Jennifer Hermoso, the Spanish soccer star who was forcibly kissed by Luis Rubiales, her country’s former top soccer official, testified as his trial opened on Monday that he had “ruined one of the happiest days of my life” — her team’s victory in the 2023 Women’s World Cup.
Ms. Hermoso described her horror at the unexpected kiss from Mr. Rubiales, who is accused of sexual assault and coercion. She also testified about the distress she felt after Mr. Rubiales and other Spanish soccer leaders waged what she called an intense campaign for her to publicly support him after the kiss ignited a social media storm.
“I felt disrespected,” Ms. Hermoso, 34, said in televised testimony at the trial outside Madrid, adding, “I didn’t look for that act, nor did I expect it.”
The kiss set off a national scandal, deepened debates about longstanding sexism in Spanish soccer and became a watershed moment in Spain’s #MeToo movement. Now, less than a year and a half later, Mr. Rubiales is one of four former Spanish soccer officials on trial.
Mr. Rubiales, 47, faces two and a half years in prison if convicted. The other three men, who include Jorge Vilda, the team’s coach at the 2023 World Cup, are accused of coercion. Each could face 18 months.
Ms. Hermoso has long said that the kiss was not consensual, which Mr. Rubiales has disputed.
“I couldn’t react — it was a thousandth of a second,” she testified.
Mr. Rubiales threatened to send people to talk to her family, she testified, and begged her to make a video playing it down. She also spoke of what she saw as a potential punishment for her refusal: A month after the kiss, she was briefly left off the national team’s roster.
“I was refusing to do something that my boss wanted to do,” she said, adding that she had received death threats. “I was afraid to go out in the street in case someone was chasing me.”
But during the medals ceremony after the final, Mr. Rubiales grabbed and kissed Ms. Hermoso — the national team’s record scorer — on the lips. In a video taken after the match, she said, “I didn’t like that!”
The public reaction was swift and furious.
For many, the kiss was a reminder of the repeated sexism scandals that had ripped through Spanish soccer. Some called on Mr. Rubiales to resign. Irene Montero, who was the Spanish equality minister and is now a member of the European Parliament, described the kiss as “sexual violence” in a social media post.
Initially, Mr. Rubiales offered a tepid apology and resisted calls to resign. Spain’s soccer federation released a statement that quoted Ms. Hermoso calling it “a totally spontaneous mutual gesture.”
But at the trial on Monday, Ms. Hermoso said that she had never approved the statement, adding that she knew immediately that the act was not normal. “My boss was kissing me,” she said. “This should not happen.”
After the kiss, dozens of Spanish soccer players said that they would refuse to play for their country until the “current managers” stepped aside, which many saw as a reference to Mr. Rubiales and Mr. Vilda.
Ms. Hermoso filed a criminal complaint of sexual assault against Mr. Rubiales. “At no time did I consent to the kiss that he gave me,” she said.
As the public pressure mounted, Mr. Rubiales’s support thinned. FIFA, soccer’s global governing body, suspended him and later barred him from the sport for three years. Mr. Vilda was fired. Less than a month after the kiss, Mr. Rubiales resigned as president of Spain’s soccer federation and also as a vice president of UEFA, European soccer’s governing body.
Mr. Rubiales was also briefly arrested last year in a wide-ranging investigation into allegations of corruption and money laundering while he led soccer in Spain. Those investigations are continuing, though no charges have been brought against him. He has denied wrongdoing.
Mr. Rubiales might not face prison time, even if he is convicted. In Spain, if someone without a criminal record is sentenced to two years or less, they usually do not go to prison.
Ms. Hermoso, however, described the kiss, and the public reaction, as an enduring trauma. “My life has been on standby,” she said. “And, honestly, I have not been able to live freely.”
Aritz Parra and Nader Ibrahim contributed research.