Legislative elections were held in El Salvador in February and March 2024. In the first round on 4 February, voters elected all 60 deputies of the Legislative Assembly. In the second round on 3 March, voters elected mayors and municipal councils for all 44 of the country's municipalities and all 20 of El Salvador's deputies to the Central American Parliament (PARLACEN).

The Supreme Electoral Court (TSE) allowed 13 political parties to participate in the election. Of those, ten parties participated in the Legislative Assembly election, eleven in the municipal elections, and nine in the PARLACEN election. Opinion polling indicated significant leads for , the political party of President Nayib Bukele (who was seeking re-election in the concurrent presidential election), in the legislative and municipal elections. In December 2022, Bukele suggested reducing the number of municipalities and, in June 2023, the Legislative Assembly approved his proposals to reduce the number of municipalities from 262 to 44 and the number of seats in the Legislative Assembly from 84 to 60. The reductions were criticized by lawyers, economists, and opposition politicians as gerrymandering, undemocratic, and an attempt to consolidate the government's power.

won 54 seats. Its allies—the Christian Democratic Party and the National Coalition Party—won an additional 3 seats, while the opposition, consisting of the Nationalist Republican Alliance and Vamos won the last 3 seats. won 28 municipalities, its allies won an additional 15 municipalities, and the opposition won 1 municipality. The elected deputies, mayors, and municipal councils assumed office on 1 May.

Background

Reduction of municipalities and legislative seats

On 30 December 2022, Salvadoran president Nayib Bukele tweeted that he believed the country's 262 municipalities should be reduced to only 50, claiming that it was "absurd that 21,000 km2 are divided into 262 municipalities" (""). Various economists, lawyers, and politicians argued that the proposed reduction was an attempt to consolidate power through gerrymandering, would grant an electoral advantage, and would lead to data manipulation to favor the government.

In February 2023, Ernesto Castro, the president of the Legislative Assembly, confirmed that was considering reducing the number of deputies in the Legislative Assembly from 84 to 64 and the number of municipalities from 252 to 50. Claudia Ortiz, a deputy from Vamos, criticized the announcement and remarked that the proposed reforms could help form a one-party state. She also argued that the time to make electoral reforms had passed and that the changes would violate Article 291-A of the electoral code that prohibits electoral reforms up to one year before an election. On 15 March, the Legislative Assembly voted to repeal Article 291-A.

On 1 June 2023, Bukele formally proposed legislation to reduce the number of municipalities from 262 to 44 and the number of seats in the Legislative Assembly from 84 to 60. Regarding the municipal reduction, he stated that the present municipalities would be transformed into districts. Regarding the legislative reduction, he stated that the number of seats would return to the number that were present before the 1992 Chapultepec Peace Accords that ended the Salvadoran Civil War. The Legislative Assembly approved the legislative reduction on 7 June and the municipal reduction on 13 June. Both reductions would go into effect on 1 May 2024. ARENA stated that the reductions were a "tactic to swing the electoral field in ['] favor" (""). Óscar Ortiz, the secretary-general of the FMLN, described the proposals as "institutional fraud" for occurring during the lead up to the 2024 election.

+ Results of the reductions by department Department Legislative Assembly Municipalities 2021 2024 +/– 2021 2024 +/– Ahuachapán 4 3 –1 12 3 –9 Cabañas 3 2 –1 9 2 –7 Chalatenango 3 2 –1 33 3 –30 Cuscatlán 3 2 –1 16 2 –14 La Libertad 10 7 –3 22 6 –16 La Paz 4 3 –1 22 3 –19 La Unión 3 2 –1 18 2 –16 Morazán 3 2 –1 26 2 –24 San Miguel 6 5 –1 20 3 –17 San Salvador 24 16 –8 19 5 –14 San Vicente 3 2 –1 13 2 –11 Santa Ana 7 5 –2 13 4 –9 Sonsonate 6 5 –1 16 4 –12 Usulután 5 4 –1 23 3 –20 Total 84 60 –24 262 44 –218

Electoral system

Election procedure

Legislative and municipal elections were scheduled to be held in El Salvador three years after the 2021 legislative election. All 60 Legislative Assembly deputies, 44 mayors and municipal councils of the country's municipalities (second-level subdivisions), and 20 Central American Parliament deputies were elected through a popular vote. El Salvador's constitution mandated that the election would be "free, direct, equal and secret". The Legislative Assembly election was held on 4 February 2024, concurrent with the presidential election. The elections for the 44 municipalities and the Central American Parliament were held on 3 March 2024.

Voting was held from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. CST. A total of 1,595 voting centers were available across the country. Voting was not compulsory. Electronic voting for Salvadoran expatriates began at midnight on 6 January 2024. Expatriates were able to vote at 81 voting centers in 60 of the country's embassies and consulates in 30 countries. For the legislative election, votes cast from outside of the country were counted towards selecting deputies in the department of San Salvador. Guillermo Wellman, a magistrate of the TSE, stated that individuals arrested during the country's gang crackdown were ineligible to vote. There were a total of 6,214,399 registered voters.

Deputies of the Legislative Assembly were elected by the D'Hondt method, which was changed in June 2023 from the hare quota largest remainders method used in previous elections. Mayors, municipal council members, and Central American Parliament deputies were elected by open list proportional representation. The 60 deputies of the Legislative Assembly were elected in 14 constituencies for the country's 14 departments (first-level subdivisions), the 44 mayors and municipal councils were elected for each constituency, and the 20 Central American Parliament deputies were elected from one nationwide constituency.

Legislative candidates had to be at least 25 years old while municipal candidates had to be at least 21 years old. All candidates had to have been Salvadoran citizens by birth. Per article 38 of the Law of Political Parties, at least 30 percent of a party's total candidates for the legislative, municipal, and PARLACEN elections must be women. In addition to the 60 deputies elected to the Legislative Assembly and the 20 deputies elected to PARLACEN (referred to as proprietary deputies), an additional 60 substitute deputies were elected to the Legislative Assembly and 20 substitute deputies were elected to PARLACEN. Voters in each of the 44 municipalities elected 1 mayor and a varying number of members to the municipal council. Each municipal council consisted of 1 trustee, 4 proprietary aldermen, and 4 substitute alderman, however, two municipalities elected 8 proprietary alderman and two more elected 10 proprietary alderman due to those municipalities' larger size. In total, 624 people were elected to hold public office in the 2024 elections, a decrease from 3,206 in 2021.

Political parties

Political parties must be registered with the TSE to be able to participate in elections. The following table shows the thirteen political parties that were eligible to participate in the 2024 election.

Party Leader 2021 results Legislative Municipal PARLACEN PDC Christian Democratic Party Reinaldo Carballo CD Democratic Change Javier Milián FMLN Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front Óscar Ortiz GANA Grand Alliance for National Unity Nelson Guardado V Let's Go Cesia Rivas Did not run PCN National Coalition Party Manuel Rodríguez ARENA Nationalist Republican Alliance Carlos García Saade NI New Ideas Xavier Zablah Bukele NT Our Time Andy Failer Did not run DS Salvadoran Democracy Adolfo Salume Artiñano Did not run PAIS Salvadoran Independent Party Roy García align="center" colspan="3" FPS Salvadoran Patriotic Fraternity Óscar Morales Lemus Did not run FS Solidary Force Rigoberto Soto align="center" colspan="3"

Legislative candidates

held a majority in the 13th Legislative Assembly; GANA, the PDC, and the PCN supported ' government. The opposition consisted of ARENA, the FMLN, , and . Within the Central American Parliament, the fifteen deputies from and GANA belong to the Center-Democratic Integration Group, the four deputies from ARENA and the PCN belong to the Integrationist Democratic Unity, and the sole FMLN deputy belongs to the Parliamentary Group of the Left.

In the years following the 2021 legislative election, three deputies and twenty-two mayors from ARENA left the party and become independents, as had eleven mayors from the FMLN, and one deputy and two mayors from GANA.Multiple sources:

Retiring deputies

Eighteen deputies elected to the Legislative Assembly in 2021 did not run for re-election in 2024 because they chose to run for another office, were eliminated during their party's primary elections, were suspended by their party prior to the election, or they chose not to seek public office in 2024.

Party Retiring deputy Department Serving since Nationalist Republican Alliance Alberto Armando Romero Rodríguez Cuscatlán 1 May 2006 Rodrigo Ávila Avilés La Libertad 1 May 2015 Ana María Margarita Escobar López San Salvador 1 May 2009 René Alfredo Portillo Cuadra 1 May 2015 José Javier Palomo Nieto Santa Ana Nuevas Ideas Rodil Amílcar Ayala Nerio Cabañas 1 May 2021 José Ilofio García Torres Erick Alfredo García Salguero La Libertad Rebeca Aracely Santos de González Marcela Balbina Pineda Erazo La Paz Edwin Antonio Serpas Ibarra La Unión Carlos Hermann Bruch Cornejo San Salvador Iris Ivonne Hernández González Aronnette Rebeca Mencía Díaz José Asunción Urbina Alvarenga Gerardo Balmore Aguilar Soriano San Vicente Jorge Alberto Castro Valle Santa Ana Nuestro Tiempo John Tennant Wright Sol San Salvador

Election campaign

Nuevas Ideas

According to Ernesto Castro, the majority of ' deputies were seeking re-election. During the primaries, 60 legislative candidates, 44 municipal candidates, and 20 PARLACEN candidates were also confirmed. formed one municipal coalition with GANA for San Miguel Centro and two municipal coalitions with Democratic Change for Sonsonate Oeste and Santa Ana Norte.

Nationalist Republican Alliance

On 16 July 2023, the Nationalist Republican Alliance elected 42 municipal candidates and 60 candidates to the Legislative Assembly. According to Citizen Action, ARENA stated that it would not disclose its entire list of candidates due to alleged threats made against its candidates for participating in the elections.

Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front

In July 2023, Ángel Monge, a member of the FMLN's political commission, stated that the FMLN would not form coalitions for the Legislative Assembly but would still consider forming coalitions for the municipal elections. The party elected 44 municipal candidates and 60 candidates for the Legislative Assembly from all 14 departments on 16 July 2023. According to Citizen Action, the FMLN stated that it would not disclose its entire list of candidates due to alleged threats made against its candidates for participating in the elections.

Grand Alliance for National Unity

The Grand Alliance for National Unity (GANA) formed one municipal coalition with for San Miguel Centro and one municipal coalition with the PCN for Chalatenango Centro. Unlike in the 2021 election, GANA did not form coalitions with for the Legislative Assembly elections.

National Coalition Party