Swedes Vote Early as Sweden Democrats Seek Cabinet Role

Swedish voters headed to early polling stations on Saturday in a national election whose central question is not so much which party finishes first as which side can assemble a parliamentary majority.

More than 8 million of the country's roughly 10.6 million people are eligible to vote for the 349-seat Riksdag, which will in turn choose the next prime minister. The Swedish Election Authority said more than a third of voters had already cast early ballots.

At a voting station in Stockholm, voters queued to register and enter the booths. Carol Farber, a voter from Eskilstuna, said she hoped people would turn out and that "some changes will be made, not just promises," describing a campaign that had been "very heated." Petri Dahlström, voting in the capital, said he wanted as many people as possible to vote for what they believe in, adding that the outcome felt "very like 50/50 at this point."

Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson is seeking a second four-year term at the helm of the European Union nation that is also NATO's newest member. He has led since 2022 with a three-party centre-right coalition that depends on outside support from the Sweden Democrats, an anti-immigration party with far-right roots that has moved toward the political mainstream, for its parliamentary majority.

Kristersson announced in April that his conservative Moderates would allow the Sweden Democrats into government if the right secures a majority, though he would remain prime minister even if they emerge as the stronger party. The Sweden Democrats, who took 20.5% of the vote in 2022 to become the largest party on the right, can expect cabinet posts if power does not change hands.

Challenging him is Magdalena Andersson of the centre-left Social Democrats, who served as prime minister from 2021 until her defeat at the last election. "It's up to the Swedish people," she said, adding that she hoped voters had seen that the country "needs to take a new direction, where we can come together and make our country strong again."

Sweden Democrats leader Jimmie Åkesson, who has led the party since 2005 and overseen its growth from a marginal force, cast his own early ballot and addressed supporters at a rally. He said the four parties on his side of politics had shown over the past four years that they could cooperate constructively despite differing ideologies and priorities, and could "get Sweden moving in the right direction again."

The contest pits two four-party blocs against each other, with individual parties needing at least 4% of the vote to win seats. The Sweden Democrats were founded in the 1980s by people active in right-wing extremist groups, including neo-Nazis, and later toned down their rhetoric and expelled openly racist members under Åkesson.

Their role is in focus amid broader gains for the populist right in Europe, including a first-place finish by the far-right Alternative for Germany in a regional election last weekend. Experts say the Swedish campaign has been fragmented, with policy questions such as how healthcare should be organised drowned out by debate over which parties can put together a government.