[1] In 1980, it joined with four other leftist parties in the country - the FPL, RN, PRTC and ERP - to form a revolutionary political-military front called the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación Nacional - FMLN).

When the civil war ended in 1992, the FMLN became a legal political party and began to compete in elections.

At that point the Communist Party of El Salvador ceased to exist as an independent entity, though many of its leaders and members are still visible in the FMLN.

Prior to him, Cayetano Carpio was the Communist Party leader in the 1960s, before leaving the CP to form the FPL and launch the armed struggle against the dictatorship in 1970.

On 27 March 2005, a group of Salvadoran communists formed a new PCES, in the tradition of the old party that dissolved into the FMLN.