TOKYO, FEB 8: Voting is underway in Japan’s snap elections, despite the heavy snowfall, which is affecting Tokyo and other cities.

Despite the severe cold, people are heading to polling stations to exercise their right to vote. Election forecasts said that Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s party could win 300 or more of the 465 seats. 

Moreover, Takaichi, 64, who became prime minister in October after being selected LDP leader, called the rare winter election to try to ride a wave of personal popularity.

With a straight-talking style and an image as a hard worker that have won her support, Takaichi has accelerated military spending to counter China, angering Beijing, and pushed for a sales-tax cut that has rattled financial markets.

“If Takaichi wins big, she will have more political room to follow through on key commitments, including on consumption-tax cuts,” said Seiji Inada, managing director at FGS Global, a consultancy. “Markets could react in the following days, and the yen could come under renewed pressure.”

Her promise to suspend the 8% sales tax on food for two years to help households cope with rising prices has spooked investors concerned about how the nation with the heaviest debt burden among advanced economies will fund the plan.

Niigata resident Mineko Mori, 74, padding through the snow with her dog early on Sunday, said she worried that Takaichi’s tax cuts could saddle future generations with an even bigger burden.

Mori planned to vote for Sanseito, a small far-right party that broke through in a 2025 upper house ballot with promises to crack down on badly behaved foreigners and control immigration.

But younger voters are among the most supportive of Takaichi, with one recent poll finding more than 90% of those under 30 favoured her.

The prime minister has sparked an unlikely youth-led craze called “sanakatsu”, roughly translated as “Sanae-mania”, with the products she uses, such as her handbag and the pink pen she scribbles notes with in parliament, in high demand.

That young cohort, however, is less likely to vote than the older generations that have long been the bedrock of LDP support.

On Thursday, Takaichi received the endorsement of U.S. President Donald Trump, a signal that may appeal to right-leaning voters.

If the coalition of Takaichi’s LDP with the Japan Innovation Party, known as Ishin, wins a supermajority of 310 seats, she could override the upper chamber, where the coalition does not have a majority.

On the other side, general elections are also taking place in Thailand, and voting is in progress.