In the Czech Republic, power has revealed itself to be a divided inheritance: Andrej Babis, the populist billionaire who reclaimed the prime ministership in October 2025, sought to extend his mandate into the Senate and found the door closed. Opposition parties aligned with Western Europe claimed 22 of 27 contested seats, leaving Babis' ANO movement without a single new lawmaker in the upper chamber. The result is not mere electoral arithmetic — it is a democratic architecture asserting itself, with voters in two successive elections drawing careful distinctions between who should govern and w
Babis' Coalition Shut Out in Czech Senate Elections as Opposition Retains Control
We certainly didn't expect not to win a single seat
Mark
So Babis won the parliamentary elections last October and came back to power. Why did the Senate elections go so differently?
Mimi
The Senate and lower house serve different functions and voters seem to have treated them that way. The lower house is where most laws get made, and Babis won there. But the Senate controls constitutional amendments and court appointments—the deeper institutional stuff. Opposition voters showed up to protect that.
Luke
Do we know if turnout was different between the two elections, or if some of the same voters just split their ballots? The source doesn't say.
Mimi
That's a fair gap. We know the results, but not the voter behavior underneath them.
Mark
What does Babis actually want to do that the Senate could block?
Mimi
He's already ended military support for Ukraine and opposed EU climate policies. Now he's planning to restructure public broadcaster funding, which is usually code for reducing editorial independence.
Luke
The broadcaster plan is described as unpopular—unpopular with whom? The public? Other parties? That matters for understanding whether the Senate opposition reflects broader public concern or just institutional positioning.
Mark
And the Senate can actually stop him on these things?
Mimi
On constitutional changes and court appointments, yes. On regular legislation, the lower house dominates. So it depends what he's trying to do.
Luke
Right. The source says the Senate has "a big say" in amendments and judges, but doesn't detail what happens if Babis tries to pass something the Senate blocks. That's the real test ahead.
Mark
So this is a preview of the next four years—coalition government in practice.
Mimi
Exactly. Babis has the power to govern, but not to govern alone.
The Pulse
- Babis entered the Senate elections riding the momentum of a parliamentary victory, only to walk away with nothing — his own word for it was 'catastrophic.'
- ANO now holds just 14 Senate seats in an 81-member chamber dominated by pro-Western opposition, leaving the ruling coalition structurally isolated in the one body that controls constitutional amendments and judicial appointments.
- The stakes are not abstract: Babis has already ended military aid to Ukraine, broken with EU climate policy, and is preparing a controversial overhaul of public broadcaster funding that critics see as a move against press independence.
- Opposition control of the Senate gives pro-Western parties a durable institutional brake — not enough to reverse lower-house legislation, but enough to block the constitutional and judicial changes that would entrench Babis' agenda.
- Babis has vowed to press forward regardless, but Czech voters have now sent two different signals from two different elections, engineering a divided government that is less a failure of democracy than a feature of it.
In the Czech Republic, power has revealed itself to be a divided inheritance: Andrej Babis, the populist billionaire who reclaimed the prime ministership in October 2025, sought to extend his mandate into the Senate and found the door closed. Opposition parties aligned with Western Europe claimed 22 of 27 contested seats, leaving Babis' ANO movement without a single new lawmaker in the upper chamber. The result is not mere electoral arithmetic — it is a democratic architecture asserting itself, with voters in two successive elections drawing careful distinctions between who should govern and who should guard.
Andrej Babis arrived at the Czech Senate elections expecting to build on his October 2025 parliamentary triumph. He left without a single new seat. When ballots closed, opposition parties had claimed 22 of the 27 contested positions in the 81-member chamber, and Babis himself called the outcome catastrophic.
His ANO movement — the acronym means YES in Czech — now holds just 14 Senate lawmakers, a position of near-isolation in a body where pro-Western, NATO-aligned parties hold firm control. It was the first real electoral test of his return to power after four years in opposition, and it exposed a fault line in Czech public sentiment: the same electorate that handed him the lower house drew a different boundary at the upper one.
That boundary matters. The Senate is not a ceremonial body. It holds authority over constitutional amendments and the appointment of Constitutional Court judges — the mechanisms through which a country's legal future is shaped. For Babis, whose government has already ended direct military support for Ukraine, broken with EU climate policy, and is now preparing an overhaul of public broadcaster funding, opposition control of the Senate represents a structural constraint on his most consequential ambitions.
He has vowed to govern regardless. And in the lower house, where his coalition holds its majority, most legislation will still move on his terms. But Czech voters have now spoken twice in succession and said something precise: here is the man we want to lead, and here is the institution we want to keep from his reach. It is divided government not by accident, but by democratic design.
Andrej Babis walked into the Czech Senate elections on Saturday expecting to build on his October 2025 parliamentary victory. Instead, his ruling coalition left empty-handed. When the two-day ballot closed, opposition parties had claimed 22 of the 27 contested seats in the 81-member chamber, cementing their control of the upper house and delivering what Babis himself described as a catastrophic result.
The populist billionaire's ANO movement, which means YES in Czech, won no new seats at all. The party now holds 14 Senate lawmakers total—a position of isolation in a chamber where pro-Western opposition parties dominate. Babis acknowledged the sting directly. "We certainly didn't expect that we wouldn't win a single Senate seat in this election," he said, though he signaled his government would press forward regardless.
The Senate election marked the first real electoral test for Babis since his return to power. He had been out of office for four years before his parliamentary victory last October. That lower house win gave him the mandate to form a government and set policy direction. But the Senate result suggests the Czech electorate drew a different line. Opposition parties, aligned with Western Europe and NATO, retained their institutional foothold precisely where it matters most for constraining executive power.
The Senate's role in Czech governance is not ceremonial. The chamber holds decisive authority over constitutional amendments and the appointment of Constitutional Court judges. These are the levers that shape a country's legal and institutional future. With opposition control, Babis faces a structural brake on his most ambitious plans—and his government has already signaled what those plans are. His coalition has ended direct military support for Ukraine as it defends itself against Russian invasion. It has opposed European Union climate policies. It is now preparing an unpopular overhaul of public broadcaster funding, a move that typically signals intent to reshape media independence.
Babis vowed to pursue his agenda regardless of the Senate setback. But the mathematics of Czech governance have shifted. The lower house, where his coalition holds sway, drives most legislation. The Senate, now firmly in opposition hands, becomes the place where constitutional questions and judicial appointments get decided. It is a divided government by design—not because of gridlock, but because voters in two consecutive elections sent different signals about what they wanted from different parts of their political system.
Notable Quotes
We certainly didn't expect that we wouldn't win a single Senate seat in this election— Prime Minister Andrej Babis
Babis called the result catastrophic— Prime Minister Andrej Babis
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