–I think that's a difficult question to answer, says a holiday-dressed Åkesson after a press conference and a joint election rally at Fiskartorget in Söderköping.
In Statistics Sweden's major party sympathy survey in June, the red-green parties led by 12 percentage points over the Tidö bloc: the three government parties and the SD. And this despite the Tidö parties having fulfilled much of what they promised voters in the election four years ago. The SD, for its part, is hoping for support that is no lower than its result in the last election, 20.5 percent.
"I am quite certain that many voters appreciate what we have done," says Åkesson, but notes that this is, at least not yet, visible in voter support.
Norwegian model
In Söderköping, the first stop on Åkesson's five-day election tour along the Göta Canal, the SD leader, group leader Linda Lindberg, and rural policy spokesperson Mattias Karlsson will be speaking. They will talk about support for village schools during downturns and upswings in childbearing, a sense of home, a Norwegian model for rural support, and being the "guarantor" of lower fuel prices.
"I think our slogan of security, freedom and Swedishness sums up what Sweden needs," says the SD leader.
Migration and law and order issues do not seem to be catching on with voters as they did in the 2022 election. Recently, the party's migration policy spokesperson Ludvig Aspling attracted attention with a statement, in an interview with the newspaper ETC, about why immigrants who have received Swedish citizenship should also be able to apply for repatriation grants.
“Unfortunate”
“There are far too many people in the population who are not ethnic Swedes,” said Aspling. The SD's principle program from 2023 states that things like skin color and ethnicity are irrelevant to whether someone is considered Swedish.
Åkesson says Aspling's statement was "unfortunate." SD has not changed back to a previous view.
But what is political is that Swedishness is based on what citizenship you have.
