Austria European Parliament election 2019 — Results

At a glance

The 2019 European Parliament election in Austria, held on 26 May 2019, was won decisively by Sebastian Kurz's People's Party (ÖVP). It took place in the immediate, extraordinary aftermath of the "Ibiza affair", which had broken just days earlier and was tearing apart the ÖVP–FPÖ coalition — yet the turmoil seemed only to strengthen Kurz's party at the European polls.

The political system

Austria elects its members of the European Parliament in a single nationwide constituency by proportional representation, with a 4% threshold and the option of a preferential vote for individual candidates. In 2019 Austria returned 18 seats, with a 19th to follow once the United Kingdom left the EU. Because the whole country votes as one district, European elections offer a clean read-out of national party strength, although turnout is lower than in National Council elections.

The run-up to the vote

The vote came amid national crisis: the Ibiza video had been published on 17 May, FPÖ leader Heinz-Christian Strache had resigned, and the coalition was collapsing even as Austrians voted. Kurz's ÖVP campaigned on a pro-European but migration-sceptic platform; the SPÖ sought to rebuild; the FPÖ, reeling from scandal, tried to limit the damage; and the Greens and NEOS appealed to pro-EU, urban voters. The backdrop of scandal gave the European contest an unusually national, almost plebiscitary character.

The outcome

The ÖVP won 34.55% and seven of the 18 seats, a clear victory and a gain of two. The SPÖ took 23.89% and five seats, the FPÖ 17.20% and three — a smaller fall than many expected given the scandal — the Greens 14.08% and two, and NEOS 8.44% and one. Turnout rose sharply to 59.77%, part of a Europe-wide increase in 2019. The result reinforced Kurz's dominance just before the national snap election that the Ibiza affair had made inevitable.

Preference votes and a turnout surge

Two features of the night stood out beyond the headline shares. Turnout, at 59.77%, was almost fifteen points higher than the roughly 45% recorded in 2014 — the steepest rise anywhere in that year's Europe-wide turnout recovery — suggesting the domestic crisis pulled voters to a ballot they usually skip. And Austria's preferential-voting system produced a remarkable footnote: Heinz-Christian Strache, who had resigned as FPÖ leader and vice-chancellor only days earlier, still attracted enough personal preference votes on the FPÖ list to qualify for a seat in the European Parliament — a mandate he ultimately declined to take up, sparing his party a further standoff.

What happened next

The European result foreshadowed the ÖVP's strong showing in the September 2019 National Council election, which Kurz again won handsomely before forming his coalition with the Greens. The FPÖ's relatively contained European losses also showed the resilience of its core vote even amid scandal — a resilience that would carry the party to an outright national victory five years later.

Compiled and reviewed from official results by ElectioMap. See our data methodology.