Tebas has defended his comparison between Real Madrid’s communications strategy and Nazi propaganda after the club demanded his immediate resignation as president of LaLiga and vice-president of the Spanish Football Federation.
In a lengthy post on X, Tebas accused Real Madrid’s leadership and television channel of repeatedly portraying the club as a victim of refereeing decisions.
He wrote: “The executive leadership of Real Madrid directs an orchestra of mouthpieces, and Real Madrid TV leads the way. Its script is always the same: select the incidents that suit it, repeat the grievance, feed suspicion and point to enemies.”
He then made the comparison that prompted the club’s response.
“That method recalls mechanisms of propaganda exploited by Goebbels, minister of Propaganda of Nazi Germany: systematic repetition, the construction of an enemy and the subordination of facts to the narrative,” Tebas wrote.
He added an explicit qualification: “The comparison is with those propaganda techniques, not with an ideology and, of course, not with the Real Madrid fans.”
Tebas argued that Real Madrid TV focused on decisions it believed had harmed the club while failing to apply the same scrutiny to incidents involving other teams. He also challenged Madrid to publish a full record of its requests to change match dates and kick-off times, including those accepted by LaLiga, and rejected accusations that the league had been passive over the Negreira case.
Real Madrid issued a five-point statement condemning the remarks as “absolutely intolerable and extraordinarily serious”. The club said that Tebas’s clarification did not soften what it called the “deeply offensive, morally repugnant and institutionally unworthy” nature of the comparison.
The statement said the comments were another example of repeated attacks on the club, its president and its media operation. It also criticised Tebas for questioning Real Madrid’s actions over the Negreira case, involving payments by Barcelona to former refereeing official José María Enríquez Negreira.
“His constant attacks on Real Madrid and those demanding transparency and regeneration represent, in our view, a genuine scourge for Spanish football,” the club said.
Madrid concluded by demanding Tebas’s “immediate resignation” from both his roles. It also renewed its call for a comprehensive overhaul of the refereeing system and football governance structures.
Tebas responded that he had lost count of the times Madrid’s leaders had sought his removal over the past 13 years.
“My position requires independence, not passivity in the face of injustice or silence in response to the continuous, disproportionate and insulting attacks by Real Madrid TV and its mouthpieces on our competition,” he wrote.
He described the dispute as intimidation and insisted that LaLiga’s president had a duty to defend the competition, including against criticism from Real Madrid.
Marca reported on the exchange, which adds another chapter to the long-running public conflict between Tebas and the Spanish champions.