Save Romania Union
The Save Romania Union is a political party in Romania. The party was founded following the success of the Save Bucharest Union party in the 2016 local elections. After being officially registered as a political party in 2016, it united with the local USB and Union for Codlea parties, thus gaining most of its initial membership base from the two latter parties. It is currently the third largest political party in the Romanian Parliament after the 2016 legislative elections and runs on an anti-corruption platform.
History
USR continues the political project Save Bucharest Union at the national level, established on July 1, 2015. At the Save Bucharest Union kick off conference talking about goals of the new movement, Nicușor Dan stated:Besides Nicușor Dan, the founding members of the Save Bucharest Union are Ioan Miloș, Alina Vernon, Dan Podaru and Argentina Traicu, the last two have retreated as founding members and from the Initiative Committee in January 2016.
On February 23, 2016, Nicușor Dan published on his Facebook account the document„Programul pentru București al candidatului Nicușor Dan la Primăria Generală”, which he submitted to the public debate.
In 2016, at the local elections, the Save Bucharest Union has obtained in Bucharest a score of 25% and was ranked in second place according to Bucharest's preferences.
On August 21, 2016, Save Bucharest Union merged with the Union for Codlea and Save Romania Union, the new formation bearing the name Save Romania Union, and participated in the parliamentary elections held in 2016. During the merger congress, Nicușor Dan was elected the president of the party, the vice presidents became Cristian Ghica, Clotilde Armand, Dumitru Dobrev, Roxana Wring and Erwin Albu. For the legislative elections, Nicușor Dan has predicted at least 10% of votes for the new formation. Officially, the merger process has been hampered by numerous appeals, filed by PSD, PER and private individuals. By a decision of December 29, 2016 issued by the Bucharest Court of Appeal, the merger remained final.
At the congress held on October 28, 2017 in Poiana Brașov, Dan Barna was elected the new president of the party, for a two-year term.
In September 14–15, 2019, the fifth National Congress of the USR held in Timișoara. At this congress, the leader Dan Barna was reconfirmed as president of the party, at the same time being elected nine vice-presidents, as well as the new members of the National Bureau and the members of the National Comissions of Arbitration and Censors.
Political program
On October 5, 2016, the Save Romania Union launched its political program, with nine chapters on the following areas: transparency, industry, agriculture, education, culture, health, infrastructure, environmental protection and foreign policy. USR militates for maximum transparency, industrialization with modern means, support for small farmers, education reform, a new paradigm in the cultural field, granting 6% of GDP for Health, construction of highways and infrastructure in collaboration with European partners, environmental protection in particular by stopping deforestation, as well as close cooperation with the European Union, NATO and support for the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine. The president of the USR, Nicușor Dan, said that the program is still in public debate, and could be improved in the nearest future, according to the society’s suggestions and recommendations.In October 2016, the USR declared the public support for the prime minister Dacian Cioloș for a new prime minister mandate, following the December’s parliamentary elections. On October 26, 2016, the Save Romania Union has announced several candidates for the parliamentary elections in 2016. Mihai Goțiu, journalist and civic activist, writer Dan Lungu, former ministers from Cioloș Vlad Vladrescu's cabinet and Cristian Ghinea, with former state secretaries of the cabinet have joined the project.
Ideology and issues
, the president of USR, characterized the party as "generally centre-right", leaning centre-right on economic policy and centrist in terms of social policy. However, USR has a substantial amount of both progressive and conservative members. He compared the party with Emmanuel Macron's La République En Marche!, while mentioning that the key difference between the two is that USR predominantly consists of people who have not been involved in politics before.Anti-corruption campaign
Since its foundation USR has supported the anti-corruption drive in Romania and the activity of the National Anticorruption Directorate. USR was against the modifications to the justice laws initiated by the government coalition PSD-ALDE and requested the rejection of OUG 13.In 2018 USR helped and supported the initiators of Fără Penali în Funcții Publice civic campaign, whose objective is to bar the persons convicted to final imprisonment sentences for intentional offences from being elected to local government, the Chamber of Deputies, the Senate or the office of President of Romania by amending the Article 37 of the Romanian Constitution. USR and volunteers collected more than 1million signatures from eligible voters.
Moldova
USR supports the Party of Action and Solidarity lead by Maia Sandu and supports the European path of Moldova. At the June 2018 elections for the Chișinău mayoralty, USR supported the candidate of the pro-European forces, Andrei Năstase. Subsequently, with the invalidation of the mandate by Judge Rodica Berdilo, Dan Barna stated:LGBT rights
USR's position on LGBT issues is not clearly defined. The party leader, Dan Barna, declared: "Gay marriage is not yet a subject for the public agenda, there is no initiative promoting same-sex marriage. Maybe in 20, 30 years next generations will take care of this problem, but for now, this is not a priority."However, USR was the only parliamentary party in Romania that did not support the constitutional referendum, proposed by Coaliția pentru Familie and supported by the Romanian Orthodox Church. The constitutional amendment proposed to change the definition of family in order to prohibit the same-sex marriage, however it failed, as the turnout was only 21.1%, below the required voter turnout threshold of 30%. USR considered the referendum a way to divide the Romanian people and to distract the attention from the real issues Romania currently faces, such as corruption.
Roșia Montană
USR supported the inclusion of the Roşia Montană site in UNESCO World Heritage. At the 42nd session of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee, held in Manama, Bahrain, the government's representative, Ștefan Răzvan Rab, state secretary of the Ministry of Culture, in Bahrain, on June 24 to July 4, asked for postponement on behalf of Romania including the Rosia Montana Mining Cultural Landscape in the World Heritage List until the completion of the judicial dispute with Gabriel Resources, an unprecedented fact in the history of UNESCO. USR Senator Vlad Alexandrescu, under whose Ministry of Culture 2015-2016 Roșia Montană was included in the UNESCO indicative list, accused the PSD-ALDE government coalition of treason, writing in a post on 2 July 2018 on Facebook:European affiliation
USR supports Romania's membership of the European Union and is in favor of a joint European external policy and military and of Romania's accession to the Schengen Area. While not being part of a European political party yet, USR has had negotiations with Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Party and to a lesser extent with the European People's Party and the European Greens. USR's hesitation to join ALDE is due to the fact that a Romanian party they vehemently oppose is part of that European party and bears the same acronym.In May 2019, the party stated that it would take part in the new liberal group in the European Parliament that includes France's La République En Marche!, named Renew Europe in June 2019.
On 30 May 2019 the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats withdrew from ALDE. With no more obstacles on its way, USR joined ALDE on 28 June 2019.
Party leaders
| Nº | Name born – died | Portrait | Term start | Term end | Duration |
| 1 | Nicușor Dan | 28 July 2016 | 1 June 2017 | ||
| – | Elek Levente | 1 June 2017 | 28 October 2017 | ||
| 2 | Dan Barna | 28 October 2017 | present |
Electoral history
Legislative elections
Presidential elections
Notes:1 Dan Barna was the candidate endorsed by the 2020 USR-PLUS Alliance.
European elections
Notes:1 2020 USR-PLUS Alliance members: USR and PLUS.