Sweden votes in national election that could see Sweden Democrats enter cabinet

Swedes are voting Sunday to elect all 349 members of the Riksdag in a national election that will determine who gets to try to form the next government — and whether Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson can stay in office or former Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson can bring the center-left back to power.

A total of 8,046,725 people are eligible to vote in the parliamentary election, according to Valmyndigheten, Sweden’s Election Authority. Polling stations are open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. local time, and advance voting runs through election day. Valmyndigheten will publish official preliminary and final results.

The vote is for Sweden’s parliament, not a direct election for prime minister. But the makeup of the 349-seat Riksdag will decide which bloc has the path to governing after the ballots are counted.

Kristersson, the leader of the Moderate Party, is seeking a second four-year term after taking office on Oct. 18, 2022. His main challenger is Andersson, the leader of the Social Democrats and a former prime minister, who is trying to return the center-left to power.

The central question in the campaign has been whether Kristersson’s conservative governing arrangement continues or whether Andersson can assemble enough parliamentary support to replace it. The sharpest dividing line has been the future role of the Sweden Democrats, an anti-immigration party with far-right roots that has moderated its rhetoric under leader Jimmie Åkesson.

Kristersson’s current government is a coalition of the Moderates, Christian Democrats and Liberals. It has governed since 2022 with support from the Sweden Democrats under the Tidö Agreement, which kept the party outside the cabinet while giving it influence over policy.

This time, Kristersson has said that could change. Reuters reported on April 1 that he said the Moderates would seek a majority government that includes the Sweden Democrats if the right-wing bloc wins, with the party holding ministerial posts. “After the election, we will form a four-party majority government,” Kristersson said.

That prospect has made the Sweden Democrats’ possible entry into cabinet the campaign’s clearest test of what kind of government Sweden could get next. In the 2022 election, the party won about 20.5% of the vote and became the largest party on the right, according to AP. Nicholas Aylott, an associate professor of political science quoted by AP, said: “There’s some, I won’t say fear, but trepidation, apprehension about the possibility of Sweden Democrat ministers.”

What happens next will depend on the balance of seats in the Riksdag, not simply on which party finishes first. Under Sweden’s system, the speaker of parliament proposes a candidate for prime minister after the election. That candidate is approved unless 175 lawmakers vote against them.

The election comes as Sweden is still adjusting to a changed security role in Europe after becoming NATO’s 32nd member on March 7, 2024. But Sunday’s immediate decision is domestic and parliamentary: which parties win the seats needed to support the next government, and whether that government includes the Sweden Democrats formally for the first time.