Legislative elections were held in Iran on 21 February 2020, four years after the previous legislative election in 2016.^[2] Due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Iran, the second round, to elect eleven seats, was postponed until 11 September 2020.^[3]

Quick Facts All 290 seats to the Islamic Consultative Assembly 146 seats needed for a majority, Turnout ...

2020 Iranian legislative election

← 2016 21 February and 11 September 2020 2024 →
All 290 seats to the Islamic Consultative Assembly 146 seats needed for a majority
Turnout	42.57%[1] (19.07 pp )
First party Second party   Leader Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel Hassan Rouhani Party SHANA MDP Seats won 177 29 Popular vote 12,897,296 1,715,682 Percentage 52.62% 7%   Third party Fourth party   Leader Morteza Aghatehrani Gholamhossein Karbaschi Party FIRS ECP Seats won 8 2 Popular vote 1,611,116 487,422 Percentage 6.57% 2%
Composition of the Assembly following the election
Speaker before election Ali Larijani Elected Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf

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Candidates had to be approved by the Guardian Council, and of the 14,000 applying to run for the Islamic Consultative Assembly legislature, 6,850 were rejected,^[4] including 90 current members of the Assembly (who were approved to run in the last election). "Moderates and conservatives" were mostly rejected by the Council and "hardliners" approved (according to Parisa Hefzi);^[4] while another observer believed some of the rejected were corrupt and others lacking sufficient loyalty to the regime.^[5]

The 290-seat Islamic Consultative Assembly consists of 285 directly elected members and five seats reserved for the Zoroastrians, Jews, Assyrian and Chaldean Christians and Armenians (one for Armenians in the north of Iran and one for Armenians in the south).^[6] The 285 directly elected seats were elected from 196 single and multi-member constituencies. In single-member constituencies candidates had to receive at least 25% of the vote in the first round to be elected; in cases where no candidate passed the threshold, a second round is held between the top two candidates. In multi-member constituencies, voters cast as many votes as there are seats available; if not all seats are filled by candidates with at least 25% of the vote, a second round is held with twice the number of candidates as there are seats to be filled (or all the original candidates if there are fewer than double the number of seats).^[6]

A total of 14,444 people applied to be candidates in the election and were vetted by the Guardian Council. Of these, 7,296 (51%) were disqualified, including 75% of the members of the outgoing assembly who had applied to stand again. As a result, the election was considered to be a contest between conservatives such as former Tehran mayor Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who describes himself as a "technocrat," and ultra-conservatives opposed to the nuclear deal.^[7][8] Reformists were described as having no compromise for their strategy.^{[clarification needed][9]}

On 27 January 2020, Mahmoud Sadeghi, a former member of Iran's parliament and a candidate for this year's elections, has announced in a tweet that middlemen have asked him for up to $300,000 to have him pass inspection by the Guardian Council.^[17]

On 2 February 2020, Iranian news agency ILNA quoted Ali Hashemi, former Iran's chief of the Drug Control Agency, saying that investigations from a wealthy drug smuggler showed he has spent a lot of his dirty money on Iran's parliamentary elections. In some small cities, Hashemi stated, parliamentary seats can be bought for about US$300,000.^[18]

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The Conservatives won a landslide and swept all 30 seats in the constituency including Tehran and its suburbs.^[19]

Fars News Agency published unofficial preliminary tallies, reporting that out of 183 decided seats the conservatives won 135 while the independents were at 28 and the reformists only had 20.^[20] It updated the numbers for 241 decided seats as 191 won by conservatives, plus 34 and 16 for independents and reformists respectively.^[21] Anadolu Agency reported that out of 253 seats that were counted, 195 went to the conservatives and the reformists had 20. The rest of 40 winners were independents.^[22]

Fatemeh Rahbar and Mohammad Ali Ramazani Dastak died due to COVID-19 before they could take office.^[23][24]

On 18 June 2021, elections for deceased parliamentarians and revoked districts and those whose credentials had not been approved, were held concurrently with the presidential and local elections. Conservatives won all six seats.

The new speaker of Iran's Parliament will likely be former Tehran Mayor and former police chief Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who will replace the current holder of the position Ali Larijani. Initial estimates said over 220 out of the 290 seats will be held by hardliners.^[27][28] Reasons for the hardliner victory included a continuing poor domestic economic situation under the reformists, the withdrawal of the US from the JCPOA nuclear deal and the re-imposition of US sanctions thereafter (also partially contributing to the poor economic situation), the absence of a unified reformist strategy and low number of reformist candidates due to disqualification by the Guardian Council, public disillusionment as a result of the 2019–20 protests and the downing of a Ukrainian airliner as well as a lack of government transparency, and the recent killing of general Qasem Soleimani. Turnout was estimated to be the lowest since the 1979 revolution, hovering only slightly over 42% nationally. Turnout in cities, which previously helped the reformists to victory in 2016, fell to as low as 25%.^[29][30] In comparison, national turnout in 2016 was 62%. Khamenei stated the low turnout was due to "negative propaganda" about the coronavirus, spread by Iran's enemies.^[14]

• COVID-19 pandemic in Iran
• List of Iran's parliament representatives (11th term)