| Félix Ulloa | |
| Office: | 37th Vice President of El Salvador |
| President: | Nayib Bukele |
| Term Start: | 1 June 2019 |
| Predecessor: | Óscar Ortiz |
| Birth Date: | 6 April 1951 |
| Birth Place: | Chinameca, San Miguel, El Salvador |
| Party: | Nuevas Ideas (from 2023) Independent (until 2023) |
| Children: | 3 |
| Education: | Complutense University of Madrid (JD) |
Félix Augusto Antonio Ulloa Garay (born 6 April 1951) is a Salvadoran politician and lawyer who became Vice President of El Salvador on 1 June 2019.[1]
Ulloa was born in Chinameca, in the department of San Miguel, on 6 April 1951. His parents were Margarita Garay and, later the rector of the University of El Salvador, who was killed in an attack carried out by paramilitaries.[2]
Ulloa obtained his law degree from the Complutense University of Madrid, Spain, in 1979, and received his PhD in Law cum laude. He completed postgraduate studies in Public Policy and Public Administration at the International Institute of Public Administration in Paris, France, and at the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs of the University of Minnesota, United States. He also completed a postgraduate degree in Banking and Finance at the Technological University of El Salvador (UTEC).
Félix Ulloa actively participated in the university student movement, being president of the Student Electoral Tribunal of the General Association of Salvadoran University Students (AGEUS). As a lawyer, he was a member of the Legal Aid of the Externado San José, leader of the Workers Union of the Salvadoran Institute of Social Security, and later of the National Union of Salvadoran Workers. During the Salvadoran Civil War, he created the Institute of Legal Studies of El Salvador (ILSEL) with several other lawyers. He has been president of the ILSEL on several occasions.
His experience and academic qualifications enabled him to be a professor of Political Science in the PhD program in Social Sciences at the University of El Salvador. Ulloa also taught various law courses at the Central American University. He was a visiting professor for several years at the Spanish School of Middlebury College in the U.S. state of Vermont, and a guest speaker at multiple universities in the Americas.
After the civil war, Ulloa was elected as a Magistrate of the first Supreme Electoral Tribunal of El Salvador, where he served from 1994 to 1999. He also joined the Board of Surveillance of Political Parties from 1993 to 1994 and the Special Sub-Commission of the CO-PAZ. In 1992 and 1993, he edited the Electoral Code. Additionally, Ulloa was a part of the Political Commission of the National Revolutionary Movement Party, which was founded by his father and is affiliated with the Socialist International.
Ulloa presented constitutional amendments against laws that he believed supported an anti-democratic electoral system and impaired the ability of democracy to take hold. These constitutional resolutions substantially changed the electoral system, which was a product of the demands of unconstitutionality presented by Ulloa and other Salvadoran jurists. Ulloa successfully passed several amendments, including:
Following an invitation from Nayib Bukele to accompany him in the presidential formula of the Grand Alliance for National Unity (GANA), consisting of the political parties GANA, Democratic Change (CD), and Nuevas Ideas (NI); Ulloa ran for vice-president. Winning the elections of 3 February 2019, he became the Vice President-elect and took office on 1 June 2019 alongside President-elect Bukele.
President Nayib Bukele appointed Ulloa to lead Central American Integration and the, which has the goal of combating corruption and impunity, inside and outside the state. He is in charge of leading the Trifinio Plan, a trinational treaty that involves the vice-presidents of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, to improve the living conditions of border communities and to develop a process of environmental and territory management.[3]
Ulloa attended the Coronation of Charles III and Camilla on 6 May 2023.[4]
On 25 June 2023, Ulloa registered with Nuevas Ideas as a pre-candidate for a vice presidential re-election bid for the 2024 general election.[5]
On 30 November 2023, Ulloa was granted a leave of absence by the Legislative Assembly to campaign for his re-election.[6]
He married psychologist Lilian Alvarenga de Ulloa in 1973, and has three children.
Ulloa has published academic articles in the United States, Mexico, Spain, France, Chile, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and in every country in Central America. Among them are articles entitled: