Portugal, too, sees far-right uptick

Election results track EU pattern

FARO, Portugal — The sunsoaked Algarve region on Portugal’s southern coast is a place where guitar-strumming backpackers gather by fragrant orange trees and digital nomads hunt for laid-back vibes. It is not exactly what comes to mind when one envisions a stronghold of far-right political sentiment.

But it is in the Algarve region where the antiestablishment Chega party finished first in national elections this month, both unsettling Portuguese politics and injecting new anxiety throughout the European establishment. Nationwide, Chega received 18 percent of the vote.

Chega, which means “enough” in Portuguese, is the first hard-right party to gain ground in Portugal since 1974 and the end of the nationalist dictatorship of António de Oliveira Salazar. Its formula mixed promises of greater law and order with tougher immigration measures and an appeal to economic resentments.

Chega showed once again that taboos that had kept hardright parties out of power, foremost the long shadow of a rightwing dictatorship from last century, were falling. Today, the hard right has made gains in Italy, Spain, and Germany, among other places.

Portugal had been considered the exception. It emerged from the Salazar dictatorship as a progressive society that supported liberal drug laws and showed little appetite for the farright. In recent years, it became a booming tourist destination, flush with foreign investment, expatriates, and a growing economy. Even so, this month, more than 1 million Portuguese cast what many saw as a protest vote for Chega.

The Socialist and the mainstream conservative Social Democratic party in recent decades have presided over a painful financial crisis and tough austerity period. But even in the country’s recent economic upturn, many have felt left out, anxious, and forgotten.

Huge numbers of young Portuguese are leaving the country. Many of those who stay work for low salaries that have not kept up with inflation and left them priced out of an unaffordable housing market. Public services are under stress.

Chega campaigned promising higher salaries and better conditions for workers, who the party said had been impoverished by a greedy elite. It fought against mixed-gender bathrooms in schools and restitutions for former colonies.

The party’s message struck a chord with many Portuguese who did not vote before and attracted young voters through powerful social media outreach. It also resonated with voters in Algarve who had voted reliably for the Socialist Party in the past.

“Chega became a sort of catchall party of all anxieties,” said António Costa Pinto, a political scientist at the University of Lisbon.