VIENNA -- The anti-immigrant Freedom Party has outperformed polls to win national elections in Austria in a historic showing that underscores far-right gains in Europe but could still leave it in opposition with more mainstream parties battling to keep it out of government.
Supporters on election night in the Austrian capital cheered the Freedom Party’s 29 percent support from the country's 6 million eligible voters, placing it nearly three percentage points ahead of Prime Minister Karl Nehammer’s ruling People’s Party at 26.5 percent and eight points ahead of the opposition Social Democrats at 21 percent.
"Now it's time for a change, in my opinion," Lorenz, a social worker, told RFE/RL in Vienna after ballots were cast on September 29. "And I wish to act more nationally. Because the EU....yeah, we got so many illegal immigrants and that's a problem."
But no single party will hold a majority in the the 183-seat lower house of parliament, the National Council, and talks to form a government are likely to drag out for weeks or months.
Most major parties have vowed to avoid any coalition with the Freedom Party, which became the first far-right party to win an Austrian election since World War II.
Nehammer has specified that his conservative People's Party won't bring the Freedom Party's fiery 55-year-old leader Herbert Kickl into government, but he hasn't ruled out a deal to govern alongside it.
Despite the party's leading spot in polls for most of the past two years, Kickl remains among the country's least popular national politicians.
The Freedom Party's Fortress Austria, Fortress Of Freedom platform also contains a number of perceived pro-business steps that could roughly align with the People's Party, which has governed in coalition with the Greens since 2020.
President Alexander Van der Bellen, a former Greens party member who has expressed misgivings publicly about the Freedom Party, grants the mandate to form the next government.
Van der Bellen said after results were announced that he would ensure any government adheres to the "foundations of our liberal democracy."
Critics of the Freedom Party accuse it of xenophobia, racism, and anti-Semitism, and say its nationalist and anti-Muslim proposals undermine social cohesion.
They say its Euroskepticism threatens Austria's outsized role in the European Union and its pro-Moscow bias endangers the West's efforts to help Ukraine fight off Russia's unprovoked invasion.
The Freedom Party was formed in the 1950s by former Nazis, and it has promised to roll back asylum and immigration policies, including "remigrating" foreigners out of the country and ending reunification policies with immigrants already in Austria.
"I'm sad and I'm disappointed, because it's not a good sign that the far-right party has such good results," Karin, a teacher, told RFE/RL in Vienna late on election night. "It's not good for democracy, it's not good for the country, it's not good for Europe."
Detailed vote tallies are likely to paint a picture of rural voters powering a good deal of the Freedom Party's success.
Stepan, a waiter and student, told RFE/RL in Vienna that he wished the People's Party had fared better in the vote.
"I think in Austria we have a big difference between countryside and cities in the votes," he said. "And yes, the countryside this time won somehow."
The Freedom Party and many of its right-wing populist counterparts surging in European popularity have resisted support for the defense of Ukraine and sanctions that target Russia for its invasion of Ukraine.
The Freedom Party victory comes after Dutch elections last November saw Geert Wilders' far-right Party for Freedom score a surprise victory that also marked a postwar first.
That was followed by major gains for right-wing populist parties in national elections to the European Parliament in June.
Then the political left and center were forced to cooperate to ultimately deny Marine Le Pen’s hard-right National Rally a victory after a first-round surge in French snap elections called by President Emmanuel Macron.
In Germany this month, the far-right, anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany made major gains in state voting.
