Ventura Makes History: In Portugal’s Presidential Election, Authenticity Was the Winner

Great news from Portugal! The Right-wing candidate for President, André Ventura, is in the runoff with the Socialist candidate.

From The European Conservative

By Rafael Pinto Borges

Today, like never before in Portugal, there is a broad consensus for a national reform implemented from the Right.

Not once, in fifty years of democratic rule in Portugal, has a presidential candidate sponsored by a sitting government been so thoroughly humiliated. Luís Marques Mendes, the centrist political commentator selected by Prime Minister Luís Montenegro to win him a puppet in the presidency, was once seen as an inevitable head of state. For years, if not decades, his ambitions had been known to all; with the government’s support, he appeared hard to beat. And yet, with the votes counted, he had earned a meager 11.3% of the vote, placed fifth—and only fourth among right-wing candidates. It was a debacle few, his harshest critics included, could have contemplated. 

In retrospect, the crushing humiliation of Mendes, a former leader of the opposition and one of Portugal’s most recognisable pundits, was more the defeat of a class and worldview than a man. Marques Mendes was Portugal’s most refined embodiment of the professional politician. For forty years, he swam in the corridors of power, never actually believing in anything. As a ‘centrist,’ he could, like an admittedly more benign form of Shakespeare’s Richard, “add colours to the chameleon and change shapes with Proteus for advantages.” He was a leftover of the post-ideological, technocratic 90s, forever stuck in a politics of managed silences, compromise, backdoor negotiations, and verbose, vague proclamations. A man of the left-wing-dominated 1974 Revolution, he had always been the Right allowed by the Left, accepting the latter’s tutelage and cultural hegemony. He couldn’t think outside this box, couldn’t understand how much the country changed in recent years, couldn’t penetrate the anger, disillusion, and thirst for authenticity that had taken hold of Portugal. Such was his crime. His punishment arrived yesterday.

Another proof of the dangers of indefinition came from Henrique Gouveia e Melo’s lackluster performance. Like Mendes, Gouveia e Melo had launched his campaign as a very clear favorite to win the presidency. A former admiral, he had earned the respect of the media—and, admittedly, that of a sizable portion of the electorate—by bringing order to Portugal’s messy vaccination system during the COVID-19 pandemic. A few months ago, he was polling at 40% for the first round. The election was his to lose—and lose it he certainly did. The aura of the uniform made him popular among Portuguese conservatives, and his name recognition and reputation for competence sold him to other fractions of the electorate. But a spectacular political obtusity killed it all. Like Mendes, Melo couldn’t understand how much the country had shifted to the Right, pressured by mass immigration and fury at a corrupt, inept political class that has imposed decades of economic and political stagnation on the country. He moved back to the center, trying to win the presidency by bombarding voters with innocuous platitudes. He wanted to “speak to all”; he ended up speaking to no one at all. He finished fourth, at 12.3%—yet another tombstone in the vast cemetery of consensus politics. 

Though bitter for the old, gelatinous Right, the night marked the triumph of a new Right that thinks—and speaks—clearly. André Ventura, the national-conservative firebrand and leader of the Chega party, was yesterday’s clearest winner. He didn’t just prove his ability to retain the 23% of Portuguese who voted for Chega in last year’s parliamentary election. He actually increased that share further, with it rising to 24% in the first round. Most importantly, he qualified for the runoff with the Socialist António José Seguro—an opportunity for him to score higher than in any previous election. For the first time in the history of the Third Republic, the second round of a presidential election will include an unabashedly right-wing candidate. He might win the presidency altogether, but he will be victorious even if he doesn’t. By representing the Right in this election’s second round, he has cemented his claim to leadership of that entire political space. That was the real prize, and Ventura has already won it.

The Liberal João Cotrim de Figueiredo also had reasons to celebrate. Not quite as significant, mind you—his ambitions to reach the second round, though realistic just a week ago, were thwarted. With a final result of 16%, he significantly underperformed polls that frequently placed him in the 18%-21% range. Unlike Ventura, who speaks the language of the moment, Cotrim is the competent prophet of an obsolete religion. It is an uphill battle to be a social and economic liberal in 2026, a time dominated by themes—immigration, identity, sovereignty—for which liberalism just doesn’t have convincing answers. But, whatever the limitations of his worldview, Cotrim—articulate, intelligent, coherent—proved to be a formidable political product. Unlike Mendes and Melo, he actually dared to stand for something—and there will always be an electorate for a small government candidate while Portugal’s aspirational classes suffer the crushing burden of a fiscally insatiable state.

The second round of the election is due on February 8th. Much can happen until then. António José Seguro, who concentrated the left-wing vote on the first round, is the clear favorite to win. But Ventura is a formidable campaigner—perhaps the most formidable in Portuguese democratic history. He has the wind of history behind him. And Cotrim, Melo, and Mendes all refused to endorse Seguro for the second round, crushing establishment hopes of a local version of the front républicain that, in 2002, largely prevented Jean-Marie Le Pen from doing better against Jacques Chirac.

This has shown at least a modicum of political maturity on the part of the Portuguese Right. But it is utterly insufficient. Yesterday, the combined Right won 65% of the vote; the combined Left failed to go beyond 35%. Never since 1974 has the Right commanded such a remarkable social majority. Today, like never before in Portugal, there is a broad consensus for a national reform implemented from the Right. If Liberal Conservatives, Liberals, and Christian Democrats fail to unite behind André Ventura’s nationalist platform, they will be solely responsible for handing the presidency to an increasingly minoritarian, out-of-touch worldview. If the center-right was ever serious about putting an end to mass migration and reforming the state, the time to show it is now. 

Pictured: André Ventura, (hopefully) the next President of Portugal