The Leading Candidates of the Vienna Election 2025 in Brief Profile

The seven parties running citywide in the municipal council election are led by four men and three women. The average age is 53 years. By far the oldest top candidate is that of the ÖVP, Karl Mahrer. For the 70-year-old, it is the first time running as the lead candidate, unlike SPÖ mayor Michael Ludwig and FPÖ frontman Dominik Nepp. Record holder is Heinz-Christian Strache, who is running for the fifth time as the number 1 of a party.

Vienna Election 2025: These are the Top Candidates of the Parties

Michael Ludwig - SPÖ

The 64-year-old mayor of Vienna is leading the SPÖ into the Vienna election for the second time. Raised in a municipal housing in Floridsdorf, Ludwig studied political science and history and worked as a course and project manager in adult education. He entered politics in 1994, initially as a district councilor, and became housing councilor in 2007. In 2009, Ludwig also rose to vice mayor, but had to hand over the title to Maria Vassilakou (Greens) just a year later in the first red-green coalition.

In 2018, Ludwig won a contested vote for the Vienna SPÖ chairmanship against Andreas Schieder and took over the mayor's office from long-time city chief Michael Häupl a few months later. Unlike Schieder, Ludwig was considered a representative of the populous outer districts, which fight against the FPÖ and are not exactly red-green inclined. After the Vienna election 2020, he preferred the NEOS as a coalition partner. Unlike his outspoken predecessor, Ludwig remains consistently friendly-stoic and is not fazed by unpleasant issues such as the Corona pandemic, allotment garden affair, or the Vienna Energy case.

Karl Mahrer - ÖVP

The 70-year-old ex-policeman is leading the Vienna ÖVP into the Vienna election 2025. The late-career newcomer spent most of his professional life in law enforcement. As a police general, he served as deputy state police president until 2017. Previously, he was state police commander from 2009 to 2012. It was not until 2017 that he entered the National Council for the ÖVP and became a security spokesperson.

In 2021, he unexpectedly took over the Vienna People's Party after Gernot Blümel's departure. He did not have a municipal council mandate, but he became a non-executive city councilor and thus gained a seat in the city senate. The ex-policeman focuses mainly on security policy and polarizes with his right-wing course and controversial videos. However, the main source of internal party unrest is the breach of trust charge in the Viennawert case, which became known shortly before his nomination as the top candidate.

Judith Pühringer - Greens

The 49-year-old Green top candidate is a trained business economist and has only been in politics for five years. The former youth group leader was for many years the managing director of the non-profit company arbeit plus and chairwoman of the Poverty Conference. Before the Vienna election 2020, she was presented as a newcomer candidate by the then Vienna Green frontwoman Birgit Hebein and entered the municipal council in third place on the list.

After Hebein's involuntary departure following the Greens' exit from the city government, the state assembly elected Pühringer and Peter Kraus as the leadership duo in October 2021. The dual leadership and her calm manner are likely the reason for Pühringer's rather moderate recognition values. In February, she was elected as the top candidate. The goal is a new edition of red-green, which is why the election campaign for Pühringer is a difficult balancing act between vying for votes and courting the favor of the SPÖ.

Selma Arapovic - NEOS

Literally not the first choice as the top candidate was Selma Arapovic. During the pink list creation for the Vienna election, the 48-year-old was elected to the second place on the state list. However, after Vice Mayor Christoph Wiederkehr moved to the federal government and renounced his candidacy, the until then largely unknown city councilor took over the baton in the already ongoing election campaign at short notice.

The now pink club chairwoman in the town hall is the only top candidate with a migration background in the federal capital. Born in Visegrad in Bosnia, she fled with her family to Upper Austria after the outbreak of the war in the 1990s. After graduating from high school in Ried im Innkreis, she studied architecture in Graz. The architect, who has been working in Vienna since 2006, entered politics ten years ago as a district councilor in Vienna-Leopoldstadt. In 2020, she moved into the city council.

Dominik Nepp - FPÖ

For the 43-year-old from Döbling, it is the second election as the blue top candidate. After Heinz-Christian Strache's withdrawal following the Ibiza and expense scandal, the until then little-known Nepp took over the Vienna FPÖ in 2019 and had to endure the resounding defeat in the following year's election. Nepp also lost the position of Vice Mayor and retained the office of a non-executive city councilor.

His political career began back in 2000 when he held positions in the Ring of Freedom Youth after graduating from high school. He completed the master's program in Leadership, Politics, and Management at the FH Vienna. In 2005, he became a district councilor in Döbling, where he is still the district party chairman. In 2010, he entered the state parliament, and the move to the club leadership took place in 2015. In that year, he also ended his partnership in a trading company. The Vienna FPÖ leader is an "Old Boy" of the striking Academic Fraternity Aldania Vienna.

Barbara Urbanic - KPÖ and LINKS

The 43-year-old Barbara Urbanic leads the joint list of KPÖ and LINKS in the Vienna election. Raised in Vienna-Liesing in the Alterlaa residential park, she emphasizes that she has lived in the traditional working-class district of Favoriten for more than 20 years. Quite untypical for a Marxist was her choice of studies: religious studies. In her thesis at the University of Vienna, she dealt with Protestant fundamentalism in the USA. Professionally, she operates in the academic field, working in administration at the Austrian Academy of Sciences. She became politically active only a few years ago. Since last November, she has been the state spokesperson for the KPÖ Vienna, and in the national council election, she ran in Vienna in eighth place.

Heinz-Christian Strache - Team HC Strache

The 55-year-old ex-Vice Chancellor wants to try again. For the fifth time, he is running as the top candidate for a party in the Vienna election, but for the second time not for the FPÖ, from which he was excluded after the Ibiza and expense scandal, but for his own list. Strache's prospects of success are considered modest. Already in 2020, the trained dental technician failed with his "Team HC Strache" at the five percent hurdle. Five years earlier, he had led the Vienna FPÖ, which he had led since 2004, to its greatest success with 30.79 percent. However, he was also responsible for its implosion in 2020. Since then, he has been struggling with legal and financial problems and for his rehabilitation. Two trials ended with acquittals, several proceedings are still ongoing.

(APA/Red)

This article has been automatically translated, read the original article here.