Dalia Štraupaitė

She was a Visaginas councillor in 2024 and lost the 2023 mayoral runoff to Erlandas Galaguzas. She is nominated by the People and Justice Union, which Wikipedia describes as right-wing populist, and is a candidate in the 8 November 2026 Seimas by-election in the Northern Nalšia constituency.

Career

TV3.lt reports that Štraupaitė was mayor of Visaginas by 2012 and was re-elected in 2015, and that she was suspended from the post during the criminal case against her. She was on the Liberal and Centre Union list in the 2012 Seimas election and on the Lithuanian Freedom Union (liberals) list in 2016, and is described as a member of Freedom and Justice. In the Visaginas mayoral runoff on 7 May 2023 she took about 40 per cent against about 59 per cent for Galaguzas; her candidacy had been briefly removed and then restored. In 2024 she was a member of the Visaginas council.

Controversies

In 2014 prosecutors charged her with trading in influence, abuse of office and document forgery, and she spent about a week in custody. According to TV3.lt she was convicted of abuse of office and related offences; on appeal, reported on 23 February 2023, the suspended prison sentence was cancelled, a fine of €18,800 was imposed, she was acquitted on one trading-in-influence episode and the bribe amount was reduced. A court ban on holding appointed posts in state and municipal bodies remains, and in September 2024 a court rejected her request to shorten it. The electoral commission refused to register her for the 2024 European Parliament election; the Constitutional Court upheld the restriction in February 2025 and the Supreme Administrative Court upheld the commission's decision on 26 March 2025.

Summarised automatically from the linked sources. TV3.lt · TV3.lt · Wikipedia

Photo: Romeni, GFDL, Wikimedia Commons (cropped)