New Zealand votes in an election expected to be tight after a tense campaign

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — New Zealand’s election results will be announced Saturday after a tense campaign left the main contenders neck and neck with no clear route to victory for either, as voters evaluated three years of conservative rule.

Analysts don't expect a simple majority for either the governing coalition, led by the center-right National party, or the opposition bloc led by center-left Labour. The uncertainty may reflect voter discontent about both major parties as economic problems linger following international shocks that have buffeted New Zealand’s trade-based economy.

There's also growing support for politicians on the ideological flanks, a global trend that has gathered pace in New Zealand later than elsewhere. An unclear result could throw greater power to minor, more populist parties.

The National leader Christopher Luxon faces a tough fight for a second term as prime minister after facing two confidence votes among his own lawmakers this year. Meanwhile, Labour’s Chris Hipkins seeks a second chance at power after a resounding defeat three years ago.

Voting began Oct. 26 with results due for release after polling places close Saturday evening. New Zealand has a single house of government, and there are no states. The central government, elected for three-year terms, holds ultimate sway over the country’s direction.

Neither major party leader has managed to connect strongly with voters, analysts said.

Luxon’s party won the 2023 election on pledges to reverse New Zealand’s post-pandemic economic malaise. While he highlights trade deals signed during his tenure, economic recovery has been slow and unemployment reached an 11-year high in the September quarter.

New Zealand’s stubbornly steep costs of living send thousands of people each year to live in the country's larger, wealthier neighbor Australia.

“You’ve got an incumbent coalition government which is struggling with the same incumbency problems that we’re seeing in our Western democracies around the world,” said Ben Thomas, a former National government press secretary and now the director of a public affairs firm.

However, Hipkins and his Labour party, who are pledging to ease living costs and fund New Zealand’s struggling public healthcare system, haven’t surged in support either. Neither Labour nor National has recorded more than 30% of the vote in polls close to Nov. 7.

“I think there is a broader mistrust in the electorate of both of our traditional two major parties,” said Thomas.

That sentiment has been a windfall for smaller parties that Luxon or Hipkins would rely upon to form a governing coalition.

New Zealanders don’t elect prime ministers. Instead they cast two votes, one for their preferred party and one to select a local representative.

To govern, a coalition of parties must hold more than half of parliament’s seats. The total number of seats is determined by official calculations on election night based on quirks of the country’s vote.

National in 2023 joined with two right-wing parties, populist New Zealand First and libertarian ACT, to form the country’s most conservative modern government. Detractors of Luxon, a business executive who entered parliament in 2020, note his political inexperience compared to the leaders in his power-sharing deal.

In particular, the minor parties sought to repeal legal recognition of Indigenous Māori rights. About 100,000 people marched on Parliament to oppose one of the measures secured by ACT in its governing deal with Luxon.

The power that the smaller parties won from Luxon, said Bernard Hickey, an economic and political analyst, “created this surprise, I think, for many voters that the tail was wagging the dog for the first time. In fact, there were two tails wagging one dog.”

On Hipkins’ side, the left-wing Green party has also experienced strong support. Another traditional Labour coalition partner is Te Pati Māori, an Indigenous rights group.

Hipkins, a career politician, was thrust into the premiership nine months before the 2023 election when his predecessor Jacinda Ardern quit. Labour hasn't surged in popularity since losing that vote.

“Whoever is in government after November 7 … will have to reckon with much more assertive minor parties that want much greater concessions and much more influence than they’ve had in the past,” Thomas said.

Election deadlocks have previously seen the two blocs race to establish a coalition deal by wooing a minor party that holds the balance of power. Recent polls suggest Saturday’s election could yield such a result if The Opportunity Party is elected to Parliament for the first time.

The group's candidates are centrist, socially liberal technocrats who favor a land tax, universal basic income and pro-environment measures. The party’s new leader, 38-year-old Qiulae Wong, who has worked in business but not in politics, has pledged to negotiate first with whichever party wins the most votes if she holds the tiebreaker role.

Luxon has ruled out governing with Opportunity. Analysts say, however, that both major party leaders would likely answer the phone if Wong held the only path to power on election night.

A loss for a single-term government like Luxon’s would be unprecedented in modern times in a country where second terms are all but guaranteed. Voters in the South Pacific nation of 5 million people had before 2023 favored long alternating stretches of National and Labour-led governments.

That was seen as reflecting a largely contented public who believed the country was going in the right direction. The sentiment lingered in New Zealand long after countries such as the United States and Britain began to experience political fracture; but it swung sharply to a negative mood for the first time five years ago in the pandemic era as global tumult increased.

Thomas, the analyst, said that the public is “certainly more polarized than ever.”

Officials aim to release results on election night from 95% of votes cast. A final tally is due on Nov. 27.

Political party billboards are seen in a suburb of Wellington, New Zealand, Saturday, Oct. 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Charlotte Graham-McLay)

The Opportunity Party leader Qiulae Wong poses for a portrait outside Parliament in Wellington, New Zealand, Friday, Oct. 30, 2026. (AP Photo/Charlotte Graham-McLay)

Labour Party leader Chris Hipkins shakes hands with a supporter at a shopping center while campaigning for election in Waikanae, New Zealand, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Charlotte Graham-McLay)

People place their voting papers in ballot boxes at a voting booth in Wellington, New Zealand, Monday, Nov. 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Charlotte Graham-McLay)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer is vowing that Democrats will not allow President Donald Trump to put “a right-winger” on the Supreme Court once they take power, raising the possibility that his party could block a presidential nominee if there is a vacancy in the next two years.

In an interview with The Associated Press on Thursday, Schumer would not say if he would hold a Supreme Court vacancy open until after the next presidential election, as former Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell did in 2016. But he said that Democrats are “not going to allow any crappy nominees” to be confirmed to the Supreme Court — or to the lower courts or Trump’s Cabinet, either.

“The bottom line is we’re not going to allow a right-winger on the court,” Schumer said.

Schumer’s pledge came two days after Democrats won a decisive Senate majority in the midterm elections — a feat few predicted a year ago, when Schumer was facing intense criticism from progressives within his party and Senate Republicans were betting that a favorable map and backing from Trump would help them keep power.

While there is still frustration with Schumer in some corners of the party, the New Yorker is expected to easily be reelected as leader by his caucus after leading them to wins in Republican-leaning states across the country. Democrats could have as many as 56 seats in the Senate if they win Mississippi and Alaska, which still have not been called — “a durable majority,” Schumer predicts, that has been 20 years in the making as he has been directly or indirectly in charge of his party’s Senate campaign operation.

With so many seats, Schumer is betting that “it’s not just a flip of the Senate once.” And the party will have the power not only to reject any of Trump’s nominees, forcing him to seek more moderate choices, but also to halt the Iran war and alter policies that they have been unable to counter in the minority.

Schumer says the party’s agenda will center around lowering prices, along with five issues that they have focused on in the minority — healthcare, housing, Trump’s tariffs, childcare and lowering energy bills. He has said Democrats will try to ban federal elected officials from stock trades, and limit consumer costs from data center expansion.

Democrats also want to investigate Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids across the country and scrutinize the Trump administration, which he says is the “most corrupted administration by far in American history.”

But Schumer would not get into specifics, or how he plans to get around Trump — who posted a picture of a red hat with the word “veto” in large letters on election night.

Beyond Trump, Schumer will also have to navigate his own caucus, including progressives who have criticized him and incoming freshman who won red states and would not commit to supporting him for leader during their campaigns. And to pass any legislation, he will still have to win Republican support as well.

He predicts that Republicans will suffer more losses “and keep following Trump over the cliff” if they don't work with Democrats in a bipartisan way.

But that will not be easy. Schumer would not say if he would try and eliminate the filibuster, which he tried and failed to do when he was majority leader during President Joe Biden’s term, to allow Democrats to pass legislation with a simple majority instead of 60 votes.

“The focus has got to be on getting things done,” he says. “That’s all I am saying.”

Asked if he would support a third Trump impeachment after Trump was impeached and acquitted twice during his first term, Schumer responds that he would support an impeachment of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, an effort that House lawmakers have already launched.

And Trump? “That’s up to the House,” Schumer said.

Schumer first led his party’s campaign arm in the 2006 cycle and has had a hand in every election since then, with mixed results.

He attributes this year's wins to good candidates and a focus on local issues in Republican states — the effect of Trump’s tariffs on farms in Iowa, where Democrat Josh Turek won, Trump’s war with Canada in Maine, where Democrat Troy Jackson beat Republican Sen. Susan Collins, and data centers in Ohio, where former Sen. Sherrod Brown won after losing his seat two years ago to Republican Sen. Bernie Moreno.

Still, the party's focus on lowering costs was “a message that resonated everywhere,” he says. “That’s a big difference than in the past.”

The Democrats who won were not all his recruits — in Michigan, Democrat Abdul El-Sayed represents the progressive wing of the party and beat Schumer’s original choice for the seat, Haley Stevens, in the primary. But Schumer poured $67 million into that race to help El-Sayed and the two “talk regularly,” he said.

Even with his winning record this year, it is still unclear how long he will stay in power — and how long the party will support him as some call for a new generation of leadership. He is up for reelection in 2028, and he won’t say if he’ll run again for a sixth term.

“I’m focused on 2027,” said Schumer, who became the party's Senate leader in 2015.

Senators in his caucus are sticking by him, but many are also agitating for change as they enter a new era of power.

Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a potential contender for the 2028 presidential nomination who has not committed to supporting Schumer, said in an interview with the AP on Wednesday that Democrats need to have an “open and honest discussion” about the next leader.

Vermont Sen. Peter Welch said in a separate interview that Schumer “has to adjust and open things up and take into account the criticism of our efforts.”

Still, Welch said, there’s no indication of a leadership challenge. “Schumer did an incredible job on this campaign,” he said.

Associated Press writers Joey Cappelletti and Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report.

Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., speaks at the Center for American Progress (CAP) post election forum, Thursday, Nov. 5, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., speaks at the Center for American Progress (CAP) post election forum, Thursday, Nov. 5, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., speaks at the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee office, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Allison Robbert)

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., speaks at the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee office, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Allison Robbert)