José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero On 12 October 2003, during the Fiesta Nacional de España military parade held in Madrid, then opposition leader and presidential candidate Zapatero remained seated as a U.S. Marine Corps honour guard carrying the American flag walked past Zapatero and other VIPs. Everybody else stood as with the rest of the foreign guest armies representations. He declared afterwards that his action was a protest against the war and certainly not intended as an insult to the American people. Later on, during an official visit to Tunisia shortly after Zapatero was elected, he asked all of the countries with troops in Iraq
José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero of Civilizations; the legalisation of same-sex marriage; reform of abortion law; a peace negotiation attempt with ETA; increase of tobacco restrictions; and the reform of various autonomous statutes, particularly the Statute of Catalonia. José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero was born in Valladolid, Castile and León, to Juan Rodríguez y García-Lozano (born 1928), a lawyer, and María de la Purificación Zapatero Valero (Tordehumos, Valladolid, 1927 – Madrid, 30 October 2000). He grew up in León, where his family originated. His paternal grandfather, Juan Rodríguez y Lozano (28 July 1893 – Puente Castro, León, 18 August 1936), was a Republican captain, executed by