The SP of the Canton of Zurich presents National Councillor Priska Seiler Graf and Winterthur City Councillor Nicolas Galladé as their candidate duo for the Cantonal Government Council elections on April 4, 2027. Delegates will decide on the definitive candidacy on July 4, while at least four of the seven seats will be newly filled.
Zurich, June 5, 2026
The SP of the Canton of Zurich presented National Councillor Priska Seiler Graf and Winterthur City Councillor Nicolas Galladé on Friday as their candidates for the Cantonal Government Council elections on April 4, 2027; delegates will decide on the definitive candidacy on July 4.
The SP of the Canton of Zurich is entering the cantonal Cantonal Government Council elections with a two-person ticket. As the party announced on Friday, National Councillor Priska Seiler Graf and Winterthur City Councillor Nicolas Galladé are to run. The nomination commission expressed its conviction that it had found "suitable persons" for the elections in these two. Both candidates possess high public recognition, political experience, and the ability to appeal to voters beyond the core left-wing electorate, the commission explained.
For the SP, the goal is to defend the existing seat of Cantonal Government Councillor Jacqueline Fehr and additionally win a second seat. The starting situation is open: Jacqueline Fehr is no longer running, and with the independent Director of Security Mario Fehr, who left the SP in 2021 after a dispute, only one SP seat on the council is directly occupied.
The Candidate: Priska Seiler Graf
Priska Seiler Graf is 57 years old, a trained secondary school teacher and ballet instructor, and lives in Kloten. She has been a member of the National Council since 2015 and is the Vice-Chair of the Audit Committee there. Before that, she was a city councillor in Kloten for ten years and a cantonal parliamentarian for ten years. In the NZZ Parliamentarian Rating 2025, she is positioned further to the left than the Aargau SP politician Cédric Wermuth.
Seiler Graf had already run for the Cantonal Government Council in 2023 and received around 120,000 votes. This made her the candidate with the most votes who narrowly missed being elected to the cantonal government. In the election campaign at the time, during which seven incumbents ran again, she was about 25,000 votes short of being elected.
The Candidate: Nicolas Galladé
Nicolas Galladé will turn 51 in June. He was a member of the Zurich Cantonal Council and SP parliamentary group leader in the Cantonal Council from 2007 to 2010, before being elected to the Winterthur City Council in 2010, where he heads the Social Affairs Department. In March 2026, he was re-elected to his office without difficulty. Galladé is the brother of former Zurich National Councillor Chantal Galladé, who was formerly SP and now belongs to the GLP.
Open Starting Situation in the Zurich Cantonal Government Council
The starting situation for the elections on April 4, 2027, is unusually open. At least four of the seven seats on the Zurich Cantonal Government Council will be newly filled: In addition to Jacqueline Fehr, the Centre Party Education Director Silvia Steiner, the SVP Finance Director Ernst Stocker, and the FDP Economic Director Carmen Walker Späh are also not running again.
For the SVP, Health Director Natalie Rickli has officially announced she will run again, but at the same time has also expressed interest in a candidacy for the Council of States. National Councillor and farmer Martin Hübscher is running for the SVP. For the FDP, National Councillor Andri Silberschmidt is considered a sure candidate.
Candidate Field of Other Parties
For The Centre Party, National Councillor Philipp Kutter is applying as a priority candidate, and among others, Meilen municipal councillor and cantonal councillor Marzena Kopp has expressed interest. GLP co-president and Winterthur parliament member Nora Ernst wants to run, and for the EVP, cantonal councillor and real estate expert Donato Scognamiglio is running. Director of Bausparen Martin Neukom (Greens) intends to run again.
It remains unclear what independent Director of Security Mario Fehr plans. The SP hopes that with the open starting situation and the strong personnel lineup, an additional seat can be won. In the election year 2019, when two seats were up for election, around 116,000 votes were needed to be elected.
The definitive candidacy of Seiler Graf and Galladé will be decided at the party congress on July 4. The SP selection committee plans to present the two-person ticket to the delegates and then have them decide on the definitive candidacy. The departure of Daniel Jositsch from the SP on Thursday, who was a prominent figure in Zurich politics as a member of the Council of States, is also being closely watched.
With the official candidacies outside the SP, the number of contenders for the Cantonal Government Council seats continues to rise. The Zurich Cantonal Council elections in 2027 are thus shaping up to be one of the most open Cantonal Government Council elections in a long time, in which the party-political composition of the cantonal government will need to be rebalanced.
Questions & Answers
Who are the SP candidates for the Zurich Cantonal Government Council?
The SP is fielding National Councillor Priska Seiler Graf and Winterthur City Councillor Nicolas Galladé; delegates will decide on the definitive candidacy on July 4.
How many seats on the Zurich Cantonal Government Council will be newly filled in 2027?
At least four of the seven seats are open, as Jacqueline Fehr (SP), Silvia Steiner (The Centre), Ernst Stocker (SVP), and Carmen Walker Späh (FDP) are not running again.
Which other candidacies are known so far?
For the SVP, Natalie Rickli and Martin Hübscher are running; for the FDP, Andri Silberschmidt is considered set; The Centre is relying on Philipp Kutter; and the GLP and EVP are fielding Nora Ernst and Donato Scognamiglio respectively.
