Learn Spanish (Latin America): Ayer se rumoreó que el político robó el dinero. - Yesterday it was rumored that the politician stole the money.

Even though a rumor is not a confirmed fact, verbs of reporting or communication like rumorear (to rumor) take the indicative when used affirmatively. The sentence simply reports that the rumor occurred, so we use the indicative robó.

Why is se rumoreó in the preterite tense here instead of the imperfect? Aren't rumors usually ongoing?

While a rumor can be an ongoing state, the word Ayer (yesterday) frames it as a completed event that happened on that specific day. If you were describing a rumor that circulated continuously in the past without a clear end, you would use the imperfect se rumoreaba.

How does the impersonal se work with the word que in this sentence?

The structure se + verb + que is incredibly common for reporting information without naming who said it. Here, se rumoreó que translates to 'it was rumored that.' The impersonal se acts as the general subject (like 'people' or 'they'), followed by the noun clause starting with que that explains what the rumor was.

Could I translate 'it was rumored' directly as fue rumoreado?