He was also a senator representing the Social Democratic Party (PSD) between 2000 and April 2008, serving as the vice-president of the Senate Committee for Public Health. Oprescu resigned from the Senate on 24 June 2008.[4]
In February 2006, Oprescu also became the president of the Social Democratic Party's Bucharest branch, a position from which he stepped down upon quitting the party in April 2008.
In 2008, after the Social Democratic Party (PSD) refused to nominate him to the mayoral elections, he ran as an independent candidate. He earned the most votes in the first round of the elections. In the second round against the Democratic Liberal Party (PDL) candidate Vasile Blaga, with the support of the National Liberals and Social Democrats (who announced they would support anyone who ran against the Democratic Liberals), he won with 56.6% of the vote.[5] Nevertheless, the Social-Democrat mayor of Bucharest's Sector 2, Neculai Onţanu, announced he supported Blaga,[6] while the Social Democratic mayor of Sector 5, Marian Vanghelie, announced he would not support Oprescu and even accused him of being a "cheap demagogue".[7]
Conviction
In September 2015, he was arrested on charges of corruption.[8] On 15 September 2015, being deposed by Bucharest's Prefect upon a courts' decision to maintain Oprescu's arrest, an interim successor was elected from one of the city's deputy-mayors.[9]