GroenLinks-PvdA, PVV now tied with VVD for largest party; NSC out of top 3

GroenLinks-PvdA is on the rise in the polls and now has 27 (virtual) seats compared to 23 a week ago. That puts Frans Timmermans’ party at the same level as the VVD, according to the latest poll by I&O Research. The liberals remained stable at 27 seats.

The PVV achieved a virtual gain of 6 seats, climbing to 26 in the poll. Geert Wilders’ party is now in the top three with the VVD and GL-PvdA, researcher Peter Kanne announced Monday evening during the TV program Khalid & Sophie. Statistically, these three parties are the same size.

With another loss of 4 seats, NSC has fallen to fourth place with 21 seats. Pieter Omtzigt’s party started to decline a week ago.

BBB and Volt each lost 2 seats compared to a week ago. BBB now has 6 seats in the polls, and Volt has 3.

There were no significant changes for the other parties.

Kanne “doesn’t dare to bet anything on who will become the largest,” he said on Khalid & Sophie. “It could go either way.” Omtzigt can also still bounce back.

GL-PvdA’s virtual seat gain is due to voters who plan to vote for the party for strategic reasons. They hope to prevent an utterly right-wing Cabinet. The polling agency noted that Timmermans’ party has been stealing voters from Volt, D66, and SP in the past week.

The PVV has mainly taken voters away from NSC and won over floating voters. Many PVV voters are also voting strategically. They want a right-wing Cabinet that will implement stricter immigration policy and want to prevent GL-PvdA from joining the government.

“Voters gravitate towards these parties for strategic reasons out of fear that the other will play an important role in the next government,” the researchers conclude.

NSC is mainly losing voters to the PVV and VVD. Dropouts cite Omtzigt’s lack of clarity on whether he wants to be Prime Minister as the reason. The data collection for this poll had largely already been done before Omtzigt said on Buitenhof on Sunday that he wanted to become Prime Minister in a Cabinet of specialist voters. Other voters said they changed their minds about NSC because the youngest party’s positions are not clear enough.

Over 2,400 Dutch people aged 18 or older participated in the poll. The survey was conducted from Friday afternoon to Monday morning.