Will Sebastian Kurz be able to remain as Austrian Chancellor for another week? [Updated 05/23/2019]

Following Austria's political crisis is a news junkie's dream, especially since Austria has strong enough democratic institutions that even a historically dramatic government crisis does not involve fighting in the streets or competing militia groups, as there were in the 1920s and 1930s.

As of this point, the far-right FPÖ has withdrawn its support from the government of Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (ÖVP). Kurz with the permission of the President and head of state Alexander Van der Bellen, fired Interior Minister Herbert Kickl (FPÖ). It's the first time since the current post-1945 Austrian Second Republic that a Cabinet Minister has actually been fired, as opposed to submitting a resignation.

All the remaining FPÖ Ministers resigned Monday evening. The only exception is the Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl, who is considered "close to" the FPÖ, although not technically a member, and she was recommended by the FPÖ leadership. Kurz' 2017 coalition agreement with the FPÖ involved giving them the Interior Ministry (internal security), Defense, Justice, and Foreign Affairs. Van der Bellen balked at allowing all three of the security agencies to the FPÖ and so Justice went to the ÖVP.

It's not clear why Kneissel stayed. It may be that she just didn't want to give up the post. Or that the FPÖ wanted her to stay even though they wanted all the FPÖ members to leave. Kneissel is most famous for inviting Vladimir Putin to her wedding last year and literally bowing down on her knee before him.

Van der Bellen on Wednesday accepted four "experts" proposed by Kurz to fill the vacated positions. (Karl Ettinger et al, Die Neuen - ein Wink in Richtung SPÖ Wiener Zeitung 22.05.2019)

But it's very possible that Kurz himself will be removed from the Chancellorship through a no-confidence vote in Parliament. That would mean Van der Bellen could appoint a new Chancellor for the interim period before election in September and immediately thereafter, while a new government is being formed. This is not a frequent occurrence in parliamentary democracies but not an unusual one, either. But it would be the first time in Austria's Second Republic. The new Chancellor would have to be an Austrian citizen but does not have to be a Member of Parliament.

Kurz has been the shooting star of Austrian politics. During the immigration crisis of 2015-16, Kurz as Foreign Minister postured as Austria's savior from the scary foreigners and Angela Merkel. It was a sham performance. The influx of refugees was curbed in 2016 by Merkel's deal with Turkey, not by the "closing of the Balkan route" for which Kurz took credit. He then had the ÖVP withdraw from its coalition with the SPÖ (center-left Social Democratic Party).

In the 2017 campaign, he basically campaigned for an ÖVP/FPÖ coalition. I attended a live debate in Linz in 2017 of the three Chancellor candidates: Kurz, Strache, and then-Chancellor Christian Kern (SPÖ). It was striking that Kurz and Strache were refraining from serious criticisms of each other. It was also evident that Strache was the most experienced at comfortable with retail politics. He presented a moderate (for him) face and was clearly more comfortable with being before the public and connecting with an audience. Kurz himself was 31 at the time and when he became Chancellor in December 2017. He campaigned on xenophobia and was happy to make a coalition with the FPÖ knowing very well who and what they are.

Kurz is obsessed with message control and appears to have enormous confidence in his ability to reinvent himself overnight in the public eye. This Financial Times piece from January 2019 shows that he was successful in maintaining a balance in pandering to pro-European conservatives and far-right xenophobes.

Sebastian Kurz: saviour of Europe’s mainstream or friend of the far-right? "centre-right/far-right alliance is deemed a success is that it marries Austrians’ hostility to illegal immigration with a broadly positive view of Europe." https://t.co/nunI472ekq via @financialtimes

— Troels Heeger (@Heeger) January 7, 2019

But his government came crashing down spectacularly within the last week. And now he is posing as the country's savior from the mess he himself created by taking the FPÖ into the government and being unable to control their actions, not even to hold them to his preferred public messaging.

This is a new kind of challenge for him. He rode the anti-immigrant horse to the Chancellorship in cooperation with the FPÖ. But Kurz himself is not good at unstaged appearances before the public or the press. This week, he went back into election campaign mode and acted as though he could instantly reinvent himself in the middle of his own catastrophe. He has refused to take questions from the press after his public appearances this week, and gave a press interview only to a friendly reporter from the German tabloid Bild-Zeitung. [Update 05/23/2019: Kurz did take questions from the press after his announcement on Wednesday afternoon, 05/22/2019] But he hasn't been able to give a convincing pretence that he takes seriously his responsibility as the head of government or has real concern for its effects on the country.

This podcast (in German) from Falter featuring Armin Thurnher, Florian Klenk, Nina Horaczek und Josef Redl talks about how Kurz is trying once again to present himself as unsullied by the past, a man of political Immaculate Conception. Der türkis-blaue Absturz 21.05.2019:

Kurz may not be Chancellor much longer. But right now, he's campaigning to win a new term in the September elections. This analysis by Natascha Strobl in the SPÖ website Kontrast.at, Die 6 rhetorischen Tricks von Sebastian Kurz in Zeiten der Krise 21.05.2019 talks about his six basic messages in his latest reinvention the last few days. These are her summaries of the six messages she takes from his presentations:
(All translations from German in this post are mine.)

• I couldn't foresee it and I am devastated
• The President and I take responsibility
• The FPÖ has destroyed our good and successful [govermental] project
• The Social Democrats [SPÖ] are just as bad as the FPÖ
• Tal Silberstein instead of FPÖ!
• Only I can make things right

On the third point, Tal Silberstein is an Israeli political consultant who has did work for the SPÖ in 2017. Both the FPÖ and Kurz have suggested without any evidence that he may have been the was who set up the sting operation in Ibiza that wound up bringing down Kurz' government this past week. Yes, they both went there: it must be a conspiracy involving somebody with a Jewish-sounding name. (See: Rabinovici: Kurz’ „Spiel“ mit Antisemitismus ORF 20.05.2019)

Strobl stresses that Kurz' statements indicate a continued willingness to form a government with the FPÖ, maybe even a preference for it:

The negative pair of opposites with the FPÖ is always the SPÖ. Kurz does not leave a dig at the SPÖ out of any of his statements. They was "not willing" to support him and thus to take responsibility. In truth [claims Kurz], they are even tinkering with a shift to the left in Europe, which [Kurz presents as] actually almost worse than a shift to the right.

The ÖVP/FPÖ project has by no means failed, in Kurz’ telling, nor is a new version unthinkable in the future. He takes digs at individuals in the FPÖ and their "style," as he calls it. He does not make any basic pushback against the actions of the FPÖ while they had governmental responsibility.