2023 Turkish parliamentary election

At the initiative of the ruling AKP and its main political ally MHP, the national electoral threshold for a party to enter parliament was lowered from 10% to 7%.[4] This was the first lowering of the threshold since it was introduced by the military junta following the 1980 Turkish coup d'état.[5]

There is no threshold for independent candidates.[6] Political parties can also opt to contest the election in a political alliance with other parties, removing the 7% requirement as long as the alliance as a whole wins more than 7% of the vote in total.

Other amendments to the election law includes the distribution of seats. Previously, parliamentary seats were distributed based on the vote share of each election alliance in any given district. Now, the seats are distributed based solely on the vote share of each political party in that district. If applied to the previous elections, the results would have been slightly more in line with the preferences of the voters on local level. For example, one Erzurum seat from IYI (4th largest party in Erzurum) would have gone to HDP (3rd largest party in Erzurum) and one Elazığ seat from CHP (3rd largest party in Elazığ) to MHP (2nd largest party in Elazığ).[7]

Turkey is split into 87 electoral districts, which elect a certain number of Members to the Grand National Assembly of Turkey. The Assembly has a total of 600 seats, with each electoral district allocated a certain number of MPs in proportion to their population. The Supreme Electoral Council of Turkey conducts population reviews of each district before the election and can increase or decrease a district's number of seats according to their electorate.

In all but four cases, electoral districts share the same name and borders as the 81 provinces, with the exceptions being Ankara, Bursa, Izmir and Istanbul. Provinces electing between 19 and 36 MPs are split into two electoral districts, while any province electing above 36 MPs is divided into three. As the country's most populous provinces, Bursa and Izmir are divided into two subdistricts while Ankara and Istanbul are divided into three. The distribution of elected MPs per electoral district is shown below.[8]

The table below shows the places of alliances, parties, and independent candidates in the order they appear on the ballot paper:[lower-alpha 6]

The below table shows the remaining parties that were eligible to contest the election but decided run on the lists of other parties or decided not to field candidates.

Party			Chairperson	Main ideology	Supporting alliance	Course of action
	DEVA	Democracy and Progress Party	Ali Babacan	Liberal conservatism	Nation Alliance	YContesting from list of Republican People's Party
	DSP	Democratic Left Party (Turkey)	Önder Aksakal	Social democracy	People's Alliance	YContesting from list of Justice and Development Party
	DP	Democrat Party	Gültekin Uysal	Liberal conservatism	Nation Alliance	YContesting from list of Republican People's Party
	SP	Felicity Party	Temel Karamollaoğlu	Millî Görüş	Nation Alliance	YContesting from list of Republican People's Party
	HÜDA PAR	Free Cause Party	Zekeriya Yapıcıoğlu	Kurdish Islamism	People's Alliance	YContesting from list of Justice and Development Party
	GP	Future Party	Ahmet Davutoğlu	Conservatism	Nation Alliance	YContesting from list of Republican People's Party
	BÜYÜK TÜRKİYE	Great Turkey Party	Hüseyin Durmaz	Turkish nationalism	People's Alliance	NThe party withdrew to support People's Alliance[14]
	BTP	Independent Turkey Party	Hüseyin Baş	Civic nationalism	Nation Alliance	NThe party withdrew to support Nation Alliance[15]
	EMEK	Labour Party	Ercüment Akdeniz	Marxism–Leninism	Labour and Freedom Alliance	YContesting from list of Party of Greens and the Left Future
	YTP	New Turkey Party	Engin Yılmaz	Social conservatism	—	—
	TDP	Party for Change in Turkey	Mustafa Sarıgül	Social democracy	Nation Alliance	YContesting from list of Republican People's Party
	HDP	Peoples' Democratic Party	Mithat Sancar & Pervin Buldan	Minority rights	Labour and Freedom Alliance	YContesting from list of Party of Greens and the Left Future

During the election campaign, several occurrences that took place have been labelled as political violence. On 31 March 2023, the Istanbul headquarters of the Good Party was targeted in a shooting attack.[17] No one was harmed in the shooting. Akşener criticised Erdoğan after the attack by saying "A political party cannot be intimidated one and a half months before an election. We are not afraid. I fear nothing but God. Mr. Recep (Erdoğan), I am not afraid of you. But you are the president and you are responsible for every citizen in this country." The attackers were emboldened by the president's harsh words against the opposition, Akşener said.[18][19][20] Upon investigation, it became clear that a nighttime security guard had fired his gun at burglars – only to hit the building by mistake with two stray bullets. President Erdoğan said in response to Akşener "The truth has come out, are you now going to apologize to me?"[21]

Recent attacks on other parties have raised issues of political polarisation and security in the country.[22][23]

On 1 May, a group of unidentified individuals armed with guns and sticks assaulted HUDAPAR youth members in Mersin. HUDAPAR was hosting an election campaign stand to help their electoral ally the AK Party. The HDP denied links to the attack, and urged its supporters to refrain against provocations.[24]