2024 Austrian legislative election

Legislative elections were held in Austria on 29 September 2024 to elect the 28th National Council, the lower house of Austria's bicameral parliament.

2024 Austrian legislative election

← 2019 29 September 2024
← outgoing members
All 183 seats in the National Council 92 seats needed for a majority
Opinion polls
Turnout	78.0% ( 2.4pp)
First party Second party Third party   Leader Herbert Kickl Karl Nehammer Andreas Babler Party FPÖ ÖVP SPÖ Last election 16.2%, 31 seats 37.5%, 71 seats 21.2%, 40 seats Seats won 58 52 41 Seat change 27 19 1 Popular vote 1,375,464 1,246,676 991,069 Percentage 29.2% 26.5% 21.0% Swing 13.0pp 11.0pp 0.1pp   Fourth party Fifth party   Leader Beate Meinl-Reisinger Werner Kogler Party NEOS Greens Last election 8.1%, 15 seats 13.9%, 26 seats Seats won 17 15 Seat change 2 11 Popular vote 421,954 378,113 Percentage 9.0% 8.0% Swing 0.9pp 5.9pp
Chancellor before election Karl Nehammer ÖVP Elected Chancellor TBD

The election saw the far-right Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) place first, winning 29.2% of the vote and achieving its best result in the party's history. It also marked the first time that a far-right party won a National election in Austria since World War II.^[1][2][3]

The governing Austrian People's Party (ÖVP) lost 19 seats, while its coalition partner, the Greens, lost 11 seats. The centre-left Social Democratic Party (SPÖ) won just 21.0%, marking its worst result ever in the National Council. The NEOS – The New Austria and Liberal Forum (NEOS) slightly improved from 2019, rising from 15 to 17 seats.

The 2019 legislative election was called after the Ibiza affair, which triggered the collapse of the coalition government between the Austrian People's Party (ÖVP) and the Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) led by Chancellor Sebastian Kurz. The coalition was ousted in a motion of no confidence and replaced by a non-partisan interim government.^[4] The election delivered a strong victory for the ÖVP, which rose to 37.5%, while the FPÖ declined to 16%, their worst result since 2006. With 21%, the opposition Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) recorded their worst performance in over a century. The Greens returned to the National Council after failing to win seats in 2017, achieving their best-ever result with 14%. NEOS improved to 8%.^[5]

The ÖVP formed a coalition with The Greens, a first on the federal level in Austria. The new government took office in January 2020, with Sebastian Kurz returning as Chancellor.^[6]

Norbert Hofer announced his resignation as leader of the Freedom Party in June 2021. He was replaced by parliamentary group leader Herbert Kickl, whose dismissal as interior minister caused the collapse of the ÖVP–FPÖ government in 2019.^[7]

On 6 October 2021 agents of the Central Prosecutorial Agency for Corruption and Economic Affairs (WKStA) raided the Federal Chancellery and the headquarters of the ÖVP as part of a corruption probe targeting Chancellor Sebastian Kurz and his "inner circle". Prosecutors alleged that, in 2016, Kurz paid bribes to news outlets to publish coverage and opinion polling favourable to himself, the goal of the scheme being to undermine then-ÖVP leader Reinhold Mitterlehner so that Kurz could take his place.^[8] The Greens threatened to support a motion of no confidence if Kurz did not step down as Chancellor. He thus announced his resignation on 9 October and was replaced by Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg. However, he was quickly elected faction leader of the ÖVP in the National Council; it was widely understood that he would remain de facto leader of the government.^[9][10]

On 2 December Kurz announced he would resign from all offices and retire from politics, citing a desire to focus on his family after becoming a father. Shortly after, Schallenberg announced he would resign as Chancellor in favour of the new ÖVP leader once one had been elected.^[11] On 3 December, Interior Minister Karl Nehammer was unanimously appointed as leader of the ÖVP by the federal party committee and proposed as Chancellor.^[12] He was sworn in by President Alexander Van der Bellen on 6 December.^[13]

Since 2019 numerous new and old minor parties such as Team HC Strache – Alliance for Austria, MFG Austria – People Freedom Fundamental Rights, The Beer Party and the Communist Party of Austria received at times considerable support in the 2020 Viennese state election, 2021 Upper Austrian state election, 2022 Austrian presidential election, 2023 Salzburg state election and various local elections, allowing these parties to win seats.

During the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, the ÖVP-Green government enjoyed high support. The government then became deeply unpopular after it passed a mandatory vaccination law, which led to a strong polarization of the population. As a result, and because of large-scale public protests, the mandatory vaccination law (one of few in the world) was later dropped and was never enforced.^{[citation needed]}

After a series of corruption scandals involving the ÖVP and rising inflation – such as skyrocketing housing, electricity, fuel and grocery prices – the government parties lost considerable support in 4 subsequent state elections in Tyrol, Lower Austria, Carinthia and Salzburg. As of May 2023, inflation in Austria was still around 10% and continues to be much higher than the Eurozone average, at around 7%.^{[citation needed]}

Under Nehammer's leadership, Austria's government implemented a package of measures worth six billion euros ($6.3 billion)^{[as of?]} in 2022 aimed at cushioning the blow to households of the rising cost of living.^[14] The measures helped limit poverty, but according to experts increased inflation further.^{[citation needed]}

On 8 December 2022 Nehammer was the architect of blocking Romania and Bulgaria's access into the Schengen Area. Nehammer said he first wants the EU to introduce strict border controls at the EU's outer border to limit illegal immigration before the two countries should be allowed to join Schengen.^[15]

On 3 June 2023, after years of internal conflicts, intrigues and crossfire, the opposition SPÖ elected a new party leader. The non-binding party membership vote ahead of the binding party congress was won by Hans Peter Doskozil, although by a simple plurality of votes, leaving the door open for a challenge by second-place finisher Andreas Babler at the party congress. On 23 May 2023, incumbent party leader Pamela Rendi-Wagner announced that she would not be a candidate at the party congress, after coming in just third in the membership vote and announced her orderly resignation. On 25 May 2023, Rendi-Wagner announced her complete withdrawal from Austrian politics by the end of June, also resigning as a member of the Austrian Parliament. On 3 June 2023, Hans Peter Doskozil was elected as the new party chairman with 53% of the delegates. However, two days later the SPÖ announced that the results had been mixed up in Microsoft Excel spreadsheets and that Babler was the actual winner with 53%, thus becoming the new party chairman.^[16]

The weakness of both the government parties and the SPÖ has allowed the far-right, populist opposition party FPÖ to top the polls during 2023, positioning it to win an Austrian legislative election for the first time, even though it has previously been involved in the Ibiza affair scandal which caused the 2019 governing coalition to resign.^{[citation needed]}

A government led by the FPÖ and a Chancellor Herbert Kickl, a political hardliner, is opposed by about two in three Austrians, according to polls conducted in May 2023. Additionally, President Alexander Van der Bellen has said that he might not swear in a FPÖ-led government with a Chancellor Kickl on top, but that he remains open to swearing in a more moderate FPÖ Chancellor.^{[citation needed]}

The rising inflation and increasingly unaffordable housing situation has seen the Communist Party of Austria (KPÖ) rise considerably in opinion polls conducted before the legislative election. Previously a non-factor in Austria-wide elections, the party rose to as high as 7 percent after the Salzburg state election in April 2023, in which it received a record 12 percent of the vote, a result out of nowhere, which stunned political observers.^{[citation needed]}

On 18 October 2023 former chancellor Sebastian Kurz (ÖVP) was charged in federal court for allegedly making false statements to a parliamentary investigation committee.^{[citation needed]}

On 4 November 2023 the KPÖ elected Tobias Schweiger as their lead candidate for the upcoming election.^{[citation needed]}

On 11 November 2023 the new SPÖ leader Andreas Babler was confirmed at a party convention in Graz by 89 percent of voting delegates.^[17]

On 18 January 2024 Dominik Wlazny (alias Marco Pogo) announced the candidacy of the Beer Party (BIER).^[18]

• Sebastian Kurz and Alexander Schallenberg in New York City (2021)

• Protest against coronavirus restrictions in Vienna (2021)

• Eurozone (red) and US (blue) inflation rates (2016–2023)

• Hans Peter Doskozil - SPÖ, (2023)

• Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen and Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin (2023)

Date

The election must be held before the conclusion of the 5-year term of the current 27th National Council on 23 October 2024 (typically, regularly-scheduled elections are held several weeks earlier than that – to allow for the publication of an official certified election result). Elections are traditionally not held during the school summer holidays, from early July to mid-September.^{[citation needed]}

Due to the government's unpopularity, it was often speculated in the media that early elections would be called for the spring of 2024, but the ÖVP-Green government repeatedly said they wanted to finish their term and that the election would be held in September 2024.^[19]

In February 2024 Minister of Agriculture Norbert Totschnig (ÖVP) mentioned that the election will likely be held on Sunday, 29 September 2024, exactly 5 years after the previous election.^{[citation needed]}

On 28 June 2024, the federal government formally announced the election date of 29 September 2024.^[20] Polling stations opened at 07:00 and closed at 17:00.^[21]

The 183 members of the National Council are elected by open list proportional representation at three levels; a single national constituency, nine constituencies based on the federal states, and 39 regional constituencies. Seats are apportioned to the regional constituencies based on the results of the most recent census. For parties to receive any representation in the National Council, they must either win at least one seat in a constituency directly, or clear a 4 percent national electoral threshold.^[22]

Following the elections, seats are allocated to the candidates of successful parties and lists in a three-stage process, starting with the regional constituencies. Seats are distributed according to the Hare quota in the regional constituencies, and with unallocated seats distributed at the state constituency level.^[23] Any remaining seats are then allocated using the D'Hondt method at the federal level, to ensure overall proportionality between a party's national vote share and its share of parliamentary seats.^[24]

In addition to voting for a political party, voters may cast three preferential votes for specific candidates of that party, but are not required to do so.^[25] These additional votes do not affect the proportional allocation based on the vote for the party or list, but can change the rank order of candidates on a party's lists at the federal, state, and regional level. The threshold to increase the position of a candidate on a federal party list is 7 percent, compared to 10 percent at the state level, and 14 percent at the regional level. The names of candidates on regional party lists are printed on the ballot and can be marked with an "x" to indicate the voter's preference. Preference votes for candidates on party lists at the state and federal level, however, must be written in by the voter, either by writing the name or the rank number of the candidate in a blank spot provided for that purpose.^[26]

Voting law reform

In early 2023 the ÖVP–Green government decided to reform the voting law. Among the reforms were the introduction of an early voting period, starting 3 weeks before election day, during which voters can request absentee ballots in every municipality. Voters can either fill out the ballot in the municipality and therefore cast the ballot early, or take the absentee ballot with them and cast it later by mail, or in-person before or on election day. Previously, this was only possible in large cities. Another reform will be the counting of almost all absentee and mail-ballots on election day. Previously, most mail ballots were counted the Monday and Thursday after election day. The new changes will lead to most votes being counted on election day, while only a much smaller number of late-arriving mail ballots and mail ballots from electoral districts other than the voters' own district will be counted on Monday after election day. The 2024 European Parliament election in Austria was the first national election in which the new law took effect and it showed that only about 130,000 absentee ballots had to be counted on the Monday after election day, compared to almost 960,000 the Monday after the 2019 legislative election. Other reforms include measures to lower the number of invalid or spoilt votes among absentee/mail ballots, by re-designing mail ballot instructions and introduction of "easy language" (or plain language) on them. High fines and a prison sentence of up to two weeks will be introduced for election commission members who deliberately leak election results of their polling stations to the media or other third parties before poll closing time. The reform of the voting law, which takes effect on 1 January 2024, was also supported by the three opposition parties SPÖ, FPÖ and NEOS, after several amendments were made to satisfy these parties too. The reformed election law^[27] was approved by the Nationalrat (National Council) on 31 January 2023 and by the Bundesrat (Federal Council) on 16 February 2023.^[28][29]

• Front side of an Austrian absentee/mail ballot (2017, before the reform)

• Back side of an Austrian absentee/mail ballot (2017, before the reform)

According to final numbers from the Federal Ministry of the Interior, a total of 6,346,059 people are eligible to vote in the election. In the 2019 election, 6,396,812 people were eligible to vote. This means that the number of eligible voters has fallen by 50,753 people. The reasons for this are that the number of Austrian citizens has been falling for years due to a birth deficit and negative migration balance to abroad, which is not compensated for by the number of naturalizations. The final number of eligible voters was published on 27 September 2024 after a period for objections and the correction of the electoral rolls.^[30]

Absentee/mail ballots will be sent to voters who requested them, starting at 2 September 2024. Early voting in every municipality will also be possible from that day, by immediately casting absentee ballots there (after requesting them at the municipal election department).^{[citation needed]}

A total of 1,436,240 absentee ballots have been issued by the electoral authorities all over Austria ahead of the election, with 27 September 2024, the last possible day to request one. The number is a new record and much higher than the 1,070,933 ahead of the 2019 election. In total, about 23% of all eligible voters requested an absentee ballot, compared to 17% in 2019. It is expected that every fourth vote cast in total in this election will be an absentee ballot.^[31]

Any party that intends to be on the ballot for the election must submit a statement of candidacy, their candidate list, a filing fee of €435 and either the signatures of three members of the Austrian National Council, or sufficient petition signatures of eligible Austrian voters by 1 August 2024 at 17:00 at the federal election commission in the Austrian Interior Ministry. To be on the ballot in all nine state, 2,600 signatures are required, with individual states requiring between 100 to 500 signatures. Parties contesting the election in only some states only need to reach the signature threshold for those states.

The table below lists parties represented in the 27th National Council:

The following other parties have announced their candidacy, are currently not represented in the National Council, but have collected the required amount of signatures to be on the ballot nationwide:^[32]

• KPÖ: Communist Party of Austria (Kommunistische Partei Österreichs)
• BIER: The Beer Party (Bin In Einer Reformbewegung)
• LMP: Madeleine Petrovic List (Liste Madeleine Petrovic)
• KEINE: None of the above (Keine von denen) (note: the party Der Wandel – (Change) decided to run as None of the above, with the abbreviation KEINE on the ballot)

• KPÖ lead candidate
  Tobias Schweiger

• BIER lead candidate
  Dominik Wlazny
  (alias Marco Pogo)

• KEINE lead candidate
  Fayad Mulla

The following other parties have announced their candidacy, are currently not represented in the National Council, but have collected the required amount of signatures to be on the ballot in at least one state:

• MFG Austria – People Freedom Fundamental Rights, in Vorarlberg, Tyrol, Salzburg, Styria, Upper Austria, Lower Austria & Vienna
• Liste Gaza (Gaza List), in Vorarlberg, Tyrol, Styria, Upper Austria, Lower Austria, Vienna & Burgenland
• BGE: The Yellows (Die Gelben), in Burgenland

MFG Austria were on the ballot for states including about 90% of eligible voters, only being absent in Burgenland and Carinthia. The Gaza List were on the ballot for states including about 87% of eligible voters, only being absent in Carinthia and Salzburg. The Yellows are only on the ballot in Burgenland, which includes about 4% of eligible voters in Austria.

The following other parties have ruled out a candidacy:

• DNA: Democratic – Neutral – Authentic (Demokratisch – Neutral – Authentisch)

All major parties started their election campaigns in mid-to-late August 2024. First waves of election billboards and campaign posters were placed at heavily frequented places and roads, lead candidates appeared in TV interviews and discussions and ads on social media, radio and TV were launched. Each party can spend a maximum of 8.6 million euros for the election, in accordance with campaign finance laws.^{[citation needed]}

Especially after the 2024 Vienna terrorism plot in early August 2024, in which the Islamic State unsuccessfully tried to target concerts of the American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift, the campaigning shifted heavily towards security and policing issues, how to tackle political and extremist Islam in Austria and on immigration and the integration of (primarily Muslim) immigrants in Austria.^[33] The focus on these topics were reinforced by the 2024 Solingen stabbing in late August 2024 in neighboring Germany, with the FPÖ calling for "zero asylum" in Austria, increased deportations of criminal foreigners to their home countries and a new law to ban political/extremist Islam in Austria, similar to Austria's anti-Nazi law^[34] in its campaign program titled "Fortress Austria".^[35] The FPÖ also called for enshrining legal recognitions of binary genders in the constitution,^[36] restoring some political powers from the European Union to Austria,^[35] ending sanctions against Russia and Austria's exit from the European Sky Shield Initiative. The SPÖ and the ÖVP has attacked Herbert Kickl, with its leaders describing him as “a threat to democracy” and a “security risk”. Both parties have pledged not to join a government led by the FPÖ, although Karl Nehammer has not ruled out forming a coalition with the FPÖ that would exclude Kickl from the cabinet.^[37]

The FPÖ's use of the term Volkskanzler (People's Chancellor) to describe Kickl in its campaign material has caused criticism among some Austrians for its usage by Adolf Hitler in the 1930s and as a reminder of the FPÖ's origins as a party founded by former Nazis in the 1950s.^[38]

The ÖVP campaigned on a platform of stability.^[39] It also pledged to implement tighter immigration laws and tax cuts.^[40]

Results by state

According to experts from "Foresight" (ex-SORA), about 90 percent of the 1.436 million requested absentee ballots will be returned for counting. Of those roughly 1.3 million ballots, the vast majority (roughly 1.1 million, or 85%) will be counted on 29 September, while an estimated remaining 15% or 160,000 late-arriving absentee ballots will be counted – by law – on 30 September and an additional 40,000 (from another district than the voters' own) will be counted – by law – on 3 October.^[41] Reports of polling stations throughout election day have suggested that overall turnout is "very high" and could reach "80 percent or more".^[42]

Celebrations broke out among FPÖ supporters after initial projections showed them winning a plurality of votes. FPÖ general secretary Michael Schnedlitz said "the men and women of Austria have made history today", while Herbert Kickl called on other parties to reconsider forming a coalition with his party. In response, Karl Nehammer reiterated that the ÖVP would not enter into a coalition with the FPÖ unless Kickl was excluded from a ministerial position.^[43][44] Nehammer also said he was "bitter" over the ÖVP failing to win but acknowledged his role in improving the party's showing following low opinion ratings.^[35]

A protest was held outside the Austrian Parliament Building in Vienna by around 300 people protesting against Kickl on 29 September, calling him a "Nazi".^[35]

President Alexander Van der Bellen pledged to ensure the formation of a government that respects the "foundations of our liberal democracy".^[45]

The leaders of far-right parties across Europe, including Marine Le Pen of the National Rally in France,^[46] Geert Wilders of the Party for Freedom in the Netherlands and Alice Weidel of the Alternative for Germany, sent congratulations to Kickl and the FPÖ.^[35]