Politics and Elections in the Netherlands: Rutte III era

[Zinneke]

For voters abroad, there is currently an experiment with a redesigned ballot:

https://mobile.twitter.com/LuukDeCock/status/1365302333870112770

Mark a party, and at the bottom mark the number of the candidate.

Won't work for the 50PLUS voters who have already forgotten who their local Henk Krol "doyen" figure's number is by the time they have entered the election booth.

[Zinneke]

https://fd.nl/achtergrond/1375699/op-zoek-naar-het-electorale-gat-op-links-ljc1caRHSw3o

"the gap on the left" - an article appearing in the Financieele Dagblad about how a "Danish" style social democratic party that is hard on immigration could potentially do well given polling and revive their hopes somewhat. The obvious candidate would be SP, with them already on many cultural issues being quite traditionalist and Jan Marijnissen saying he didn't like the way the left in the west had chosen the culture wars as a battleground or the cancel culture. But daughter Lilian tried to make migration an issue going beyond social dumping and calling for a revision for work permits, and it caused too much friction internally. You know have a movement within PvdA called "Vrij Links" that wishes to stop the debate about culture wars and start talking about secular progressive values as a starting point and then focus on economics.

The Dutch left continues to slide in the polls. Yet the median voter might still probably consider itself progressive, and I think in 2012 you had a SP then PvdA surge to shoulder Rutte (ok, after the most right-wing government in Dutch history, granted) but eventually falling just short and collapsing after the mistake that was the Purple coalition. Weirdly I can only see Timmermans being able to get back to that level in the short term. He actually can target the places a PvdA campaign to unite the Left needs to target (his "home" Parkstad being the prime example), and he has a way of being able to talk to several constituencies without tripping up. But he probably sees himself as more effective in Brussels. Plus the other left-wing parties wouldn't want to work with him as easily as they did with Asscher and now Ploumen.

[Zinneke]

Wierdly upside down but quality nonetheless :

[Zinneke]

The SP is literally you though Laki.

[Zinneke]

My prediction for tomorrow:

VVD 34 (+1)
D66 19 (-)
PVV 19 (-1)
CDA 17 (-2)
PvdA 12 (+3)
SP 10 (-4)
GL 8 (-6)
FvD 7 (+5)
CU 6 (+1)
PvdD 6 (+1)
SGP 3 (-)
Volt 3 (+3)
JA21 2 (+2)
Denk 2 (-1)
50+ 1 (-3)
BBB 1 (+1)

Turnout 75% (-6%)

This prediction makes a lot of sense to me. FvD for me are being underpolled as they are the true lockdown sceptic party and in the end this is a lockdown issue election.

[Zinneke]

This is the biggest party map per the polls by Maurice de Hond done on 14th of march. Let's see how accurate they are but its Maurice De Hond so don't hold your breath.



I still can't believe university cities will back D66. But then it will mostly be staff voting as students might be with their parents.

[Zinneke]

Turnout at 74% one hour and a half before polls close:

https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1372261995668443136

Turnout suprisingly high, seems to be heading towards the 2017 election turnut which was quite high

Bad news for the smaller parties like Bij1 or Code Oranje as they will need more votes to get a seat

Which of course is interesting since every time I peaked at this thread it was a VVD snooze-fest of a lead. Turnout matching 2017 with the pandemic suggests excitement to vote for...somebody, and that probably isn't a single-issue minor party.

There were a lot of undecideds that do not seem to have even considered VVD and were mainly sizing up left-of-center parties or the far right, where the competition lies.  

[Zinneke]

https://twitter.com/SLdeLange/status/1372266569229828109

[Zinneke]

This is the biggest party map per the polls by Maurice de Hond done on 14th of march. Let's see how accurate they are but its Maurice De Hond so don't hold your breath.



I still can't believe university cities will back D66. But then it will mostly be staff voting as students might be with their parents.

Why? It is their core constituency.

Because D66 joined a fairly right-wing government and they allowed the studiebeurs to go. Idk I just also think that the emergence of competitors including VOLT and Bij1 (remember that D66 as the first post-materialist party attracted the woke types before it was cool) would harm them.

[Zinneke]

This is the biggest party map per the polls by Maurice de Hond done on 14th of march. Let's see how accurate they are but its Maurice De Hond so don't hold your breath.



I still can't believe university cities will back D66. But then it will mostly be staff voting as students might be with their parents.

Why? It is their core constituency.

Because D66 joined a fairly right-wing government and they allowed the studiebeurs to go. Idk I just also think that the emergence of competitors including VOLT and Bij1 (remember that D66 as the first post-materialist party attracted the woke types before it was cool) would harm them.

Studiebeurs was abolished during Rutte-II not Rutte-III (D66 indeed supported it). Volt will definetely eat up the D66 vote, but not BIJ1 and its questionable Volt is much more left-wing than D66. D66 may be post-materialis and may be somewhat woke, but its voters are also pragmatic. Another strong constituency of D66 are affluent suburban where they more compete with the VVD. The idealist post-materalis and more woke party is GL that is competing more with BIJ1 for the most wokish voters.

I think most people would consider D66 posh or elitist rather than woke.

Yup, you are right, but D66 in university contexts is slightly more towards that direction.

[Zinneke]

https://twitter.com/GijsSchumacher/status/1372274349063999489

[Zinneke]

Lol Hoekstra failed badly.

[Zinneke]

VVD/D66/CDA have a majority lol

And in the Senate?

[Zinneke]

VVD/D66/CDA have a majority lol

And in the Senate?

I think we can safely conclude that D66 will be the largest party in the university cities

Yup, but like Laki alludes to, they are just re conducting Rutte to power.

PvdA needs to get their act together. They should be competing on that ground as they used to. They are nowhere now.

[Zinneke]

The guy on the NOS is making a good point : the fact that most parties swung massively left on the economy helped D66 because they could focus on their issues and not be exposed as aiding and abetting a right-wing government.

What's the reason of this dramatic surge of D66?

Kaagmania too

[Zinneke]

We are missing another big deal here : D66 have the cleanest hands out of many of the top parties when it comes to the benefits scandal.

Also, as the NOS pundit said, they get strategic votes from right and left. The whole "race for second place [behind Rutte]" played a part I think. That was the media excitement in the last week.

[Zinneke]

Wait, is Otten backing JA21? He's in the background during Eerdmans interview. Why has Otten still got his own group in the Senate?

[Zinneke]

https://twitter.com/CasMudde/status/1372277905233952774

Wait, is Otten backing JA21? He's in the background during Eerdmans interview. Why has Otten still got his own group in the Senate?

No thats EU JA21 faction leader Derk Jan Eppink

Oh yeah I thought he looked familiar!

[Zinneke]

https://twitter.com/SimonOtjes/status/1372282958283964416

R E A L I G N M E N T

[Zinneke]

Dutch/pol/ is taking it well...

[Zinneke]

Dutch/pol/ is taking it well...

probably meaning, r/thenetherlands. Yea they are not taking it well.

First results coming from the islands. One going to D66 and one to VVD

What specifically are they upset about? Were they expecting Volt at 80 seats?

The pic is from 4chan, and they were genuinely seeing Baudet get 20 seats.

[Zinneke]

https://twitter.com/pbergsen/status/1372296806961446918

/nederdraad/ on /int/ seems pretty pleased with the D66 surge. Saw some of them vote for BIJ1 earlier in the day too, although it's 4chan so you can never tell when one is being serious or ironic.

They are trolling 100%

[Zinneke]

https://twitter.com/L_deJonge/status/1372299506159607809

Look at those non-voters...unbelievable that Wilders didnt try to surf on the anti-lockdown wave.

[Zinneke]

https://twitter.com/L_deJonge/status/1372299506159607809

Look at those non-voters...unbelievable that Wilders didnt try to surf on the anti-lockdown wave.

I don't know if Wilders is really wrong though. 2 Years ago, FvD was the largest party and people were questioning the existance of the PVV. But FvD icollapsed when Covid hit them, and PVV attracted a lot of these votes from FvD by taking Covid more seriously than FvD. PVV is still much bigger than FvD

But increasingly Wilders had seen the polls and started arguing more about ending lockdown etc. I agree at the start FvD looked silly but by the end they were getting a big campaign going and focusing on the anti-lockdown sentiment and it paid off. Really Wilders should have finished Baudet off and taken his transfers to "beat" Kaag. Finishing second again would have given him more ammo as the leader of the opposition who is constantly ignored.

[Zinneke]

Why were D66 so underestimated in the final polls of the campaign?

The final polls picked up a Kaag surge, and the media discourse the last week was all about the "battle for second place", which likely led to a lot of strategic voting, knowing Rutte would likely lead the outgoing coalition.