Stockholm, Sweden – Jimmie Akesson, leader of the far-right Sweden Democrats (SD), cast his early ballot in Rinkeby, a Stockholm suburb where most residents have a minority background.

“It was a political stunt,” said 18-year-old Sumeyah Ali. “It was meant to provoke.”

After voting, Akesson told reporters Rinkeby “doesn’t look like Sweden … Sweden shouldn’t look like this, I think.”

His provocative comments were designed to fuel the party’s anti-immigration and Islamophobic rhetoric, said Ali at an office space for Jarva i samverkan, a Stockholm-based network of local nonprofits that coordinates free activities and youth programmes.

But his apparent bid failed.

Although the overall general election is too close to call, one result is clear: the SD suffered its first-ever decline in a parliamentary election, falling three percentage points to 17.5 percent and slipping from second to third place behind the Moderate Party.

Anti-Islam threats

The party, which has neo-Nazi roots, has repeatedly targeted Islam.

In 2023, Akesson called for a halt to new mosques and said Sweden should, in the longer term, begin “seizing and demolishing mosques” that spread “anti-democratic, anti-Swedish” propaganda, a proposal rejected by Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson.

Akesson has said he targets Islamism, not Muslims, but senior SD MP Richard Jomshof abandoned that distinction during the campaign.

When asked by the newspaper Dagens Nyheter in August what message he had for Muslims living peacefully in Sweden, he replied: “They can stop being Muslims, for a start.”

Zack*, a 27-year-old resident, told Al Jazeera that many have grown thicker skin in response to the SD, which has also proposed banning the hijab and intimidated people with posters reading “We make Sweden, Sweden again”.

“It was rage-bait, but it didn’t work,” said Sara, a 25-year-old business owner.

She recalled when Rasmus Paludan, the Danish-Swedish far-right politician, burned a Quran in Rinkeby Square in 2022. Riots, as well as peaceful protests, took over several Swedish cities.

“It was chaos then, but people know now we can’t be provoked, as that is what they [the far right] want,” she said.

In the end, there was no response to Akesson’s visit. He enjoyed a seamless visit, reportedly welcomed by a young boy who held the door open and later shook hands with a poll clerk.

A setback for SD

For the SD, once considered a political pariah, this election signalled an opportunity to capitalise on two decades of steady growth and enter government with the right-wing bloc that includes the Moderates, the Christian Democrats and the Liberals.

By the early hours of Monday, preliminary results gave Sweden’s centre-left opposition bloc a razor-thin lead of 176 seats to 173 over Kristersson’s right-wing alliance. But the numbers settled little; some votes are still to be counted on Wednesday, and the final results are not expected for several days.

With a margin of just three seats, even a small shift could change the outcome, and even with a majority, the opposition’s four parties would still have to agree on a government.

Analysts warned of a deadlock that could drag on for weeks and possibly end in a snap election.

Young people feel ‘their vote will count’

Voter turnout largely rose in multicultural areas like Rinkeby, but fell across the country overall. With little margin between the blocs, every vote counts.

“Before, young people felt like their vote didn’t matter, but now they feel their vote will count for a united society; even their parents are telling their kids to go and vote,” said Ali.

Sweden’s public broadcaster published a poll showing that voters with a non-European background favour the left bloc, with the Left Party, sitting at the opposite end of the political spectrum to SD, rising from 17 percent of the vote in 2022 to 21 percent this year.

In Rinkeby central, preliminary results show more than half of voters backed the Left Party.

One stop away on the underground is Tensta, an area equally maligned by right-wing politicians; 54.35 percent of voters backed the Left Party, with only six votes for SD despite the party placing a poster in the central square.

The Trump effect

Ali believes the SD election campaign was driven by an “Americanisation” of Swedish politics, where politicians try to emulate United States President Donald Trump’s divisive politics.

In Stockholm’s central station, SD spent about $100,000 on a weeklong summer campaign that included posters that read: “If you commit crimes, live off benefits, don’t learn Swedish or misbehave, you’re not welcome.”

In Skaraborg, western Sweden, SD bus advertisements asking “Missing Mogadishu?” and promoting a grant to help migrants return home were pulled by the transport operator in August after about 20 drivers of Somali heritage called in sick in protest.

Ali remains optimistic as many Swedes embrace diversity and several initiatives are working to reduce segregation.

Stockholm City has launched Fokus Jarva, a project that aims to close the gap in conditions between the district and the rest of the city, with plans for some 15,000 new homes alongside upgrades to schools, services, jobs, safety and public spaces.

Ali suggested that Akesson should look beyond Rinkeby’s beige and grey housing blocks to see its vibrant, diverse and supportive community.

“In the end, that’s what makes a place, however it looks,” she said.

*Some interviewees asked that their surnames be withheld because of the political nature of the interviews.