Overview

• Delegates confirmed Herbert Kickl at the FPÖ helm with 96.9 percent, giving him a near-unanimous mandate at the Salzburg party congress.
• Kickl outlined a 'Dritte Republik' project built on an asylum stop, a ban on political Islam and expanded direct-democracy measures.
• He signaled a foreign-policy tilt toward rapprochement with Russia and cautioned against hasty military reactions to airspace incidents.
• Looking to 2028, Kickl said the FPÖ plans to play a 'joker' in the presidential election but offered no names.
• The FPÖ leads national polls at about 35 percent after being shut out of government by an ÖVP–SPÖ–NEOS coalition; one outlet separately cited an uncorroborated 42 percent preferred-chancellor figure for Kickl as protests and opposition criticism accompanied the event.