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Rui Tavares
Rui Tavares
	Tavares in 2022
Member of the Assembly of the Republic
	Incumbent
	Assumed office ; 29 March 2022
Constituency	Lisbon
Member of the Lisbon City Council
	Incumbent
	Assumed office ; 18 October 2021
Mayor	Carlos Moedas
Portfolio	None
Member of the European Parliament
	In office; 14 July 2009 – 30 June 2014
Constituency	Portugal
Personal details
Born	Rui Miguel Marcelino Tavares Pereira; 29 July 1972 (age 52); Lisbon, Portugal
Political party	LIVRE (2014–present)
Other political; affiliations	Left Bloc (2009–2011); Greens/EFA (2011–2014)
Spouse	Marta Bobichon Loja Neves
Children	2
Alma mater	NOVA University Lisbon; École des hautes études en sciences sociales (PhD)
Profession	Historian, translator

Rui Miguel Marcelino Tavares Pereira (born 29 July 1972) is a Portuguese historian and politician. He has been elected a Member of the Assembly of the Republic in the 2022 legislative election, and has been a member of the Lisbon City Council since 2021.

Tavares is one of the founders and leaders of the green political party LIVRE, established in 2014. He had previously served as an independent Member of the European Parliament, elected in 2009 for the Left Bloc.

Early life and career

Rui Tavares was born in Lisbon on 29 July 1972, to a bank clerk (and occasionally shepherd) father and a homemaker mother. Tavares had two older half-siblings (born of his father's first marriage; cut short when he became a widower) and two older siblings.^[3]

The family was originally from the small rural village of Arrifana, in Azambuja, in the Ribatejo Province, where Tavares spent part of his childhood. The area had a significant labour movement background, influenced by republicanism and anarcho-syndicalism in the early 20th century: the anti-christian spirit of the First Portuguese Republic saw the local parish priest temporarily banished from the town and, unusually for the traditionally Catholic country, it then gained a significant Evangelical Baptist population. The Protestant denomination was indirectly introduced in the town by an atheist great-uncle of Tavares, who invited a Baptist pastor to the village to spite the Catholic hierarchy.^[3]

Living with his parents and his next older brother, Tavares attended primary school in Arrifana; of his much older siblings, his sister was already married at the time, and the two other brothers were attending university, one in Lisbon and the other in Czechoslovakia (sponsored by the Portuguese Communist Youth, of which he was a member).^[3] Tavares's next older brother attended secondary school in Azambuja and used to bring him books from the school library; by his own admission, Tavares was "bookish" ever since his mother taught him how to read, and he took great pride in having read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn at this time "as they should be read: perched up in a tree".^[3] He became interested in politics at around age 11 or 12, when he started reading anything he could on the different political ideologies at the Municipal Library in Penha de França, and became fascinated with anarchism and left-libertarianism.^[3]

Tavares earned a licentiate in History of Art from the Faculty of Social and Human Sciences of NOVA University Lisbon in 1994, a master's degree in Social Sciences from the Institute of Social Sciences of the University of Lisbon in 1998, and a doctorate in History from the École des hautes études en sciences sociales, in Paris, in 2014.^[4] He taught at university level for two years.^[2]^[3]

Political career

He was elected Member of the European Parliament in 2009 for the Left Bloc. In June 2011, Tavares became an independent within the Greens–European Free Alliance group.^[5] During his time at the European Parliament, he focused on refugee and fundamental rights issues.

Tavares Report

In June 2013, he was commissioned by the European Parliament to submit a report on Hungarian constitutional concerns. The Tavares Report urged the Hungarian authorities "to implement as swiftly as possible all the measures the European Commission as the guardian of the treaties deems necessary in order to fully comply with EU law... [and with] the decisions of the Hungarian Constitutional Court and... the recommendations of the Venice Commission, the Council of Europe and other international bodies…".^[6]

LIVRE

In 2014, he founded the new party LIVRE.

In the 2021 local elections, Tavares was elected member of the Lisbon City Council.^[7] Tavares had run alongside incumbent Mayor Fernando Medina on the electoral list of the "Mais Lisboa" coalition (Socialist Party and LIVRE), to be the councillor with the "Human Rights, Knowledge, Science, and Culture" portfolio on a Socialist-led City Council. The majority, however, was won by the "Novos Tempos" coalition (PSD/CDS–PP/Alliance/MPT/PPM); Tavares stated his intention to serve as opposition within the City Council to the new centre-right Mayor, Carlos Moedas.^[8]

Tavares was elected Member of the Assembly of the Republic in the 2022 legislative election for the Lisbon constituency. Tavares pledged to get António Costa, who was re-elected Prime Minister with an absolute majority, to work with other left-wing parties.^[9]^[10]

Electoral history

European Parliament election, 2014

Ballot: 25 May 2014
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	Seats	+/−
	PS	Francisco Assis	1,034,249	31.5	8	+1
	PSD/CDS–PP	Paulo Rangel	910,647	27.7	7	–3
	CDU	João Ferreira	416,925	12.7	3	+1
	MPT	Marinho e Pinto	234,788	7.2	2	+2
	BE	Marisa Matias	149,764	4.6	1	–2
	Livre	Rui Tavares	71,495	2.2	0	new
	PAN	Orlando Figueiredo	56,431	1.7	0	new
	PCTP/MRPP	Leopoldo Mesquita	54,708	1.7	0	±0
	Other parties		111,765	3.4	0	±0
Blank/Invalid ballots			243,681	7.4	–	–
Turnout			3,284,452	33.67	21	–1
Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições^[11]

European Parliament election, 2019

Ballot: 26 May 2019
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	Seats	+/−
	PS	Pedro Marques	1,104,694	33.4	9	+1
	PSD	Paulo Rangel	725,399	21.9	6	±0
	BE	Marisa Matias	325,093	9.8	2	+1
	CDU	João Ferreira	228,045	6.9	2	–1
	CDS–PP	Nuno Melo	204,792	6.2	1	±0
	PAN	Francisco Guerreiro	168,015	5.1	1	+1
	Alliance	Paulo Sande	61,652	1.9	0	new
	Livre	Rui Tavares	60,446	1.8	0	±0
	Basta!	André Ventura	49,388	1.5	0	new
	NC	Paulo de Morais	34,634	1.1	0	new
	Other parties		116,743	2.7	0	±0
Blank/Invalid ballots			235,748	3.5	–	–
Turnout			3,307,644	30.75	21	±0
Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições^[12]

Legislative election, 2022

Ballot: 30 January 2022
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	Seats	+/−
	PS	António Costa	2,302,601	41.4	120	+12
	PSD	Rui Rio	1,618,381	29.1	77	–2
	Chega	André Ventura	399,659	7.2	12	+11
	IL	João Cotrim Figueiredo	273,687	4.9	8	+7
	BE	Catarina Martins	244,603	4.4	5	–14
	CDU	Jerónimo de Sousa	238,920	4.3	6	–6
	CDS–PP	Rodrigues dos Santos	89,181	1.6	0	–5
	PAN	Inês Sousa Real	88,152	1.6	1	–3
	Livre	Rui Tavares	71,232	1.3	1	±0
	Other parties		91,299	1.6	0	±0
Blank/Invalid ballots			146,824	2.6	–	–
Turnout			5,564,539	51.46	230	±0
Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições^[13]

Legislative election, 2024

Ballot: 10 March 2024
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	Seats	+/−
	AD	Luís Montenegro	1,867,442	28.8	80	+3
	PS	Pedro Nuno Santos	1,812,443	28.0	78	–42
	Chega	André Ventura	1,169,781	18.1	50	+38
	IL	Rui Rocha	319,877	4.9	8	±0
	BE	Mariana Mortágua	282,314	4.4	5	±0
	CDU	Paulo Raimundo	205,551	3.2	4	–2
	Livre	Rui Tavares	204,875	3.2	4	+3
	PAN	Inês Sousa Real	126,125	2.0	1	±0
	ADN	Bruno Fialho	102,134	1.6	0	±0
	Other parties		104,167	1.6	0	±0
Blank/Invalid ballots			282,243	4.4	–	–
Turnout			6,476,952	59.90	230	±0
Source: Comissão Nacional de Eleições^[14]