Lina Maria Cardoso Lopes (born 28 May 1961) is a Portuguese politician. A former member of the centre-right

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties Form ...

(PSD), Lopes was first elected to the Assembly of the Republic in 2019 as a representative of the

Lisbon Lisbon ( ; ) is the capital and largest city of Portugal, with an estimated population of 567,131, as of 2023, within its administrative limits and 3,028,000 within the Lisbon Metropolitan Area, metropolis, as of 2025. Lisbon is mainlan ...

constituency. She will be the Chega's candidate to the Mayorship of

Setúbal Setúbal ( , , ; ), officially the City of Setúbal (), is a city and a municipality in Portugal. The population of the entire municipality in 2014 was 118,166, occupying an area of . The city itself had 89,303 inhabitants in 2001. It lies withi ...

in the local elections of 2025.

Early life and education

Lina Maria Cardoso Lopes was born in

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. Featuring Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe, Portugal borders Spain to its north and east, with which it share ...

on 28 May 1961. Her father was a businessman who had been held at gunpoint following Portugal's

Carnation Revolution The Carnation Revolution (), code-named Operation Historic Turn (), also known as the 25 April (), was a military coup by military officers that overthrew the Estado Novo government on 25 April 1974 in Portugal. The coup produced major socia ...

in 1974, when the Estado Novo dictatorship had been overthrown. She has said that witnessing that conditioned her subsequent political views. Lopes obtained a degree in chemistry at the science faculty of the

University of Lisbon The University of Lisbon (ULisboa; ) is a public university, public research university in Lisbon, and Portugal's largest university. It was founded in 1911, but the university's present structure dates to the 2013 merger of the former Universit ...

in 1988. Later studies included a postgraduate course in public health at the ''

Universidade Lusófona Universidade Lusófona de Humanidades e Tecnologias (Lusophone University of Humanities and Technologies) is the largest private university in Portugal. It is also the main institution of Grupo Lusófona, which administers other universities and ...

'', a master's in food engineering in 2002 from the ''

Instituto Superior Técnico The Instituto Superior Técnico (IST, also known as Técnico, and stylized TÉCNICO LISBOA; English: ) is the school of engineering and technology of the University of Lisbon. It was founded as an autonomous school in 1911, and was integrated in ...

'' of Lisbon and a diploma in information systems from the

Complutense University of Madrid The Complutense University of Madrid (, UCM; ) is a public research university located in Madrid. Founded in Alcalá in 1293 (before relocating to Madrid in 1836), it is one of the oldest operating universities in the world, and one of Spain's ...

Career

Lopes became a teacher, first at schools and later at the faculty of engineering at the ''Universidade Lusófona''. She joined the ''Sindicato Nacional e Democrático dos Professores'' (SINDEP), a teachers' union, and became its deputy secretary-general. SINDEP is affiliated to the

General Union of Workers A general officer is an officer of high rank in the armies, and in some nations' air and space forces, marines or naval infantry. In some usages, the term "general officer" refers to a rank above colonel."general, adj. and n.". OED Online. Mar ...

(UGT) and Lopes became a member of the UGT executive and president of its women's committee. She was also appointed as a member of the ''Comissão para a Igualdade no Trabalho e no Emprego'' (Committee for Equality in Work and Employment), a body consisting of government ministries and trade unions. She also served on the women's committee of the

European Trade Union Confederation The European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) is the major trade union organisation representing workers at the European level. In its role as a European social partner, the ETUC works both in a consulting role with the European Commission and ...

Political career

Lopes was elected to the Assembly of the Republic as a member of the Social Democratic Party (PSD) for the

constituency in the 2019 national election. In February 2021 she was appointed as the representative to the Assembly of the international organization,

Women Political Leaders Women Political Leaders (WPL) is a non-profit foundation that operates as a global network of female political leaders at national level, including the European Parliament, of whom there are currently around 9,000. WPL provides a platform for t ...

(WPL). WPL is a non-profit organization whose mission is to promote the participation and influence of women in positions of political leadership. In her first term of office as a parliamentarian, Lopes sat on the national defence committee of the Assembly. She was re-elected in the January 2022 national election, being sixth on the list of 13 PSD members to be elected for the Lisbon constituency. However, for the 2024 national election, in which the PSD formed a coalition with two smaller parties to form the Democratic Alliance (AD) coalition, she was only included on the AD list for Lisbon in last place, and was not elected. After the election, in which the right-wing CHEGA party performed better than in previous elections, she was appointed to the office of the CHEGA vice-president of Parliament,

Diogo Pacheco de Amorim Diogo Velez Mouta Pacheco de Amorim (born 10 March 1949) is a Portuguese politician of the Chega and since 2022 a member of the Assembly of the Republic representing Porto. Biography Pacheco de Amorim was born in Lisbon in 1949 and is the gran ...

References

External links

Interview with Lina Lopes
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lopes, Lina 1961 births Living people Members of the 14th Assembly of the Republic (Portugal) Members of the 15th Assembly of the Republic (Portugal) People from Setúbal Portuguese trade unionists Social Democratic Party (Portugal) politicians University of Lisbon alumni Women members of the Assembly of the Republic (Portugal)