Edita Rudelienė

She is a Lithuanian politician and public figure, and a former Mayor of Trakai District Municipality (2014–2021).

Edita Rudelienė was born on 19 October 1978 in Trakai, Lithuania.

She earned a Master’s degree in Social Work from Vilnius University in 2003.

In 2001, she earned a Bachelor’s degree in Social Work from Vilnius University.

In 1997, she graduated from Trakai Vytautas Magnus Gymnasium (secondary school) in Trakai.

From 2011 to 2014, she served as a strategy coordinator for the Trakai District Local Action Group.

From 2003 to 2011, she worked as the Coordinator for Youth Affairs in the Trakai District Municipal Administration.

In 2002, she worked as a social pedagogue at primary schools in Rykantai and Kariotiškės (Trakai District).

In 2022, Rudelienė became the chair of a temporary parliamentary group uniting former municipal mayors in the Seimas.

She serves as the Deputy Chair of the Liberal Movement’s political group (parliamentary faction) in the Seimas.

In 2021, she became the First Deputy Chairperson of the Liberal Movement party.

In January 2020, she was elected as the chairperson of the Liberal Movement’s Trakai District branch.

She was the Mayor of Trakai District Municipality from 2014 to 2021.

She has been a member of the Liberal Movement political party since 2013.

She was elected to the Trakai District Municipal Council in 2011 and served as a council member until 2014.

She is currently a member of the Seimas Committee on Social Affairs and Labour (appointed in November 2024).

She also serves as a member of the Seimas Commission for Suicide and Violence Prevention (since December 2024).

During the previous term, she was also a member of the Seimas Youth and Sports Affairs Commission (joined in June 2022).

During the 2020–2024 term, she served as a member of the Seimas Committee on Education and Science.

In 2024, she was re-elected to the Seimas as a member of the Liberal Movement’s list (party-list representation).

In 2024, internal party balloting ranked Rudelienė among the top five Liberal Movement candidates for the parliamentary elections (behind only Virgilijus Alekna, Eugenijus Gentvilas, and Andrius Bagdonas).

In May 2021, she became a Member of the Seimas (Parliament), taking the seat of the late MP Kęstutis Glaveckas.

She was the first candidate who failed to win a seat in the Seimas on the Liberal Movement’s list in the 2020 parliamentary elections.

In the 2020 parliamentary elections, she was ranked just below the threshold on the Liberal Movement’s list – the party won one seat fewer than her position – making her the first candidate who did not initially enter the Seimas (she later obtained a seat when a vacancy arose).

In 2015, she was directly elected as Mayor of Trakai District, and she was re-elected by voters in 2019.

As of 2024, Rudelienė’s declared assets were approximately €0.558 million, consisting mostly of registered property (real estate and vehicles).

As a rank-and-file Member of the Seimas, her monthly take-home salary was about €2,180 during 2021–2024, which increased to roughly €3,780 net per month starting in late 2024 after a pay reform for MPs.

In her 2023 tax declaration, she reported about €75,700 in income for the previous year and paid €9,900 in personal income tax (around a 13% effective tax rate).

As Mayor of Trakai District (2014–2021), Rudelienė earned an official salary of roughly €3,520 per month (circa 2020).

Her family is known to own multiple real estate properties in the Trakai area and a Tesla electric car, which they have been observed charging at a free public charging station (drawing local criticism).

Her sister, Lolita Pipirienė, and nephew Julius Pipiras are involved in a venture called MB “Akmenos pirtys,” which operates rental saunas on the shore of Lake Akmena in Trakai (on public land).

Her husband, Henrikas Rudelis, is a businessman who owns two stores in Trakai.

Her husband Henrikas Rudelis and her mother-in-law Danė Rudelienė are co-owners of a company called Chempreka.

In 2024, an investigative commentary alleged a nepotism scheme: a newly established firm (MB “Du bau”) — headed by Rudelienė’s son-in-law Deividas Urbanavičius — secured roughly €60,000 in Trakai District municipal contracts for social housing repairs within its first half-year of operations.

In October 2020, the Chief Official Ethics Commission (VTEK) found that Rudelienė had grossly violated conflict-of-interest rules by signing a character reference for a school principal candidate who was a co-owner of two land plots with her family. VTEK noted that she had failed to recuse herself in earlier municipal decisions involving this same individual, and it recommended a fine for the repeated ethics breach.

In 2020, an investigative report by LRT revealed that Rudelienė had failed to disclose her husband’s role as head of the Lentvaris Leisure Club (a local association) in her public interest declaration, and she updated the declaration only after journalists’ inquiries.

Her mother-in-law, Danė Rudelienė, was a defendant in a major Trakai political corruption case, having sat on the trial bench alongside former Trakai vice-mayor Saulius Raščiauskas.

Her mother-in-law, Danė Rudelienė, was a long-time head of the Economic Analysis, Finance and Budget Department in the Trakai District Municipality and, after retiring in 2019 due to age limits, continued to work in the municipality as a finance/economics specialist.

She speaks English, Polish, and Russian in addition to her native Lithuanian.

She is married to Henrikas Rudelis and they have two children, a son Augustas and a daughter Greta.

She was among the founders of the Trakai District Local Action Group and served as the municipality’s representative on that group’s project selection commission.