DPFP Has Mediocre Results in Japan’s Polls on Sunday, But Party Still Gains More Seats Than Before

The Yomiuri Shimbun

2:00 JST, February 10, 2026

The Democratic Party for the People had a mediocre showing in the House of Representatives election on Sunday, although DPFP executives won single-seat constituencies and the party won more seats than it had before the election.

DPFP leader Yuichiro Tamaki was elected in Kagawa Constituency No. 2, and acting representative Motohisa Furukawa won in Aichi Constituency No. 2.

In the 2024 lower house election, the DPFP won 28 seats, four times the number it held prior to the race.

Tamaki had set two goals in the latest election: securing 51 seats, enough to make the party submit bills on its own in the lower house, and 9 million votes in the proportional representation segment.

However, the presence of the DPFP was somewhat overshadowed because a showdown between the Liberal Democratic Party and the Centrist Reform Alliance became the main focus of the election. The CRA was formed by the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan and Komeito before the election.

In the 2024 election, the DPFP refrained from fielding candidates, in principle, in districts where former legislators of the CDPJ ran, out of consideration for the CDPJ which was supported by the Japanese Trade Union Confederation (Rengo), like the DPFP.

In the latest poll, however, the DPFP actively fielded candidates even in districts where CRA candidates ran, believing that there was no longer a need to show such consideration.

Consequently, the DPFP and the CRA competed in 46 constituencies, vying for votes critical of the ruling parties

During the campaign, Tamaki stressed that his party succeeded in realizing its flagship policies, including those to end provisional surcharges on the gasoline tax and raise the “annual income barrier,” or the threshold at which income tax is levied, to ¥1.78 million. “What we must consider is not the stability of the ruling parties, but that of people’s lives,” Tamaki said.

The DPFP pledged in the campaign that it would cut residential taxes and establish a system to refund social insurance contributions to reduce the burden on the working generation, among other things, but the message did not fully reach voters.

At a press conference in the early hours of Monday, Tamaki denied the possibility that his party would join the ruling coalition. “We will cooperate on policies that should be advanced,” Tamaki said.