LIVRE

LIVRE (L; lit. 'FREE'), temporarily known as LIVRE/Tempo de Avançar (lit. 'FREE/Time to Move Forward', L/TDA), is a green left-wing Portuguese political party, founded in 2014. Its founding principles are ecology, universalism, freedom, equality, solidarity, socialism, and pro-Europeanism.

Rui Tavares, founder of LIVRE, during its 10th Congress in 2021

In 2011, Left Bloc's Independent MEP Rui Tavares departed the party's group due to disagreements with coordinator Francisco Louçã and began sitting as an independent in European Parliament. Tavares also left the Left Bloc's European Parliament group, GUE-NGL, and began sitting with Greens–European Free Alliance.

In 2014, ahead of that year's European elections, LIVRE was formed, with Tavares being its most notable founder. Its founding congress was 31 January. The party was legalised by the Portuguese Constitutional Court on 20 March 2014. On 20 May 2015, it officially changed its name LIVRE to LIVRE/Tempo de Avançar, with L/TDA as its abbreviation. This change was made in order to run for the 2015 legislative election in a broad coalition with the citizen platform Tempo de Avançar, as only political parties can run in legislative elections. It switched back to its original name a few years later. Its symbol is a poppy.

In the 2019 legislative election the party entered parliament for the first time, with Joacine Katar Moreira as their sole MP. After several clashes between Katar Moreira and the party's leadership, including accusations that LIVRE only used her to achieve the state mandated subvention due to her being a black woman, and Katar Moreira's claim that the election was "won" only by her the party expelled her from their caucus on 31 January 2020, losing all representation in the Assembly of the Republic.

During the campaign for the 2022 legislative election, Rui Tavares, once again the main candidate from LIVRE, was able to appear in the televised debates due to the party having elected one MP during the previous election. Rui Tavares was elected as the party's sole MP, with LIVRE regaining representation in parliament.

During the 2024 legislative election, LIVRE increased their result to 3.2% and elected 4 MPs: Rui Tavares, Isabel Mendes Lopes (who became the first Parliamentary leader of LIVRE), Jorge Pinto and Paulo Muacho.

In the same year, LIVRE selected Francisco Paupério as the main candidate for the 2024 European Parliament election after his victory in the party primaries, a result that caused some internal turmoil in the party after allegations of electoral fraud. Rui Tavares was later criticized for not being as present as other party leaders in the party's campaign for the European elections. In the end, LIVRE achieved 3.8% of the votes, their best result at that point, but failed to elect any MEPs.

In the 2025 legislative election, LIVRE once again rose to 4.1% of the votes and elected 6 MPs, this time also taking Filipa Pinto and Patrícia Gonçalves to parliament, with LIVRE becoming the largest party to the left of the Socialist Party. In the local elections, LIVRE managed to elect about 50 local representatives, having kept one city councillor in Lisbon within a PS/LIVRE/BE/PAN coalition, Carlos Teixeira.

Later that year, the party presented its first own presidential candidate for the following year's presidential election, Jorge Pinto. He achieved a very poor result, winning just 0.7% of the votes and coming in 9th place, behind all left-wing candidates and even satirical candidate Manuel João Vieira, with the party endorsing António José Seguro for the second round against André Ventura on election night.

The party's political responsibilities are divided between two main organs, both elected for two-year terms in the party congress: the Contact Group, composed of 15 people elected through lists, is responsible for the executive functioning of the party

The Assembly, composed of 50 people (with gender parity) elected through individual candidacies, is responsible for determining the political positioning of the party.

Unlike most parties in the Portuguese landscape, LIVRE does not have a fixed leadership role, having rotating roles such as a male-female spokesperson duo from the Contact Group and a coordinator of the assembly's board. Given that both organs have term limits and no person can serve in one organ more than three consecutive terms, they are considered rotating roles.

Primaries for the 2015 legislative election were held on 24 June 2015. Party founder Rui Tavares was selected as the main candidate in Lisbon, with former deputy Ana Drago coming in second place.

Meanwhile, the primary for Porto was filled with controversy, after the first ballot selected Daniel Mota as the main candidate, with former Secretary of State Ricardo Sá Fernandes coming in third place. A recount was held, with Sá Fernandes coming in first place, while Daniel Mota fell to 11th place following the annulment of 46 votes. This led the Intervention and Citizenship Movement (MIC), founded by Manuel Alegre following the 2006 presidential election, to withraw from LIVRE/Time to move forward.

On 26 June 2015, LIVRE held an internal referendum to decide who the party would support in the 2016 presidential election, counting only as valid votes candidates that had already presented their candidacy. On the ballot, 79.7% of the party members were in favour of the party supporting a candidate, while 65% voted in favour of supporting former Rector of the University of Lisbon António Sampaio da Nóvoa.

Primaries were held on 8 July 2017 to select the candidates for the 2017 local elections in Lisbon, Oeiras and Ponta Delgada. In Lisbon, Isabel Mendes Lopes was selected as the main candidate for the City Council and Paulo Muacho for the Municipal Assembly, with LIVRE being integrated in the Socialist Party's lists, led by Fernando Medina. In Oeiras, Safaa Dib was the party's candidate for Mayor and in Ponta Delgada the party's mayoral candidate was José Manuel Azevedo.

Joacine Katar Moreira, deputy elected in the 2019 legislative election. She ended up being expelled from the party in 2020.

Primaries to select the candidates for the 2019 European Parliament election and for the 2019 legislative election were held on 22 February 2019 and on 3 March 2019. Rui Tavares decided only to run for the European Parliament, winning that contest, with historian Joacine Katar Moreira coming in second place. Meanwhile, Katar Moreira was selected as the main candidate for Lisbon, while Jorge Pinto was selected in Porto.

LIVRE held an internal referendum to determine which candidate the party would support in the 2021 presidential election. On the ballot, 91% of the members were in favour of supporting a candidate, while 89% of the voters supported former MEP Ana Gomes.

Candidates for the 2021 local elections were selected on 24 June 2021 and 22 July 2021. In Lisbon, Rui Tavares was selected as the party's candidate for Mayor, while Isabel Mendes Lopes was selected as the main candidate for the Municipal Assembly. LIVRE ended up running in a coalition with the PS led by Fernando Medina, with Rui Tavares being elected to the City Council in result of that. In Porto, Diamantino Raposinho was selected as the party's candidate for Mayor.

In the 2022 legislative election, primaries were held on 28 November 2021 in order to select the party's candidates. Rui Tavares returned as the main candidate for Lisbon, with Isabel Mendes Lopes in second place despite having less support than Carlos Teixeira, due to the parity rule.

Primaries were held for the 2024 legislative election on 7 December 2023 and 12 December 2023. In an election marked by an increase in the number of deputies from LIVRE, Rui Tavares was once again selected as the main candidate from Lisbon, with Jorge Pinto running in Porto and Paulo Muacho in Setúbal. Co-spokesperson Teresa Mota ran once again in Braga.

Francisco Paupério, LIVRE's main candidate in the 2024 European Parliament election

Primaries were held for the 2024 European Parliament election with a first round on 10 April 2024 and a second round on 19 April 2024. The winner of the first round was Francisco Paupério, who was ahead of leadership-aligned candidate Filipa Pinto.

Following the first round, accusations arose that Paupério had won because of the votes on non-members, some aligned with other parties. This caused the party to intend to restrict the second round of voting to party members, a decision that was eventually reverted after public backlash.

Despite this controversy, Francisco Paupério ended up being selected as main candidate, with a substantial margin over second candidate Filipa Pinto.

In the 2025 legislative election, primaries were held with a first round on 19 March 2025 and a second round on 24 and 25 March 2025. This was the first time in which only members and party supporters were allowed to vote on the second round.

Rui Tavares was selected as the main candidate from Lisbon, while Jorge Pinto was the main candidate in Porto and Paulo Muacho was selected in Setúbal. Teresa Mota was selected for Braga, but ended up withrawing and was replaced by Jorge Oliveira Araújo. Francisco Paupério, who had been the main candidate in the 2024 European Parliament election, ran in Lisbon, ranking fifth in the first round and sixth on the second.

There was one rejected candidacy, Paulo Barcelos in Madeira, who only got 40.5% of votes in favour. He ended up being replaced by Marta Sofia, who had been the main candidate in the 2025 regional election.

Primaries for the 2025 local elections were held with a first round on 25 February 2025 and a second round on 7 July 2025, a process interrupted by the snap legislative election held in May. No deputies from the party ran in the primaries. In Lisbon, the selected candidate for Mayor was Carlos Teixeira, with Ofélia Janeiro being the main candidate for the Municipal Assembly, with these candidates being integrated in the lists of the PS/Livre/BE/PAN coalition led by Alexandra Leitão. Meanwhile in Porto, Hélder Sousa was selected as the candidate for Mayor, with Diamantino Raposinho becoming the party's candidate for the Municipal Assembly.

There were five rejected candidacies in this election, all for parish assemblies: Sérgio Valente for Parque das Nações in Lisbon, Carlos Melo for Santa Maria Maior in Lisbon, Duarte Guelha for Póvoa de Santo Adrião e Olival Basto in Odivelas, Gonçalo Lúcio for Rio de Mouro in Sintra, and Fernando Morais for Castanheira do Ribatejo e Cachoeiras in Vila Franca de Xira.

Jorge Pinto, deputy from the party and presidential candidate in 2026

Jorge Pinto, deputy from LIVRE, announced his candidacy for the 2026 presidential election on 22 October 2025. Despite that, some party members had already supported António José Seguro, from the Socialist Party. The party allowed votes on other candidates on the left, despite not including them on the ballot. On the ballot, 78.7% of the party members decided to support a candidate, while the distribution of support between candidates was the following:

As such, LIVRE officially supported Jorge Pinto. Even though he was an MP for the party, this was the least consensual endorsement of a presidential candidate by LIVRE of all time.

One of the main points of the party's manifesto going into the 2022 legislative election was support for a universal basic income. In January 2022, the party highlighted its support for increasing the national minimum wage to €1,000 per month and extending support for remote working, pregnant workers, workers with health problems, caregivers and supporting "micro-businesses". The party also supports a Green New Deal for Portugal, lowering VAT from 23% to 6% on vets and pet food, banning bullfighting and legalising cannabis. The party has been described as "libertarian left-wing". All of its MPs have voted in support of legalising euthanasia.

Vote share in the Portuguese legislative elections

The following results include LIVRE led coalitions.

• Official website