Field of expertise: Foreign policy, defence, migration, agriculture and human rights

Hilde Vautmans worked in the Belgian Senate for the then-liberal senators, Valère Vautmans, Stef Goris and Guy Verhofstadt, whom she advised as a reporter for the Rwanda Commission in 1997.

In 2003, she was elected as a Member of Parliament and chaired the Foreign Affairs Committee in the House of Representatives. She was also Open Vld's chair in the House of Representatives from 2009-2010 and chair of Open Vld Women from 2011-2015. In 2015, Hilde succeeded Minister of State Annemie Neyts in the European Parliament. She was re-elected as MEP in the 2019 European elections.

She is also active in municipal politics. From 2000 to 2002 she was a municipal councillor in Wellen, between 2006 and 2012 she was a municipal councillor in Hasselt, and since 2013 in Sint-Truiden. In Hasselt she was chairman of the city council from 2006 to 2011 and in Sint-Truiden she has been an alderwoman since 2013. In the current coalition in Sint-Truiden, she is first alderwoman.

She was also national vice-president from 2008 to 2009 and international secretary of Open VLD from 2008 to 2014.