The far-right Sweden Democrats have neo-fascist roots and have long been shunned by the country’s mainstream. But they have been the political beneficiaries of discontent among Swedes about the numbers seeking asylum in the country. In 2010, the party won its first members of parliament, passing the 4 per cent threshold needed. Today, it tops the opinion polls. A YouGov survey in late January put the party on 28 per cent, seven points clear of the next most popular party, the governing Social Democrats.

They would not have been able to exploit the migrant crisis — fertile soil for all far-right parties — had it not been for its leader, Jimmie Akesson, a kind of far-right David Cameron who has focused his energy on detoxifying the party’s image since he became leader at 26, more than a decade ago. And only the most hardline Sweden Democrat would dispute that there was considerable detoxifying to be done. The party was born from the “Keep Sweden Swedish” party. One of its early leaders, Anders Klarström, had also run the Nordiska rikspartiet, or Nordic Reich Party. The Sweden Democrats had close links with Sweden’s White Power music scene as well as Viking rock bands spouting lyrics such as “vad gör ni här era blattesvin”, which translates as “what are you doing here, you fucking Paki scum?” Akesson swapped fascistic rock for feel-good pop and the party’s old logo, a burning torch, was replaced by a blue and yellow flower. He has avoided raising a clenched fist while saying “keep Sweden Swedish”, as one predecessor had done.

For Ekeroth, Akesson’s modernisation was a cosmetic process: “We’ve changed a lot. We’ve become more professional, but policy-wise we were never extreme. There was never anything racist in our party programme but the picture, the appearance, the media and the professionalism are much better.” Ekeroth is Jewish yet he is remarkably unfazed by his party’s neo-Nazi roots or its more unsavoury supporters. There are, he says, “a few rotten eggs. It’s too important to stop immigration to this country so I don’t care. As long as they are kicked out.”

When he makes the case for his party, Ekeroth mostly sticks to a formula that will not surprise those familiar with other European far-right parties. Immigration, they say, is costly both economically and culturally; we can’t afford an open-door immigration policy, nor do we want one. There is little to distinguish his patter from that of a British UKIP politician. Indeed, the Sweden Democrats sit in the same group as UKIP in the European Parliament. 

But is the claim that today’s Sweden Democrats promote nationalism of a civic sort convincing? What does Ekeroth want to do about integrating those that are already here? “We want them to go home.” When I ask him about those that are Swedish citizens, he admits: “That is a problem.” But he goes on to list the various grounds on which his party would like to revoke Swedish citizenship. Ekeroth and his colleagues want “Sweden to remain Swedish.”

And when it comes to the downside of immigration, it’s the “little things on the tram, on the bus, in the school yard, these things that people think it’s too petty to talk about. If there’s a bunch of immigrants sitting next to you screaming and shouting or whatever, you feel uncomfortable, you think what the fuck is going on?”