José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero because he was sure of his victory after only one ballot and he apparently did not want to humiliate his adversary. After being elected Secretary General, he was congratulated by Lionel Jospin (then the Prime Minister of France), Gerhard Schröder (Chancellor of Germany) and José María Aznar. He moved to Madrid with his family that year. As a Congressman he had lived from Monday to Thursday in Madrid and the rest of the time in León. This was the period when Zapatero was appointed as Secretary General of the PSOE in 2000 until he became Prime Minister of Spain on
Spain–United States relations Popular, were against the war. After the Spanish general election in 2004, in which the Spanish socialists received more votes than expected as a result, besides other issues, of the government's handling of the 2004 Madrid train bombings, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero succeeded Aznar as Prime Minister. Before being elected, Zapatero had opposed the American policy in regard to Iraq pursued by Aznar. During the electoral campaign Zapatero had promised to withdraw the troops if control in Iraq was not passed to the United Nations after June 30 (the ending date of the initial Spanish military agreement with the multinational