He intended each candidate on the list to specialise in and represent a specific policy area, stating he sought to "people the programme".
[7][3] For his list, Pilz initially presented teacher, musician, and activist Maria Stern, lawyer and consumer advocate Peter Kolba, former Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) politician and animal rights activist Sebastian Bohrn Mena, entrepreneur Stephanie Cox, and lawyer Alfred J.
[7] On 28 July, three National Council deputies defected from their parties and joined the Pilz list: Wolfgang Zinggl and Bruno Rossmann from The Greens and Daniela Holzinger-Vogtenhuber from the SPÖ.
On 18 December 2017, Kolba announced that the Pilz List would not run in the upcoming state elections in Carinthia, Lower Austria, Salzburg, and Tyrol.
He stated the party wanted time to build as a movement, and that they planned to compete in the following European Parliament elections.
This was strongly criticised by other parties, with the women's spokeswomen of both the SPÖ and NEOS stating the allegations against him were "not even partially cleared up".
[23] On 22 May 2018, the Innsbruck public prosecutor's office suspended its investigation of Peter Pilz for sexual harassment due to the alleged victims' inability to press charges.
[28] On 10 July, Sebastian Bohrn Mena was expelled from the parliamentary group without notice after speaking critically of Peter Pilz in an interview.
[33] After a snap legislative election was called in June 2019, Alfred J. Noll, Bruno Rossmann, Wolfgang Zinggl and Stephanie Cox announced they would not seek re-election.
Peter Pilz's former party, the Greens, re-entered parliament with their best ever result, winning 13.9% of votes cast and 26 seats.
[36] After the launch of the party, Die Presse described it as an answer to the Greens' failure to "take the left-wing populist course Pilz recommended," and "at the same time a political experiment.
... Socio-politically the movement is clearly left ... On the other hand, when it comes to the topic of "Migration and Asylum", the initiative should be classified on the right."
They emphasised Pilz's outspoken opposition to "Political Islam", which he described as a greater threat to Austria than right-wing populism.
Political scientist Reinhard Heinisch stated that the Pilz list could occupy space in the "left-wing populist area" which has opened up due to the "rightward drift" of other parties on the left.
He stated the party could target "older, male, left-wing segments of the electorate with a critical emphasis on social issues and immigration and Islam, who may currently feel less wooed by the Greens.
[41] After JETZT failed to win seats in the 2019 legislative election, the party foundation "Education Association - Open Society" retained €1.4 million in public funding which it was not required to repay.
[42] At the unveiling of the party, Pilz stated its official colour is "transparent", but that white would suffice for representation in opinion polls.