Overview

• The Legislative Assembly approved the reforms on August 1 with a 57–3 vote, using its supermajority to abolish presidential term limits.
• The amendments extend presidential terms from five to six years, eliminate second-round runoffs and reschedule the next election for March 2027.
• New Ideas legislators bypassed regular procedures by fast-tracking the changes under an expedited review without public hearings.
• Opposition lawmaker Marcela Villatoro declared that “democracy has died” after the vote and accused the majority of dismantling institutional checks.
• Human rights groups caution that the overhaul, set against a state of emergency with more than 88,000 gang-related arrests, further erodes El Salvador’s democratic safeguards.