Portugal Tilts to Far Right—Is Democracy at Risk?
As the far right gains ground, how far can the shift go before democracy loses its footing?
Last Sunday was election day here in Portugal. The morning was gray, with my small village sunk beneath a thick dome of uncertainty. Every cloud carried the promise of rain, and a hint of change, at a time when the country and the world are gripped by volatility, where even the most unreal scenarios feel possible.
When I arrived at the polling station, my old elementary school, I realized that the turnout was moderate and that by the end of election night, the abstention rate would likely be high, as is often the case in Portugal.
As we all know, when moderates stay home, the extremes grow in proportion to our disinterest in shaping the nation’s direction. Even so, in 2024, turnout was the highest ever for an election in Portugal, with an abstention rate of 40.16%, the lowest since 2005.
At a time when the world seems to be sliding dangerously toward the abyss of chaos, I walked into the booth convinced that in times like these, we must defend democracy above all else.
I picked up the ballot and, with conviction, marked a cross, marking what I believe to be the right direction for my country.
I admit that I was surprised when it was reported that the turnout up to noon was higher than in 2024.
I say this because, just a year after the last legislative election, there could have been a lack of interest in the parties’ political proposals, as the campaign lacked real ideas or vision, across both left and right.
The General Secretariat of the Ministry of Internal Administration (SGMAI) recorded a turnout of 25.56% of those registered, a higher percentage than the 25.21% who, at the same time, had already voted in the 2024 elections.
This marked the highest turnout in 20 years, something that immediately caught my attention.
For the first time, it occurred to me that the results of election night could be surprising and lead to a configuration of the Portuguese Parliament unlike anything seen in the 51 years of democracy since 25 April 1974.
A surprising turnout
In Portugal, the turnout percentage has been recorded since at least 2005 and has never been higher: in 2023, it was 23.3%, and before that, it was never above 22%.
The Portuguese traditionally vote mainly in the morning, but young people tend to go to the polls in the afternoon, and it remains to be seen whether the election campaign has mobilized the younger generation.
I followed the campaign closely, and from what I saw, I think the parties failed to attract young people to vote.
My disbelief was confirmed in the middle of the afternoon.
Voter turnout at 4 pm was 48.28%, down from 51.96% at the same time in last year’s legislative elections, according to figures released by the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MAI).
At that time, approximately 5.24 million people had voted, 340,000 fewer than those who had voted by 4 pm last year.
A perfect storm was quietly brewing in the secrecy of the polls, ready to erupt as soon as the results were revealed.
The Socialists’ defeat and Chega’s surge
No one could have predicted the outcome of the Socialist Party in the 2025 legislative elections, but the official results indicated something that even the polls didn’t seem to show.
The center-left party, which had dominated the national political scene for years and even managed to govern with an absolute majority under Antonio Costa, had fallen to third place behind the extreme right party Chega, according to TVI/CNN Portugal.
On other Portuguese television channels, Pedro Nuno Santos’ Socialist Party and André Ventura’s Chega were in a technical tie, with the PS slightly ahead.
Over the next few hours, the scenario would remain unchanged.
Portugal’s center-right Democratic Alliance (PSD-CDS), the coalition led by Prime Minister Luís Montenegro, was backed by 32% of Portuguese voters.
I believe this result confirms that the Portuguese longed for political stability that would allow the government to face the challenges of today.
However, the Democratic Alliance only managed to secure 89 seats in the country’s parliament. A number below the 116 needed for a governing majority.
With the Democratic Alliance growing in the number of votes and seats, this left the Socialist Party to fend off the far-right Chega party for the place as the second-largest force in the country’s parliament.
Chega surged in the polls, winning a further increase in seats. The far-right party led by Ventura seems unstoppable, and the results prove their unstoppable climb in Portugal.
In just six years, Chega went from a single seat in parliament in 2019 to the third-largest party last year, and now they control a quarter of the seats in the country’s legislature.
Now, my country seems to have leaned a bit too far to the right, and things may soon feel off-balance.
This raises a question.
Até onde chega o Chega?
How far will Chega go?
How we got here
There can be many explanations for the surprising results in the 2025 Portuguese Legislative Elections.
I will only say, Pedro Nuno Santos from the Socialist Party was wrong when he decided to go all-in and push the country to an election nobody wanted.
This partially explains why his party got hammered by voters, forcing elections that the public thought were pointless.
The center-left group took a major hit, losing 20 seats and ending up with only 58 seats in parliament so far.
However, at this time, there are still four seats in parliament reserved for overseas Portuguese communities.
In 2024, the Chega party gained two MPs and is expected to maintain or even increase the number of votes.
If this happens, the Socialist Party will be relegated to third place, ceding the leadership of the opposition to André Ventura’s party, something never seen before in Portuguese democracy.
Looking back, there’s one sentence that stayed with me from everything I heard last night.
Sebastião Bugalho, a Portuguese journalist and Member of the European Parliament, elected in 2024 as part of the Democratic Alliance, said to CNN/TVI.
“Age passes with time, and if the country were to change with the people who have been here for a long time, it would have changed long ago.”
I couldn’t agree more with this insight, and I want to be part of this change. If we want democracy to prevail when it’s daily assailed by forces coming from the fringes of the system and set to bring down the rightful order of things, we need to bring new voices to the forefront.
In 2021, I was elected to the parish assembly. I had never been part of any political party, but I joined an independent citizens’ movement determined to make a difference in my town. Since then, I’ve been fully engaged in local politics.
What comes next
Many are saying they saw this coming. They argue democracy is broken, claiming the rise of the Chega Party in Portugal is a direct consequence of an eroded system.
We see far-right movements spawning like mushrooms all over Europe, and here in Portugal, in six years, they have found fertile ground to proliferate unchecked.
I think the rise of the Chega party was, in part, fueled by the Socialist Party, which, in trying to weaken moderates to its right, may have triggered its own downfall.
In doing so, it shook the very core of Portuguese democracy, which had stood firm for half a century.
What the future holds now rests with the Socialist Party. Their leader, Pedro Nuno Santos, has resigned after losing the election, and the party will need to regroup quickly as the country gears up once again, this time for local elections, to be held on a date set by the government between September 22 and October 14, 2025, and for the presidential election scheduled for January 25, 2026.
If the Socialist Party continues to flirt with extremism on both sides, I fear my country could slip beyond the democratic balance that has defined us for fifty years. We’ve reached a crossroads, and what happens next depends on how boldly we defend the center.
Rui Alves is a language teacher, published author, international book judge, and publisher. He runs Alchemy Publications and serves as editor-in-chief for Engage on Substack, Life Unscripted, Musicverse, Writelicious, The Academic, Portugal Calling, Engage on Medium, Rock n’ Heavy, Beloved, Zenite, Poetaph, Grind, and Babel.
Hi Rui, thank you for providing this analysis. I appreciate you being personally involved in trying to better life in Portugal. I had a different outlook though—my prediction Friday was “the PS continues to bleed seats to Chega across not only the Algarve, but also the Alentejo. Working-class people are switching to the populist right across Europe, and this will only accelerate.”
As unprecedented excess deaths 5 years running continue to eradicate elderly PS voters, and as the working poor grow ever more dissatisfied with their rulers, populist parties will benefit.
For example, 41 out of 42 voting districts in my district in Austria went for our Populist Right party, the FPOe, which is similar to Chega. This entire area used to vote overwhelmingly for Socialists—no more.
As birth rates have been steadily rising in the Algarve, younger people (from outside Portugal, but some become voting citizens) are moving to the islands, and the population is slowly starting to tick up from both of these reasons in the Alentejo, I see a bright future for alternative parties, or for the PS to regroup and focus on trying to attract young voters in the south and the islands. Probably the most successful way to do this as has been done in other places in Europe, whether you find it distasteful or not, is to remain a fundamentally center left party of the people, but to oppose immigration. Chega will continue to rise in popularity as long as they are the only ones making strong statements about reducing immigration, which is a popular position in basically every developed country. This is especially ironic because the PS, as far as I recall, wanted stronger requirements for the Sephardic citizenship program. But they don’t seem willing to take a hard line in general anymore.
I hope that the forces of extremism don’t weaken democracy and freedom in Portugal. The people in the center didn’t vote but consequences of not voting for stability and democracy could be their lasting regret.🌹