Commentary on Regine Sauter as a candidate for the Council of States

The Zurich delegation to the Council of States has one constant: the FDP. While one Zurich seat in the Stöckli was distributed astonishingly diverse, sometimes SVP, then LdU, sometimes GLP, sometimes SP, the other has been firmly in the hands of liberals for almost four decades.

But this FDP seat is not rock solid. In the last three elections, the party only secured representation in the second ballot. Even the previous Felix Gutzwiller (2011) and Ruedi Noser (2019) only had the certainty of being allowed to continue representing their canton in Bern after the second round.

In the 2023 elections, the FDP seat is again at stake. Noser is no longer running, the Zurich FDP will send National Councilor Regine Sauter into the race instead.

The fact that the liberals are porting a woman is tactically clever. The party is now not vulnerable on the gender side, while at the same time swing voters who care about the gender issue may find Sauter a viable candidate. The fact that the FDP is running with one woman and one man in the Zurich government elections a few months earlier makes it particularly credible.

But being a woman is not enough as an electoral platform. Regine Sauter still has a long way to go. The director of the Zurich Chamber of Commerce is not readily available; her credo, more security at all levels, is unclear, her advances in the National Council seem partly technocratic (“Better statistical bases in occupational pensions”). It will help her that her election campaign is already starting now. The association official now has more than a year to sharpen her profile and to show how she will specifically support the canton of Zurich.

However, the Zurich FDP also has to step out of the fog. She has set herself up far too comfortably in the Council of States in the flat share with the SP. The liberal Noser was supposed to present a completely different, more liberal approach than the left-wing Daniel Jositsch, instead the two even advertised together in the last elections.

Even when he announced his departure from the Council of States, Noser sounded im NZZ interview that you can only forge majorities in the Council of States as a representative of a large faction – i.e. as a member of the FDP, the center or the SP. For all other parties, including the SVP, this is much more difficult.

There may even be something to it in real political everyday life in the Council of States. Nevertheless, cutting the SVP is the wrong approach. The FDP should not forget that in 2019 it was the SVP of all people who saved the liberal seat in the Council of States in Zurich by jumping over their shadow before the second ballot, withdrawing their own candidate Roger Köppel and recommending Noser for election – a step that was highly recommended within the party was controversial because Noser does not politicize particularly close to the SVP either in Europe or in climate issues. At the time, Christoph Blocher even called out to the SVP delegates to close their eyes when voting.

This civic unity, which was born out of necessity at the time, should be aimed for in the 2023 elections right from the start. An undivided bourgeois Zurich professional status, as last from 1998 to 2007, is an – not very realistic – ideal goal. First and foremost, the FDP and SVP must ensure that anyone from their circles is brought back to the Council of States. But that’s only possible if both jump over their own shadow. It will help that Regine Sauter follows a more acceptable course for the SVP than Ruedi Noser on certain core issues.

All other major parties, namely the GLP and the Greens, will also run with their own candidacies. If the commoners fall out, the competition will be happy.