Just in time for their 20th wedding anniversary on May 22, rumors of a definitive break in the marriage of King Felipe, 56, and Queen Letizia, 51, have heated up.
This is not the first time that the royal couple face such a crisis. Twelve years ago, in 2012, they came close to going their separate ways, a move that they avoided because a reigning monarch’s private life is also a matter of State, and the Spanish crown was going through a major upheaval with accusations of corruption brought against Felipe’s father, King Juan Carlos, as well as his daughter, Cristina and her husband, Iñaki Urdangarin. The infamous Nóos corruption case ended with Iñaki Urdangarin in prison and his then-wife, the infanta Cristina, disgraced.
Eventually King Juan Carlos was forced to abdicate on June 19, 2014, after a reign of nearly 40 years. The crisis between Felipe and Letizia was not of a personal nature at that time, it was because she, a strong-minded woman who reputedly rules her husband with an iron fist–now the de facto ruler of the nation–wanted him to denounce and dissociate himself from his family. They could not divorce, but from that point the future king and queen started living separate lives.
Today’s scandal is altogether different and results from allegations made by her ex-brother-in-law–now divorced from Letizia’s sister Telma Ortiz– that they had a long-standing affair that continued secretly even after she had married Felipe.
According to Jaime del Burgo, the queen was unfaithful to the king with him for several years. It was at the end of 2012 that they were discovered, causing an apparently irremediable rift in her marriage to Felipe.
In November 2023, Del Burgo contributed to a tell-all book about the Queen of Spain, titled Letizia y Yo (Letizia and I) by journalist Jaime Peñafiel in which he dropped the bombshell. He later announced that he would be writing his own book detailing the sordid affair.
But earlier this month, Del Burgo took to X to claim that he had abandoned plans to publish his own tell-all book and instead would be producing an eight-part documentary, titled “Nothing but the Truth”. In Letizia y Yo, Del Burgo claims that he and Letizia were dating when she met Felipe and were still romantically involved after her wedding to the Spanish King 20 years ago.
He wrote: “And Nothing but the Truth, the book I promised, will instead be a TV film and documentary with eight episodes. I will start the production after summer. Coming in 2025.”
In a post on X, he shared an undated selfie that Letizia took in a bathroom mirror during one of her pregnancies, between 2005 and 2007, as “evidence” of their relationship. He also posted what is purportedly the message that accompanied the photo, written by Letizia, that read:
“Love. I wear your pashmina. It’s like feeling you by my side. It takes care of me. It protects me. I count the hours until we see each other again. Love you. Get out of here. Yours,”
Del Burgo has also claimed that the Queen asked to see him the night before her wedding to Felipe and she asked him to “never leave” her.
Letizia has been the subject of sensational and embarrassing allegations before. In 2013, in the midst of the Noos corruption scandal, her cousin David Rocasolano wrote an intimate biography, Adios Princesa, in which he claims that she had an abortion in 2002 – before she met the Crown Prince – and that she tried to cover this up before her engagement was announced.
Whether there is any truth to Del Burgo’s allegations has become secondary to the scandal they are creating, and what may follow once the TV film and documentary become a reality. He claims he has kept “photographs, videos, mobile phones” that have been safeguarded in a bank vault in Switzerland, and text messages as evidence.
Letizia has been a deeply unpopular figure in Spain since her engagement to the well-loved Felipe was first announced. Her overweening vanity and the endless cosmetic surgery that over the years has made her unrecognizable from the woman they initially knew, has alienated much of the Spanish public. With the institution of monarchy under fire throughout Europe as a vestige of a past that is no longer relevant, a major scandal may just be the last straw for the Spanish Republicans who have been clamoring for its abrogation.
