LIVRE

In 2011, Left Bloc's Independent MEP Rui Tavares departed the party's group due to disagreements with coordinator Francisco Louçã and began sitting as an independent in European Parliament.^[18] Tavares also left the Left Bloc's European Parliament group, GUE-NGL, and began sitting with Greens–European Free Alliance.

In 2014, ahead of that year's European elections, LIVRE was formed, with Tavares being its most notable founder. Its founding congress was 31 January.^[19] The party was legalised by the Portuguese Constitutional Court on 20 March 2014.^[20] On 20 May 2015, it officially changed its name LIVRE to LIVRE/Tempo de Avançar, with L/TDA as its abbreviation.^[21] This change was made in order to run for the 2015 legislative election in a broad coalition with the citizen platform Tempo de Avançar, as only political parties can run in legislative elections.^[22] It switched back to its original name a few years later. Its symbol is a poppy.

In the 2019 legislative election the party entered parliament for the first time, with Joacine Katar Moreira as their sole MP.^[23] After several clashes between Katar Moreira and the party's leadership, including accusations that LIVRE only used her to achieve the state mandated subvention due to her being a black woman, and Katar Moreira's claim that the election was "won" only by her^[24][25] the party expelled her from their caucus on 31 January 2020, losing all representation in the Assembly of the Republic.^[26]

During the campaign for the 2022 legislative election, Rui Tavares, once again the main candidate from LIVRE, was able to appear in the televised debates due to the party having elected one MP during the previous election.^[27] Rui Tavares was elected as the party's sole MP, with LIVRE regaining representation in parliament.^[28]

During the 2024 legislative election, LIVRE increased their result to 3.2% and elected 4 MPs: Rui Tavares, Isabel Mendes Lopes (who became the first Parliamentary leader of LIVRE), Jorge Pinto and Paulo Muacho.^[29]

In the same year, LIVRE selected Francisco Paupério as the main candidate for the 2024 European Parliament election after his victory in the party primaries, a result that caused some internal turmoil in the party after allegations of electoral fraud.^[30] Rui Tavares was later criticized for not being as present as other party leaders in the party's campaign for the European elections.^[16] In the end, LIVRE achieved 3.8% of the votes, their best result at that point, but failed to elect any MEPs.^[19]

In the 2025 legislative election, LIVRE once again rose to 4.1% of the votes and elected 6 MPs, this time also taking Filipa Pinto and Patrícia Gonçalves to parliament, with LIVRE becoming the largest party to the left of the Socialist Party.^[31] In the local elections, LIVRE managed to elect about 50 local representatives, having kept one city councillor in Lisbon within a PS/LIVRE/BE/PAN coalition, Carlos Teixeira.^[32]

Later that year, the party presented it's first own presidential candidate for the following year's presidential election, Jorge Pinto.^[33] He achieved a very poor result, winning just 0.7% of the votes and coming in 9th place, behind all left-wing candidates and even satirical candidate Manuel João Vieira,^[34] with the party endorsing António José Seguro for the second round against André Ventura on election night.^[35]

One of the main points of the party's manifesto going into the 2022 legislative election was support for a universal basic income.^[42] The party also highlighted its support for increasing the national minimum wage to €1,000 per month, extending support for: remote working, pregnant workers, workers with health problems, caregivers and supporting "micro-businesses". The party also supports a Green New Deal for Portugal, lowering VAT from 23% to 6% on vets and pet food, banning bullfighting and legalizing cannabis.^[43][44]