Following the 2016 election, the People's Party (PP) formed a minority government with confidence and supply support from Ciudadanos (Cs) and Canarian Coalition (CC), allowed by the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) abstaining in Mariano Rajoy's investiture after a party crisis resulted in the ousting of Pedro Sánchez as leader. The PP's term of office was undermined by a constitutional crisis over the Catalan issue, the result of a regional election held thereafter, coupled with corruption scandals and protests with thousands of retirees demanding pension increases. In May 2018, the National Court found in the Gürtel case that since 1989 the PP had profited from the kickbacks-for-contracts scheme and confirmed the existence of an illegal accounting and financing structure kept separate from the party's official accounts. Sánchez, who was re-elected as PSOE leader in a leadership contest in 2017, brought down Rajoy's government in June 2018 through a motion of no confidence. Rajoy resigned as PP leader and was subsequently succeeded by Pablo Casado.