Luis Rubiales: The president of the Spanish Football Federation refuses to resign after heavy criticism over an unwanted kiss on Jennifer Hermoso

CNN
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The president of the Spanish Football Federation, Luis Rubiales, has refused to resign as president of the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) after a week of intense criticism after a video emerged of him placing an unwanted kiss on a star of Spain’s World Cup-winning women’s team.

Rubiales was speaking before the federation’s extraordinary general assembly on Friday and said he would “fight until the end”.

He described in defiant speech The kiss as “mutual” and He spoke of “unfair” and “pseudo-feminist” campaigns, and stressed several times during the roughly 30-minute speech that he would not resign.

Rubiales was filmed forcibly kissing Spanish star Jennifer Hermoso, who helped him La Roja She won her first Women’s World Cup title on Sunday in Sydney – on the lips after collecting a winners’ medal, an act the 33-year-old World Cup winner later said she “didn’t like” and “didn’t expect”. “.

Rubiales admitted on Monday that he had “made a mistake”, but criticism continued throughout the week from the football world and Spanish politicians, including Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, who said an apology for what he called an “unacceptable gesture” was “not enough”.

On Friday, the embattled president issued a strong defense of his actions in the final, saying, “Everyone there – even some of them my family and daughters – the wish that could have been there in that kiss is exactly the same thing that could have been.” Like giving a kiss to one of my daughters. No more, no less.

“It was a spontaneous kiss… It was spontaneous, mutual, exhilarating, with consent, and that’s the key. This is the key to all the criticism, all the campaign that has been waged in this country: that it was without consent. No, it was with consent.

On Wednesday, after fierce criticism of Rubiales’ kiss from journalists, politicians and campaign groups, Hermoso said that FUTPRO and its agency TMJ “will defend my interests and act as spokespersons in this matter.”

Then FIFA said on Thursday it had opened disciplinary proceedings against Rubiales because he may have breached the “fundamental rules of proper behaviour” in the game.

Rubiales also said he was not in a position of control during the kiss and wanted to console Hermoso, who missed a penalty to put Spain 2-0 up in the final.

“When Jenny first appeared, she lifted me off the ground. She grabbed me by the thighs and by the legs, I don’t remember very well.” “She lifted me off the ground – and we were about to fall.

“And when she put me down, they hugged each other. She took me in her arms and pulled me into her body. We embraced and I said to her, ‘Forget the penalty. You were amazing, and we wouldn’t have won the World Cup without you.’ She said, ‘You’re amazing.’ And she said, “Okay.”

“Then the click happened through all this celebration where she patted my side a few times and then excused herself with another hand on the side and went off laughing. That’s the whole sequence. The whole world understood, the whole world thought it was just a joke, and above all, she said it was Just an anecdote and nothing more.

CNN has reached out to FUTPRO.

Although he acknowledged the need to apologize for his actions, Rubiales described the calls for his resignation as a “witch-hunt”.

“…the thing about the kiss, which I said was free, was mutual, and it was with consent, but obviously I still have to ask forgiveness for the context in which it happened. I don’t live out of the world and I know I made a mistake about it “But do we think this is worth my witch hunt? Do you really think so?

“The other thing is what someone has to say publicly, but do you think he deserves this chase? For them to ask for my resignation? Is it so serious that I will have to leave after I made the best drive in the history of Spanish football?

“Do you think I should quit? Well, I’ll tell you something: I will not quit! I will not quit! I will not quit! I will not quit! I will not quit!”

More to track.