LEIDEN, the Netherlands — Waking up bleary eyed this Thursday morning and wondering who won the Dutch election?
Well, it’s a stunner.
Here’s our brief explainer on the progressive liberal party that surged in recent weeks to match Geert Wilders’ far-right Party for Freedom (PVV) on the back of a charismatic young leader.
Start from the beginning, please, who won the Dutch election?
The liberal-progressive D66 party — short for Democrats 66; founded in 1966, natch — is on track to win 26 seats in the Netherlands’ 150-strong parliament, according to a preliminary forecast. That puts them equal with the hotly tipped Wilders and his PVV, which just two years ago scored a huge election win, and ahead of other mainstream conservative, socialist and liberal parties.
OK, D66 then, what do they stand for?
D66 is a pro-European party that tends to draw in urbanite, high-income voters.
While the party’s pitch in its early days was to have prime ministers and mayors directly elected, in 2025 it focused its campaign on solutions to the Netherlands’ housing crisis, notably with a plan to build new cities. It also picked a hopeful slogan: “It is possible,” evoking former U.S. President Barack Obama’s “Yes We Can” optimism.
The party campaigned on pledges to focus on “affordable, green energy from our own soil” to keep energy prices down, while securing the “healthiest generation ever” by prioritizing the prevention of illness. It also wants greener residential areas and an emphasis on better education.
D66 beefed up its stance on migration, advocating for a system that would have people lodge asylum applications outside Europe, with leader Rob Jetten warily noting the collapse of two successive Dutch governments over asylum policy.
The party also pushed to reclaim the red-white-and-blue tricolor flag as something for mainstream Dutch voters to be proud of after angry farmers turned it upside down in protests and Wilders clutched it for populist-nationalist reasons.
At D66’s election night party in Leiden, their leader told reporters the flags are a way to wave goodbye to recent years “where it sometimes seemed like our country can’t be proud anymore. We’re an amazing country and we can make it even better,” he said.
So who is the leader and what’s his deal?
Once dubbed “Robot Jetten” because of the clunky manner he answered questions, Jetten is now in pole position to become the future prime minister of the Netherlands.
Despite the unfavorable early nickname, the 38-year-old — who is openly gay — has since become a charming and media-savvy poster-boy for D66’s positive and progressive-liberal platform.
“I’ve become a lot grayer and a lot more experienced,” Jetten joked on election night.
He was in line to head the party back in 2018, but stepped aside in favor of veteran diplomat Sigrid Kaag; a move that won him plaudits among party members.
Jetten took the baton from Kaag in 2023 after her hopes of becoming the Netherlands’ first female prime minister were dashed in the previous election.
Is Jetten really going to be the next Dutch prime minister?
If the final results confirm the election night projections, he’s certainly in prime position.
But the real work starts next.
Jetten will have to form a coalition and, to get the numbers for a majority, may need to carry out the unenviable task of convincing the center-right People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) and left-wing GreenLeft-Labor to team up after bitterly campaigning against one another.
The challenge isn’t lost on Jetten. With around 26 seats, D66 is “a small large party, when compared with Dutch history,” he said on election night. “So we’ll have to cooperate with many parties.”
Jetten is also well aware of the challenge that has doomed recent Dutch governments. Migration was once more in the spotlight in the run-up to the election “and it is my ambition that in four years’ time, this will no longer need to be an issue,” Jetten told reporters on election night.
Back to the party, have they been in government before?
Many times, including most recently in the third and fourth governments helmed by longtime liberal leader Mark Rutte. Jetten himself was a climate and energy minister in Rutte’s fourth and final government, in which D66 was the second-largest party.
Before that, D66 has joined coalitions on and off since the early 1970s.
Have I heard of any of the party bigwigs?
You likely have: Diplomat and former Foreign Affairs and Finance Minister Sigrid Kaag led D66 from 2020 until 2023, before returning to the United Nations as the organization’s senior humanitarian and reconstruction coordinator for Gaza.
The EU’s Special Representative for Human Rights Kajsa Ollongren previously filled roles as defense and internal affairs minister for the party.
And then there are the party’s former European lawmakers: Both Marietje Schaake and Sophie in ‘t Veld — who left D66 in 2023 — are well-known names in the Brussels bubble.
What’s their position in Brussels?
D66, which is part of the Renew Europe group in the European Parliament, takes a decidedly more pro-EU stance than we’re used to hearing in the Netherlands, from supporting the implementation of a European migration pact to advocating for the creation of European armed forces.
But despite its pro-European stance, D66 has never filled a major EU post — like, for example, a Dutch commissioner — with most party heavyweights focused on domestic politics instead.
Max Griera contributed to this report.
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