Mayors who changed colour between 2020 and 2024: 318 of the 1,682 PSD mayors elected in 2024 were already mayors, under another label

How many of the mayors elected in 2024 were already mayors under another label?#

At PSD, 1,682 mayors won in 2024 (1,676 on PSD lists and 6 on alliance lists that include PSD). Of them, 1,027 are the same people who won in 2020 for PSD, 318 won in 2020 under another label, and 337 are people other than the 2020 winner (among them 2 communes with no comparable 2020 winner). The 318 are 18.9% of the PSD mayors elected in 2024. Only 222 of them come from another national party; the rest are 15 independents and 81 from local lists and small parties.

At PNL, 1,134 mayors won in 2024: 780 the same people under the same label, 79 who came from another label (7.0% of the PNL mayors elected in 2024) and 275 other people (among them 2 communes with no comparable 2020 winner). The arrivals at PNL (56 of them from another national party) are 21 from PSD, 17 independents, 11 from Pro România / ALDE, 11 from PMP, 10 from USR, 5 from local lists and small parties and 4 from other national parties.

PSD’s net gain, from 1,382 mayors in 2020 to 1,682 in 2024 (+300), is a different number from the 318 who came from another label. Of the 1,382 PSD mayors of 2020, 1,027 were re-elected at PSD, 144 ran for PSD and lost, 160 did not run again in the same commune, 50 ran under another label (27 won) and 1 is in a commune with a tie in 2020. Mergers and renamings do not count as a change: ALDE and Pro România are one family, USR and the USR PLUS alliances another.

Between which labels mayors moved: the label in 2020 and in 2024, commune by commune#

The figure covers the 3,182 communes, towns and municipalities (with the six sector mayors of Bucharest) with a clear winner in 2020 and data in 2024 (the four with no basis for comparison, described under method, are left out). Each band starts at the label of the 2020 winner and ends at the label of the 2024 winner; the solid part is the same person re-elected, the light part another person. Bands between the same label are faded: they show how much stayed in place.

Of the 2,826 mayors of 2020 who ran again in the same commune, 528 changed label. Only 344 are moves from one party to another; the other 184 are changes where one side is not a national party: 44 from independent to a party, 102 from another party or a local list to a party, 24 to or from the joint PSD–PNL list, 3 to an alliance that included the old party, 7 from a party to independent, 3 from a party to another party or list and 1 between an independent and another party or list. The page says “changed party” only for the first 344. Of the 81 who arrived at PSD from local lists and small parties, 76 are in four counties (Bistrița-Năsăud 31, Maramureș 24, Caraș-Severin 12, Prahova 9): local alliances run for a single ballot or gone since are counted here as a changed label, not as a party.

Were mayors who changed label re-elected?#

Of the 2,826 mayors of 2020 who ran again in the same commune, 2,449 were re-elected (86.7%). The 528 who changed label were re-elected in 84.1% of cases; the 2,298 who kept their label, in 87.2%.

PNL → PSD: 171 mayors, 88.9% re-elected (152), against 85.3% of the 914 PNL mayors who stayed at PNL. PSD → PNL: 36 mayors, 58.3% re-elected (21), against 87.7% of the 1,171 PSD mayors who stayed at PSD. The PSD → PNL group has only 36 mayors; the sheets do not show whether the gap comes from the change of label or from the communes where it happened.

The figures show what happened, not why. The sheets do not show who decided the label a mayor ran under, or whether the change helped, hurt or made no difference. The 356 mayors of 2020 who are not among the 2024 candidates of the same commune are recorded as “did not run in this commune”: the sheets do not show a death, a candidacy elsewhere or a change of name.

By county: how many mayors who ran again changed label#

The table counts, for each county, the mayors of 2020 who ran again in the same commune and changed label, and how many of them won in 2024 under the PSD or PNL label.

How the count was made#

The source is the AEP final sheet for mayor, one per commune, town or municipality, for the elections of 27 September 2020 and 9 June 2024. Each column header holds the candidate’s name and label. Same person means the same commune and the same words in the name (or the words of one contained in the other, at least two); the rule was written before counting. 2,826 mayors of 2020 ran again and 2,449 were re-elected; a separate count with another algorithm on family names gave 2,447 re-elected mayors. Name variants (a changed family name, another order of given names) can pass as another person or as “did not run”.

Labels are grouped into families. PSD includes alliances in which PSD appears (6 of the PSD mayors of 2024 were elected on such lists). The joint PSD–PNL list is a separate family (29 mayors in 2024, counted at neither PSD nor PNL). Pro România and ALDE are one family; USR, USR PLUS and Dreapta Unită another. “Other party or local list” covers local alliances (for example “Alianța pentru <commune>”) and small parties. “Independent” means a name with no party word in the header.

On the map, a commune with no colour has no comparable data: the 3 communes with a tie for first place in 2020 (Rebra (Bistrița-Năsăud), Balaci (Teleorman), Orțișoara (Timiș)) and Moldova Nouă, whose 2020 sheet has totals but no candidate data. The six sector mayors of Bucharest are in the count and appear on a click on București; Băneasa (Constanța) received another code between the two elections and was linked by name.

A random sample of 20 mayors who changed label was looked up in the press and on Wikipedia: 4 fully confirmed, 15 confirmed in part (the mayor found in office, in 2020–2024 or 2024–2028; the 2024 label stays the one on the sheet) and one in disagreement with the Wikipedia infobox (Sihlea), where the AEP sheet shows PNL in 2024. No mayor in the sample was contradicted as a person.

Not in the count: the reasons for a change; local councils; by-elections between the two ballots (a mayor elected in a by-election appears with the 2020 holder); elections before 2020; mayors who changed label without running again in the same commune.

• The group that did not die: party switches in Parliament, 2024–2028 (in Romanian)
• Mayors on trial: cases and convictions (in Romanian)

Sources#

1. AEP, final mayoral sheets, local elections of 27 September 2020
2. AEP, final mayoral sheets, local elections of 9 June 2024
3. AEP on data.gov.ro: results of the 2020 local elections
4. Administrative unit boundaries, ANCPI, via geo-spatial.org

The Permanent Electoral Authority (AEP) is the source of the data; the page sets no licence for it. Commune outlines: ANCPI, via geo-spatial.org, 2025.