With less than a week to go before Sweden’s general elections, a new opinion survey has revealed that a majority of Swedes believe the immigration policy proposed by the national-conservative Sweden Democrats is the best among the country’s political parties.
The poll, carried out by the newspaper Dagens Nyheter alongside the international market research firm Ipsos, has revealed that 35% of voters view the Sweden Democrats’ immigration program—which seeks to reduce immigration to the lowest level among European countries—as the most favorable to Swedish interests.
The leftist-globalist Social Democratic Party and the centrist Moderate Party came in a distant second and third place, with 16% and 9% of voters, respectively, favoring their immigration policies most
The 35% figure represents a significant uptick compared to numbers recorded in the same survey published in April, where 26% of voters stated that the Sweden Democrats had the best policy on refugee and immigration issues.
Additionally, in matters concerning law and order—another policy area voters see as of principal importance—a majority (21%) think the Sweden Democrats program is best. The Moderate Party and the Social Democrats came in second and third place, at 20% and 18%, respectively.
The polling figures come less than a week after Jimmie Åkesson, the leader of the Sweden Democrats, announced that asylum immigration would be reduced to “close to zero” if his party enters government.
“We cannot continue to hold Sweden’s welfare system open for everyone who wants to access it,” Åkesson said.
Presently, the Sweden Democrats are polling in second place, at 18%. If elections were held today, the center-Right opposition—composed of the Sweden Democrats, the Moderate Party, and the Christian Democrats—would garner some 40% of the national vote.
