On Sunday Austria held elections in the Salzburg region. The result was a disaster for the Country’s Establishment Centrist parties.

Remix reports Austria’s anti-immigration, anti-sanctions FPÖ party continues victory run, communists also see huge vote surge in Salzburg elections [by Cody, John, April 24, 2023].

The anti-immigration Austrian Freedom Party’s triumphant march continues. On Sunday, the right-wing party achieved the best result in the party’s history in the regional elections in Salzburg, which cements a string of victories for a party that has championed strict immigration, European identity, and an end to sanctions on Russia.

The party’s vote share soared 7.1-percentage points to 25.9 percent, making it the second-strongest party… Experts predict that the party now has a strong chance of leading the country after 2024’s national elections, given that the FPÖ is routinely polling as the most popular party in the entire country.

Given Austria’s long tradition of coalition governments this might be a reach. But the demographics mean

If voters in the 18-29 age group, as well as 30-59, were the only groups voting, the Freedom Party would have likely secured a first-place victory.

ignoring the Party is going to be difficult.

Equally interesting was

…the huge surge in votes for the Communist Party of Austria (KPÖ), which not only reveals the extreme discontent among Austrians, but also their willingness to vote for parties shunned by the mainstream media and deemed “radical” by the international press. The communists went from basically no votes to 11.7 percent, which amounts to an increase of 11.3 points.

More than a third of the Salzburg vote being against America’s Ukrainian adventure could foreshadow bad news for Washington. But the rise in the Communist vote may not be so bad for the Freedom Party itself. Although it may be tasteless to remember, the final vote surges in Germany and Italy in the interwar years saw communist voters switching from Left to Right radicalism.

And the Freedom Party’s key issue exerts more and more pressure. See A record 100,000 illegal immigrants have come to Austria, and why that’s now a big problem for Romania and Bulgaria, by Denes Albert, Remix, November 24, 2022.

Austria’s population is slightly less than 9 million.