harm their structured election campaign of a dose of Franco's remains, a pinch of a fight with bankers over mortgages, a budget which was never expected to be presented but which had many promises of being easy to sell and a hand held out, although it never held anything, to pro-independence Catalans.
But Borrell is an old-school politician: getting the jump on your opponent is key; and if you don't want a problem to make headlines, cause an even bigger firestorm to eclipse the real scandal. And that's what he's done. He went to Madrid's Complutense University to state that, unlike various European countries with "centrifugal trends", in the United States there are no problems with political integration because "the only thing they did was kill a few Indians". You cannot be more ignorant, demagogical or disdainful because what actually happened was a true genocide with millions of dead and it would be better to not joke about the matter. Diplomats now have another topic to comment on after Borrell's debated management of the topic of the Rock of Gibraltar and UK sovereignty.
I'm sorry to not be original since I said the same the very day he was nominated foreign affairs minister: Borrell isn't right to hold such an important office after the known incidents related to the recent positions of responsibility he's held and his public statements for years up to the present, including his lie about a spitting incident after his encounter with deputy Rufián. He was going to make good another foul-mouthed character, his predecessor José Manuel García-Margallo, and he's done so. Obviously, his 71 years are no impediment, but it is one that he should have had to leave important roles and posts in murky circumstances during his career and his proximity to the Societat Civil Catalana, an organisation he is an activist for with an enthusiasm he doesn't have for the current PSOE.