Maria de Jesus Simões Barroso Soares, GCL (Fuseta, 2 May 1925 – Lisbon, 7 July 2015) was a Portuguese actress, teacher and political and social activist, having been one of the founders of the Socialist Party (PS), in Germany, in 1973.

Her father, an opposer to the dictatorship, was arrested in the Lisbon Penitentiary and was deported to the Azores, where he was jailed in the Angra do Heroísmo Fort.

While being an actress, Barroso continued her studies in the Faculty of Arts, Lisbon, where she would obtain a degree in Historical and Philosophical Sciences, in 1951.

Later, in the 70s, when the Marcello Caetano government allows Soares to exile in Paris, Barroso returns to Portugal, continuing to manage the family school.

[8] After the Carnation Revolution, Barroso was elected as a deputy of the Assembly of the Republic, successively, for Santarém, Porto, and Faro, in the legislatures started in 1976, 1979, 1980 and 1983.

Although not as politically involved as her husband, Maria Barroso was a founding member of the Socialist Party in Bad Münstereifel, Germany in 1973.

As the First Lady, her intervention was directed towards the defense of the family sense and fighting against social exclusion and all forms of violence, participating in numerous initiatives in Portugal and other Portuguese speaking countries.

In April 2000 she read the poetry of Sophia de Mello Breyner Andresen at the United Nations in New York in homage to Aristides Sousa Mendes.

[12] She was involved in activities aimed at supporting the areas of culture, education and family, childhood, social solidarity, female dimension, health, the integration of the disabled and the prevention of violence.