Queen Letizia of Spain

Letizia Ortiz Rocasolano (born 15 September 1972) is Queen of Spain as the wife of King Felipe VI.

Letizia was born in Oviedo, Asturias. She worked as a journalist for ABC and EFE before becoming a news anchor at CNN+ and Televisión Española. In 1998, she married Alonso Guerrero Pérez, whom she divorced the following year. In 2004, Letizia married Felipe, then Prince of Asturias as the son and heir apparent of King Juan Carlos I. The couple have two daughters, Leonor and Sofía. As Princess of Asturias, Letizia represented her father-in-law in Spain and abroad. On Juan Carlos's abdication in June 2014, Felipe became king, making Letizia queen consort.

As the consort of the ruling monarch, Letizia has no constitutional functions of her own and it is constitutionally prohibited for her to assume any, unless she assume the role of regent. The Queen performs public commitments representing the Crown, often with her husband, but she is focused on being the patron, president or member of numerous charities and organizations, and she is the visible face of the Spanish international cooperation, often traveling around the world supervising and promoting it.

Family
Letizia Ortiz Rocasolano was born on 15 September 1972 at Miñor Sanatorium in Oviedo, Asturias, the eldest daughter of Jesús José Ortiz Álvarez, a journalist, and his first wife, María de la Paloma Rocasolano Rodríguez, a registered nurse and hospital union representative. She has two younger sisters, Telma (b. 1973) and Érika (1975–2007). Érika committed suicide by an intentional drug overdose while Letizia was pregnant with her second child.

Ortiz's parents divorced in 1999 and her father remarried in Madrid on 18 March 2004 to fellow journalist Ana Togores.

Ortiz's paternal grandparents were José Luis Ortiz Velasco (1923–2005), a commercial employee at Olivetti, and María del Carmen "Menchu" Álvarez del Valle (1928–2021), a radio broadcaster in Asturias for over 40 years. Her maternal grandfather was Francisco Julio Rocasolano Camacho (1918–2015), a mechanic and cab driver in Madrid for over 20 years who was of French and Occitan origin. Letizia's maternal grandmother, Enriqueta Rodríguez Figueredo (1919–2008) was an Insulares, a White Filipina, who was from the Philippines, born to Spanish parents.

British genealogists have provided evidence that through her mother's Rocasolano lineage, Ortiz descends from Astorg Roquesoulane, a 16th century woman who died in 1564, and her coat of arms incorporates the arms of the Rocasolano family. Reports have suggested, and remain unproven, that on her paternal grandfather's side, she is a descendant of an untitled family descended from medieval nobility who served as constables of Castile.

Education and career
Ortiz attended La Gesta School in Oviedo, before her family moved to Rivas-Vaciamadrid near Madrid, where she attended the Ramiro de Maeztu High School. She completed a bachelor's degree in journalism, at the Complutense University of Madrid, as well as a master's degree in audiovisual journalism at the Institute for Studies in Audiovisual Journalism.

During her studies, Ortiz worked for the Asturian daily newspaper La Nueva España and later for the newspaper ABC and the national news agency EFE. After completing her master's degree, she travelled to Guadalajara, Mexico, where she worked at the newspaper Siglo 21 and began work toward a PhD. She did not, however, complete her doctoral thesis because she returned to Spain. After returning to Spain, she worked for the Spanish version of the economic channel Bloomberg before moving to the news network CNN+.

In 2000, Ortiz moved to TVE, where she started working for the news channel 24 Horas. In 2002, she anchored the weekly news report programme Informe Semanal and later the daily morning news programme Telediario Matinal on TVE 1. In August 2003, a few months before her engagement to Felipe, Prince of Asturias, Ortiz was promoted to anchor of the TVE daily evening news programme Telediario 2, the most viewed newscast in Spain. In 2000, she reported from Washington, D.C., on the presidential elections. In September 2001, she broadcast live from Ground Zero following the 9/11 attacks in New York and in 2003, she filed reports from Iraq following the war. In 2002 she sent several reports from Galicia in northern Spain following the ecological disaster when the oil tanker Prestige sank.

First marriage
Ortiz married Alonso Guerrero Pérez (born in 1962), a writer and a high school literature teacher, on 7 August 1998, in a civil ceremony at Almendralejo, in Badajoz, after a 10-year courtship. The marriage ended by divorce in 1999.

Second marriage and children
On 1 November 2003, to the surprise of many, the Royal Household announced Ortiz's engagement to Prince Felipe. Afterwards, she moved to live in a wing of the Zarzuela Palace until the day of her wedding. The Prince of Asturias had proposed to her with a 16-baguette diamond engagement ring with a white gold trim. She marked the occasion by giving him white gold and sapphire cufflinks and a classic book.

The wedding took place on 22 May 2004 in the Almudena Cathedral in Madrid. It was the first royal wedding in this cathedral. It had been nearly a century since the capital celebrated a royal wedding, as the prince's parents married in Athens and his sisters, Infanta Elena and Infanta Cristina, married in Seville and Barcelona respectively. Letizia's bridal gown was designed by Spanish fashion designer Manuel Pertegaz, her bridal shoes by Pura López; and the veil, a gift from Felipe to his bride, was made of off-white silk tulle and hand-embroidered with detailing. As Letizia's previous marriage involved only a civil ceremony, the Catholic Church does not consider it canonically valid and therefore did not require an annulment to proceed with a Catholic marriage to the Prince of Asturias.

Letizia and Felipe have two daughters: Leonor, Princess of Asturias, born on 31 October 2005, and Infanta Sofía, born on 29 April 2007. They were born in the Ruber International Hospital in Madrid.

Princess of Asturias
Princess Letizia immediately joined in the duties of her husband and travelled extensively through Spain representing her father-in-law. They also represented Spain in other countries: she has travelled along with her husband to Jordan, Mexico, Peru, Hungary, the Dominican Republic, Panama, the United States, Serbia, Brazil, Uruguay, Sweden, Denmark, Japan, China, and Portugal. She also greeted international dignitaries, along with other members of the royal family, and attended gatherings of foreign royalty in Luxembourg, for the silver wedding anniversary of Grand Duke Henri and Grand Duchess Maria Teresa, and in the Netherlands for the 40th birthday of Willem-Alexander, Prince of Orange.

Letizia's solo agenda was announced in 2006, shortly after the announcement of her second pregnancy. Letizia has performed a couple of audiences and her work focuses on social issues such as children's rights, rare diseases, culture, and education. In late 2007, her solo agenda started to grow in the number of events she performed by herself and Felipe's and Letizia's agendas became more distinct and separate.

In September 2010, the Spanish Association Against Cancer (AECC) appointed her as honorary president of the Association and its scientific foundation.

Queen of Spain
On 19 June 2014, Letizia became Queen of Spain with her husband's accession as Felipe VI; as such, she holds the style of Majesty. She is the first Spanish-born queen consort since Mercedes of Orléans, the first wife of Alfonso XII, in 1878. She is also the first Spanish queen to have been born as a commoner. The queen consort was present when King Juan Carlos I gave his son, King Felipe VI, the sash of captain general of the Armed Forces (symbolizing the transfer of royal and military power), as well as when Felipe swore before the Cortes Generales to fulfill his duties, protect and defend the Constitution as well as respecting the rights of the citizens and the Spanish regions.

Queen Letizia undertook her first solo engagement as queen on 23 June 2014 at the inauguration of the El Greco and modern painting exhibition at the Prado Museum in Madrid. On 25 June 2014, the king appointed José Manuel de Zuleta y Alejandro, 14th duke of Abrantes, as her private secretary. In their first overseas trip as king and queen, Felipe and Letizia met Pope Francis on 30 June 2014, in the Apostolic Palace. They later met with Cardinal Secretary of State Pietro Parolin, accompanied by Mgsr. Antoine Camilleri, under-secretary for Relations with States. The visit followed one by King Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofia on 28 April.

In September 2014, Letizia chaired the Royal Board on Disability, a government agency protected by the Crown whose president is the consort of the reigning monarch. On 25 October 2014, she attended the delivery ceremony of the Prince of Asturias Awards, the last with this name. From 2015 onwards, they were renamed "Princess of Asturias Awards" with Leonor, Princess of Asturias as their president. On 27 October 2014, she travelled to Vienna, Austria to inaugurate an exhibition about Spanish painter Diego Velázquez, which marked her first international solo visit. There, she met the Austrian president Heinz Fischer and his wife, Margit Fischer. It was not her last solo foreign visit that year, visiting Portugal in November for the Closing Ceremony of the 2nd Ibero-American Meeting on Rare Diseases and Italy to attend the Second International Conference on Nutrition, organized by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, where she delivered the main speech. In her speech, she praised the role of women in the fight against hunger, described as "unacceptable" that more than 850 million people in the world suffer from hunger and demanded that the food industry balance its "commercial interests" with its "responsibility" to eradicate obesity. In December 2014, she chaired the general meeting of the Spanish Association Against Cancer, an association that she has chaired since 2010 and which she continues to do as queen.

During 2015, Letizia continued giving support to social causes related to relevant diseases, attending events and meetings of the Spanish Association Against Cancer, the Spanish Federation of Rare Diseases and the Spanish Red Cross, among others. The King and Queen had planned their first state visit for March 2015, to France. However, on 24 March 2015 they had to postponed the visit due to the pilot of Germanwings Flight 9525 deliberately crashing the plane in the French Alps, killing 150 people, including 51 Spaniards. They resumed the state visit on early June, being welcomed by French president François Hollande. They also met the prime minister, Manuel Valls, the president of the French Senate, Gérard Larcher, the president of the National Assembly, Claude Bartolone and the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo. On 13 April 2015, Queen Letizia visited the Artillery Academy, which marked her first solo military event. A few days later, she travelled with her husband to Copenhagen, Denmark, to commemorate the 75th birthday of Queen Margrethe II. From 25 to 28 of May 2015, Letizia made her first international cooperation visit to Honduras and El Salvador.

In June 2015, Letizia was named Special Ambassador for Nutrition for the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. Late this month, after travelling to France, she and the King made a state visit to México, their first visit to the Americas as Spain's sovereigns. They met the Mexican president, Enrique Peña Nieto, the First Lady, Angélica Rivera, the head of México City, Miguel Ángel Mancera and the leaders of the Congress of the Union. In late July 2015, she traveled alone to Milan, Italy for the Expo 2015. From 14 to 19 September 2015, the King and Queen made an official visit to the United States, where they visited American president Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle Obama, and the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. They later traveled to Louisiana, where they were received by soldiers with the traditional uniform of the Spanish Louisiana and to Virginia, to visit Mount Vernon. In October 2015, she traveled alone to Düsseldorf, Germany, to inaugurate an exhibition about Spanish painter Zurbarán. That month, she also accompanied King Felipe to the Princess of Asturias Awards ceremony, the first since Leonor assumed as Princess of Asturias. At the end of 2015, the Queen attended two funerals. First, in November, she attended, with the rest of the Royal Family, the funeral of Infante Carlos, Duke of Calabria in El Escorial. Second, in December, she attended the funeral of Spanish police officers killed in the 2015 Spanish Embassy attack in Kabul.

2016 was a low-key year for the Royal Family. The electoral process started with the 2015 general election and followed by the 2016 general election made it difficult for the Crown to develop a normal agenda. Letizia began 2016 by receiving different social entities in audience, such as the Roma Secretariat Foundation, the Association of Children's Organizations of Spain, the Association for Specific Language Disorder of Madrid and the Spanish Nutrition Foundation, which informed the queen about their goals, activity and projects.

In March 2016, leaked text messages between Letizia and businessman Javier López Madrid created controversy. Together with other executives and board members of the Caja Madrid and Bankia financial group, Madrid had been accused of corruption. In October 2014, Letizia pledged her support for him, texting "We know who you are and you know who we are. We know each other, like each other, respect each other. To hell with the rest. Kisses yoga mate (miss you!!!)". Felipe also joined in, texting "We do indeed!" The newspaper El Diario later published these texts. A palace official subsequently stated that the King and Queen were no longer friends with López Madrid due to his legal issues. Also in March, Letizia made the first of the two international trips she had in 2016. She accompanied King Felipe to Puerto Rico, in order to chair the 7th International Congress of the Spanish Language On 22 April 2016, the king and queen gave audience to Spanish figure skater Javier Fernández after winning the 2016 World Championship (his second consecutive title). To finish the year, in late November 2016, the King and Queen made a state visit to Portugal, where they met Portuguese president Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa and prime minister António Costa, among others. While the king was fulfilling his constitutional obligations before the Portuguese authorities, the queen met with the president of the Portuguese League Against Cancer, Víctor Veloso.

2017 started very like the past year, with Letizia meeting some relevant social organizations that she chaired. In February, both the King and Queen welcomed important foreign leaders at the Royal Palace of Zarzuela, such as the German president Joachim Gauck and his wife, Gerhild Radtke, and the Hungarian president János Áder and his wife, Anita Herczegh. Precisely, in an event with these last guests, the royals learned the initial judicial ruling that declared Iñaki Urdangarin, the king's brother-in-law, guilty of several corruption crimes. The king's sister, Infanta Cristina, was cleared of all crimes. To finish the month, Felipe and Letizia welcomed the Argentine president, Mauricio Macri, and the First Lady, Juliana Awada, during their state visit to Spain.

On 23 March 2017, she made her first solo trip of the year to Porto, Portugal, to attend the 7th Conference on Tobacco or Health. There, she met the Portuguese president, the European Commissioner for Health and Safety, Vytenis Andriukaitis, the minister of Health of Portugal, Adalberto Campos Fernandes, and the mayor of Porto, Rui Moreira. In April 2017, Queen Letizia and King Felipe made a state visit to Japan. At the end of the year, they travelled to the Netherlands to celebrate the 50th birthday of Willem-Alexander. In May, they offered a lunch to Jordanian Princess Muna Al Hussein and to the Portuguese president. They also celebrated, along with King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofía, the 40th anniversary of the Reina Sofía Foundation and the 10th anniversary of the Alzheimer Centre of the Foundation. In mid-July 2017, the Spanish royals made a state visit to the United Kingdom, where they met with Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. They also reunited with the Prince and Princess of Wales, Charles and Camila.

On 31 October 2018, the queen proudly witnessed the first public address of her eldest daughter, Princess Leonor, who read the first article of the Spanish Constitution during the celebration of the 40th anniversary of the Magna Carta. A year later, on 18 October 2019, Letizia accompanied her daughter Leonor to the delivery of the Princess of Asturias Awards, the first time for the young princess. The heir to the throne delivered her first speech in public in this event.

In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, King Felipe had to isolate himself in quarantine for testing positive for coronavirus in several occasions between 2020 and 2022. While he was isolated, the queen replaced him in those events for which she was constitutionally authorized (awards delivery, lunches, inauguration of events, etc.) but not in those activities tightly related to constitutional responsibilities (such as the working meeting with the president of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Željko Komšić, in 2022, which had to be postponed. For the 2020 Rey Jaime I Awards in Valencia, Queen Letizia presented the award-winners with their gold medals and gave a short speech praising the "talent, effort and generosity" of prize-winners.  In 2022, it was reported that Letizia was suffering from Morton's neuroma.

After a one-month delay to avoid interfering with the electoral campaign of the 2023 general election, on 25 July 2023 the King and Queen inaugurated the Royal Collections Gallery, a new museum sponsored by Patrimonio Nacional, the government agency that guards the Crown assets. On 17 August 2023, King Felipe and Queen Letizia, together with Infanta Sofía, accompanied Princess Leonor to the General Military Academy, to begin three years of military training. Leonor used both her father's and her mother's surnames "Borbón Ortiz". In late August 2023, she travelled with her youngest daughter, Sofía, to Australia to see the final of the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup between Spain and England. The Queen delivered the trophy to the World Champions, Spain, and celebrated with them on the pitch. Indirectly, this drew criticism to the British royal family for their absence from the event.

On 30 April 2024, State lawyer María Dolores Ocaña Madrid was appointed as private secretary to the Queen, being the first woman to hold the office.

Titles and honours


On 21 May 2004, the day before her marriage to Felipe, Letizia was appointed a Dame Grand Cross of the Royal and Distinguished Order of Charles III. Since then, Letizia has received different appointments and decorations by foreign states and other Spanish honours.

Letizia was styled as "Her Royal Highness The Princess of Asturias" from her marriage to her husband's accession in 2014, and as "Her Majesty The Queen" since.

Arms
The coat of arms of Queen Letizia was adopted in 2014, based on the design created for her by the Asturian Academy of Heraldry and Genealogy (Academia Asturiana de Heráldica y Genealogía) in May 2004 and approved by Vicente de Cadenas y Vicent, Cronista Rey de Armas; this was used by her as Princess of Asturias. The revision of 2014 was confirmed by Don Alfonso Ceballos-Escalera y Gil, Chronicler of Arms for Castile and León.

The Queen's coat of arms has no official status, as in Spain only those of the King of the King emeritus Juan Carlos, and of the Princess of Asturias are so recognized by Royal Decree.