Austria’s right-wing FPÖ received more than a quarter of the votes in the state elections in Lower Austria. In the election in the largest federal state, which is also considered a national political mood test, the party achieved a state record result of 25.4 percent, according to an initial projection by the broadcaster ORF. With a gain of more than 10 percentage points, the FPÖ became the second strongest political force behind the conservative ÖVP of Prime Minister Johanna Mikl-Leitner, which suffered a severe loss.
The chancellor party ÖVP lost almost 10 percentage points and, according to the extrapolation, received 39.7 percent of the votes. In the future, Mikl-Leitner will have to govern without an absolute majority in the state parliament. The social democratic SPÖ fell behind the FPÖ with 20.7 percent. The results for the Greens were 7.3 percent, for the liberal Neos 6.2 percent.
According to surveys, the 1.3 million eligible voters made their decision based on national and global issues such as inflation, the environment and climate, as well as asylum and migration. Chancellor Karl Nehammer’s ÖVP had to struggle before and during the election campaign with a lack of voter confidence due to corruption investigations in the wake of the Ibiza scandal.
It is the first of three state elections in Austria this year. The next national parliamentary election is scheduled for 2024.
