1980 Portuguese legislative election

1980 Portuguese legislative election

← 1979 5 October 1980 1983 →
250 seats to the Portuguese Assembly 125 seats needed for a majority
Registered	7,179,023 1.0%
Turnout	6,026,395 (83.9%) 1.0 pp
First party Second party Third party   Leader Francisco Sá Carneiro Mário Soares Álvaro Cunhal Party PSD PS PCP Alliance AD FRS APU Leader since 2 July 1978[a] 19 April 1973[b] 14 April 1978 Leader's seat Lisbon Lisbon Lisbon Last election 128 seats, 45.3% 74 seats, 27.3%[c] 47 seats, 18.8% Seats won 134 74 41 Seat change 6 0 6 Popular vote 2,868,076 1,673,279 1,009,505 Percentage 47.6% 27.8% 16.8% Swing 2.3 pp 0.5 pp 2.0 pp
Vote winner strength by district PSD ran alone in the Azores and Madeira. PS ran alone in the Azores, Madeira, Europe and Rest of the World. Results by constituency
Prime Minister before election Francisco Sá Carneiro PSD Prime Minister after election Francisco Sá Carneiro PSD

The 1980 Portuguese legislative election took place on 5 October. The election renewed all 250 members of the Assembly of the Republic.

In January 1980, the Democratic Alliance, which had won the previous election, on 2 December 1979, entered office with Francisco Sá Carneiro leading the government. However, this election was an extraordinary election and because of Fixed-term Parliament rules, in 1980, another election was held.

The Democratic Alliance (AD) won, again, and increased the majority they had achieved 10 months before, in December 1979. The AD won almost 48 percent of the votes and gathered 134 seats, six more.^[1] The Socialist Party (PS), now leading a broad coalition called Republican and Socialist Front, got basically the same vote share and seats as in 1979. The Communist led alliance, United People Alliance (APU) lost some ground, gathering almost 17 percent of the votes, 2 percentage points lower than 10 months earlier.

Turnout was one of the highest ever, almost 84 percent, and in terms of ballots cast, the more than 6 million votes cast was a record in Portuguese elections for 44 years after being surpassed in the 2024 legislative election.

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