Election During the presidency of
Evo Morales, Requena established herself as a vocal critic of the administration's support for and expansion of
extractive industries. "The government of Evo Morales, which presents itself internationally as a defender of
Mother Earth, will remain in Bolivian history as the regime that promoted radical and devastating extractivism," she stated. Requena attributed these faults to Morales's allegedly anti-democratic practices, stating: "where there is no democracy, it is even more difficult to defend nature." In the leadup to the 2019 general election, Requena participated in the formation of the
Civic Community (CC) alliance, which promoted the presidential candidacy of
Carlos Mesa. a fact that led the alliance to nominate an all-female
slate of senatorial candidates. Requena was selected to represent the
La Paz Department in the
Senate, a choice potentially brought about at the suggestion of her spouse, José Antonio Quiroga, CC's then-campaign coordinator. A few days after the election date, Requena was projected as one of La Paz's winning senatorial candidates, alongside three from the ruling
Movement for Socialism (MAS-IPSP). As a result of the annulment of the 2019 results, Requena was prevented from being seated but was re-nominated to contest the 2020 election, where she repeated the previous year's victory. In being elected, Requena became the first non-ruling party candidate to win a Senate seat in La Paz
since 2005, bucking the trend of
2009 and
2014, when the MAS swept all four of the department's Senate seats. She is thus the first opposition senator to represent La Paz in the
Plurinational Legislative Assembly; the last, Luis Vásquez Villamor, served in the now-defunct National Congress.
Tenure Once in office, Requena dedicated much of her senatorial term to environmental causes, as she had done throughout her career. Given her minority caucus's limited ability to craft and pass legislation, much of this work revolved around her powers of parliamentary oversight. In particular, Requena sought to highlight the lack of action against
illegal mining in
protected areas such as La Paz's
Madidi National Park, one of the most
biodiverse areas in the world. She attributed this lack of enforcement to the government's acquiescence before politically powerful
mining cooperatives, whom she accused of promoting "terror and violence" against those who investigate illegal activity. In one instance, Requena herself was attacked with
firecrackers and
dynamite while conducting an in-person inspection of the park. In mid-2022, she and other CC legislators presented an
actio popularis against mining activities that damage the environment in Madidi. The appeal was largely accepted by a court in La Paz later that year, which ruled that legislative and executive authorities should pass new legislation regulating the use of
mercury in
gold mining, given the immense
pollution and
environmental damage it causes.
Commission assignments • Land and Territory, Natural Resources, and the Environment Commission (President; –) • Environment, Biodiversity, Amazon, Protected Areas, and Climate Change Committee (Secretary; –, –present) • Ethics and Transparency Commission (–present) == Electoral history ==