Charismatic reform-minded LDP politician in Japan, son of a popular former prime minister. At 44 he would have been Japan's youngest post-war leader had he won the October 2025 contest to succeed Ishiba Shigeru, but he lost in the run-off to Takaichi Sanae, whose support among party elders and the rank-and-file proved decisive.
He also ran in the 2024 leadership race, casting himself as a moderniser, but faced a backlash from the party's rank-and-file, which skews old and male. In 2025 he was more cautious, insisting only that the LDP must remain attuned to "the changing sentiments of the people". He toughened his language on immigration, in part a response to the rise of Sanseito, an anti-immigrant hard-right party.
Thrust into the role of agriculture minister in 2025, he burnished his reformist credentials by helping to stem a crisis over rice prices. He subsequently became Japan's defence minister. At the Honolulu Defence Forum in January 2026 he raised the alarm over "tensions that are on the brink of war across the globe" and warned: "The Indo-Pacific and Euro-Atlantic are inseparable and indivisible." He has been a frequent visitor to the controversial Yasukuni Shrine, which honours Japan's war dead—a habit that makes many in Beijing and Seoul uncomfortable.
I came, I saw, I deleted all your files.