In July 2023, with just one week left before the July 23 elections, Pedro Sánchez sat down with La pija y la quinqui. The conversation unfolded between Rosalía and Taylor Swift, but it also touched on his childhood between Aluche and Tetouan, barely skimming the polls that would take place a few days later. It was a measured and intelligent gesture. The president and socialist candidate sought to reach Generation Z on friendly ground, with controlled risk, the headline and the impact, also thanks to the novelty of the move, secured.
Three years later, the four leading candidates for La Moncloa — Sánchez, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, Santiago Abascal, and Ada Colau — had agreed to sit down with Jordi Wild on his podcast The Wild Project — the most followed in our country — under rules not set by them but dictated by the host’s format: one-on-one interviews with no pre-arranged questions. However, Abascal cancelled his appearance on November 11, and Jordi Wild’s reaction has drawn over thirty million views on X. Added to this is the announcement by the broadcaster Ibai Llanos that he would also host a four-person debate on his channel. The difference with 2023 is of a different nature, not merely in quantity — more podcasts, more streamers —. In that sense, what also changes is who imposes the terms.
SANTIAGO ABASCAL NO VENDRÁ A THE WILD PROJECT https://t.co/kU4YSDyTEn
— Jordi Wild (@JordiWild) November 11, 2026
2023: the podcast as a wink
It is worth recalling how it was three years ago to measure the leap that is taking place. Sánchez’s interview in La pija y la quinqui aired in mid-July, and its value, as has been noted, lay in the absence of politics: pure, unvarnished humanization of his political persona. It was a small channel with an audience that shared the viewpoint. The podcast was also a minor piece, albeit striking, within a campaign that continued to revolve around conventional formats such as television. The usual appearances on El Hormiguero, interviews on morning magazines, and debates. Feijóo did not even consider the new formats.
The PP leader did not make his debut in the format until July 2024, on WorldCast, and he did so as a reaction to Alvise Pérez’s result in the European elections that year. He arrived late and trailing, seeking space in the digital ecosystem, where Vox had already overwhelmed the PP on social networks.
2026: the creator sets the rules
The sequence this autumn sums up the change underway. On October 8, three days after the election call was announced, Jordi Wild announced his intention to interview the four candidates with one condition: either all of them would participate, or none at all. Feijóo and Abascal accepted the next day. On October 19, however, the broadcaster withdrew that condition. Colau, the Frente Amplio candidate, returned to X five years after leaving it to confirm she would also appear on the podcast. On October 23, the last day of the deadline set by the creator, Sánchez replied with an “I’ll be there”.
The point is not the list of names, but the grammar. An ultimatum, common rules, an identical format for everyone, and a response deadline: it is precisely the negotiation of an electoral debate, a terrain that for three decades had been monopolized by networks and campaign chiefs. The result is that a content creator has reproduced that procedure from his own networks. The podcaster calls, and the refusal becomes news.
The cost of not going
For two weeks, Sánchez was the only one who did not respond. He waited to gauge the terrain. On October 22, he appeared on the TVE program La Revuelta, and the result was a historic record for David Broncano’s program: 4.38 million viewers and a 33.9% audience share. The following day he said yes to Jordi Wild, along with the announcement of his return to Salvados, ten years later — though that appearance had to be canceled following the Urda accident.
“The result is that a content creator has replicated that procedure from his own networks. The ‘podcaster’ calls, and the refusal becomes news”
The latest refusal came from Abascal. On November 11, Vox canceled his interview after claiming that La Revuelta had left out forty minutes of his conversation with the candidate. Jordi Wild maintains that he had already guaranteed the full interview would be published and that the party later demanded he record it himself and retain the material. He did not accept.
Two conclusions emerge. First, the risk calculation has shifted. In 2023, the risk lay in going to a space you did not control; today, the risk can also lie in not going, because an absence can generate an immediate narrative cost and opponents seek to monetize it. Second, this is not television versus platforms like YouTube. For example, the record of La Revuelta shows that traditional television still has its own muscle. What has changed is the dominating format. The long, relaxed conversation with a sense of authenticity has gained a central role in this pre-campaign, surpassing the classic interview in print or radio, and circulating equally on La 1, on YouTube, and, above all, through clips that travel on TikTok and Instagram.
From mobilizing to contest
La pija y la quinqui appeals to an audience culturally aligned with the PSOE. Its viewers tend to be young, urban, with a progressive aesthetic. Attending this podcast was a move to mobilize one’s own base. This is a fundamental difference with Jordi Wild’s audience, mostly men under 40 with sensibilities that do not neatly fit traditional ideological blocs, and who largely align with the segment where Vox and, previously, Alvise have grown. For Feijóo and Abascal it might be, a priori, a favorable terrain; for Sánchez and Colau, a challenging one.
This explains both the initial briskness of some and the doubts of others, but also helps to understand why Sánchez’s final decision matters. The left stops using the podcast to humanize itself for its base and instead seeks to use it to contest an electorate it has previously considered lost on other channels. The format ceases to be a tool for image-building or humanization and becomes a battlefield of persuasion.
“The left stops using the podcast to humanize itself for its base and instead seeks to use it to contest an electorate it has previously considered lost on other channels”
There is another significant element. The interview will be published in full, but the vast majority of the audience will not watch an hour of conversation, but the forty seconds selected by the digital teams. This is not a minor matter: the candidate loses control over their own montage, and the digital ecosystem gains it. Whoever arrives with a more solid narrative that is easier to slice into viral pieces will have the advantage.
A space without an umpire
The televised debates scheduled for the second half of November — the head-to-head between Sánchez and Feijóo and the multi-candidate debates — are governed by the criteria of the Central Electoral Board. By contrast, a YouTube channel or Spotify channel is not. For example, Jordi Wild decided his guests would be four, and Podemos was not among them. Ibai announced on October 21 a debate with “the four candidates,” without a date, without a format, and without anyone confirming it. He decides the format and the rules.
Time is another factor. The three Jordi Wild interviews will be released on November 13, the day the formal campaign begins. In other words, the first major audiovisual moment of the campaign will be set by a YouTuber. It is clearly a sign of who today largely sets the pace of the electoral conversation.
“The first major audiovisual moment of the campaign will be set by a ‘YouTuber’. It is clearly a sign of who today largely sets the pace of the electoral conversation”
Accountability remains. Jordi Wild has announced he will have two journalists on set to verify and correct, if necessary, anyone attempting to slip in false information. This is his decision. Likewise, “without pre-arranged questions” does not equate to “with rigorous questions”, and the quality of scrutiny depends on the host’s will.
What changes and what doesn’t
According to Digital News Report Spain, as early as 2023, 70% of internet users aged 18 to 24 listened to podcasts, representing a gain of fifteen percentage points from 2021. This figure shows that parties are not flocking to YouTube out of trend. They go because a sizable portion of the electorate is there. The real change lies in the architecture of mediation. If campaigns for decades had two powerful actors shaping the agenda — the parties and the media — a third has been added: the content creator with an audience and a following, who does not depend on either of the other two, who sets their own terms and can turn a refusal into reputational trouble. Campaign teams will have to plan for scenarios they do not control, and traditional media, for their part, will have to accept that the interviews driving the week are no longer solely theirs. The democratic system, for its part, will have to ask what rules apply to spaces that already perform electoral functions without being subject to them.
In 2023, parties asked whether a candidate should go on a podcast; in 2026 the question is who decides which candidates are heard, how, and when. This is the novelty that has arrived to stay.
