Wilhelmus Simon Petrus Fortuijn

Wilhelmus Simon Petrus Fortuijn, known as Pim Fortuyn , was a gay anti-Islamic Dutch politician and academic who founded the party Pim Fortuyn List (Lijst Pim Fortuyn or LPF) in 2002 and who was assassinated that same year.

Fortuyn worked as a professor at the Erasmus University of Rotterdam and became prominent in the Netherlands as a press columnist. Initially a Marxist who was sympathetic to the Communist Party of the Netherlands, and later a member of the Dutch Labour Party in the 1970s, Fortuyn's beliefs began to shift to the right in the 1990s in response to the immigration policies of the Netherlands.

Fortuyn prompted controversy with his views on multiculturalism, immigration and Islam in the Netherlands. He called Islam "a backward culture", and was quoted as saying that if it were legally possible, he would close the borders for Muslim immigrants.

Fortuyn also supported tougher measures against crime and opposed state bureaucracy, wanting to reduce the Dutch financial contribution to the European Union.

 He was labelled a far-right populist by his opponents and in the media, but he fiercely rejected this label. 

Fortuyn was openly homosexual and a supporter of gay rights.

Fortuyn explicitly distanced himself from "far-right" politicians such as the Belgian Filip Dewinter, Austrian Jörg Haider, or Frenchman Jean-Marie Le Pen whenever compared to them. While he compared his own politics to centre-right politicians such as Silvio Berlusconi of Italy and Edmund Stoiber of Germany, he also admired former Dutch Prime Minister Joop den Uyl, a social democrat, and Democratic U.S. president John F. Kennedy. Fortuyn also criticised the polder model and the policies of the outgoing government of Wim Kok and repeatedly described himself and LPF's ideology as pragmatic and not populistic.

In March 2002, his newly created LPF became the largest party in Fortuyn's hometown Rotterdam during the Dutch municipal elections held that year.

Fortuyn was assassinated during the 2002 Dutch national election campaign by Volkert van der Graaf, a left-wing environmentalist and animal rights activist.

 In court at his trial, van der Graaf said he murdered Fortuyn to stop him from exploiting Muslims as "scapegoats" and targeting "the weak members of society" in seeking political power. 

The LPF went on to poll in second place during the election but went into decline soon after.

On 6 May 2002, at age 54, Fortuyn was assassinated by gunshot in Hilversum, North Holland, by Volkert van der Graaf. The attack took place in a parking lot outside a radio studio where Fortuyn had just given an interview. This was nine days before the general election, for which he was running. The attacker was pursued by Hans Smolders, Fortuyn's driver, and was arrested by the police shortly afterward, still in possession of a handgun.

 Months later, Van der Graaf confessed in court to the first notable political assassination in the Netherlands since 1672 (excluding World War II), and on 15 April 2003, he was convicted of assassinating Fortuyn and sentenced to 18 years in prison. He was released on parole in May 2014 after serving two-thirds of his sentence, the standard procedure under the Dutch penal system.