Japan’s Do It Yourself Party: Who we are and where we are headed

Ahead of the Upper House elections on July 20, Sanseito, the party I lead, has adopted the slogan “Japanese First” and is fielding candidates in all electoral districts. Together with proportional representation, we aim to win six seats.

Our slogan is not xenophobic by any means, and instead focuses on the needs of the Japanese citizen first, which the ruling party, pursuing a globalist agenda, has increasingly forgotten.

While Sanseito is gaining voters and news coverage nationwide, some may still have questions about who we are, what we stand for and how we got started. The Sanseito — or “do it yourself” — party was formed in April 2020 by a group of citizens under the slogan: “If there is no party you want to vote for, let's create one from scratch.” In a true grassroots movement, the party was launched by ordinary citizens, most of whom had no political experience at the national or local level.

The results were impressive. Without relying on major supporters, such as large corporations or religious groups, Sanseito secured more than 1.7 million votes in our first national election in 2022, just two years after becoming an organized party. I was elected to the Upper House at this time and have served as a member of the House of Councilors as well as the president of the party beginning in 2023. I was re-elected as party president in 2025.

Following the election of three other members to the Lower House in 2024, our party currently has four members in the national legislature and operates 287 regional branches across Japan. More than 140 of our members have been elected in local elections, serving in local assemblies throughout the country.

Our core philosophy is “to protect Japan’s national interests and bring about harmony in the world.” Our platform explicitly states the goal of achieving a harmonious society centered around the emperor and valuing traditional culture.

Our party focuses on three key policy areas: “education and human development,” “food and health,” and “national security.” As a father of three small children (and planning for more) all living in the countryside, these issues and commonsense approaches — explained below — are near and dear to my heart.

Education and human development

• Promote education that fosters not only academic ability but also a love for family and community and pride in one’s country, encouraging students to learn independently.
• Provide monthly subsidies of ¥100,000 to families with children under the age of 15 as part of child-rearing support.

Food and health

• Support agriculture that does not rely on pesticides and chemicals and prioritize preventive medicine that contributes to the health of the people and the reduction of medical expenses.
• Improve the treatment of workers in primary industries (agriculture, forestry and fisheries) and aim to achieve 100% food self-sufficiency.
• Review the excessive influence of the World Health Organization (WHO) and pharmaceutical companies on pandemic policies and reconsider vaccination policies.

National security

• Reduce the burden on households by gradually abolishing the consumption tax (equivalent to Japan's value-added tax) and lowering social insurance premiums.
• We will impose restrictions on foreign capital investment in real estate and infrastructure to protect national sovereignty and security.
• We will tighten regulations on voting rights and eligibility for election for immigrants and foreign residents.
• We will call for a review of radical policies related to gender and gender issues (As well as DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) promotion policies).
• Regarding climate-change measures, the party advocates moving away from decarbonization policies that ignore economic rationality.

With these policies, Sanseito’s impact is increasingly being felt in local elections, achieving 19 wins out of 21 elections (a win rate of over 90%) since the start of 2025. In recent elections in several smaller cities, the party has won the most votes and secured the top spot, rapidly expanding its support base in local communities.

Moreover, in the recent Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly, our party’s candidates won three of the four seats we vied for, with the fourth candidate losing by a thin margin.

Public opinion polls, which have gotten the attention of foreign observers and commentators, also show an upward trend in support rates. In a survey conducted by major Japanese media in June 2025, the party’s support rate reached 3.9%, nearly tripling from the previous year’s 1.3% and rising to fourth place among all parties.

Sanseito already has over 80,000 members and supporters and our reach on social media platforms such as YouTube is also notable. The official Sanseito channel has over 270,000 subscribers, making it one of the largest among Japan’s major parties. The party’s unique election strategy, which combines grassroots networks with online outreach capabilities, is drawing significant attention.

More and more voters are aware of our policies, energy and diversity among age groups, backgrounds and experiences — including supporters in international marriages and with much international travel and work under their belts — and want us to help promote commonsense and immediate change for the country.

Japan has been very much open to foreign nationals and there has been a huge rise in the number of overseas workers in recent years. As with Europe and the United States, however, excessive immigration has become a problem causing issues in law and order. Because of this, we are simply calling for stricter rules and limits on the number of immigrants. This policy is supported by the Japanese public.

With regard to other excesses of the globalist agenda of the ruling party, examples include the privatization of public enterprises such as the postal reform in 2006 under former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi. Now, there’s chatter of dismantling the agricultural cooperative, with Koizumi’s son Shinjiro Koizumi at the helm of the farm ministry. Privatization will result in profits flowing overseas.

Japan’s “green transformation,” or GX, policies have also become excessive, with renewable energy surcharges alone costing taxpayers ¥3 trillion a year. And the forced promotion of electric vehicles has inflicted significant damage on the Japanese automotive industry, causing some associated interests to flow overseas.

Our efforts over the past five years have shown that the Japanese voter is not apathetic, as some tend to believe. If anything, they are highly committed and passionate about their communities and country and are very concerned about the direction Japan is heading.

It is normal for any nation’s citizens and voters to feel this way. Along with them, Sanseito seeks to change the direction in which the country is headed and bring power back to the people.

In the lead-up to the July 20 Upper House election, The Japan Times reached out to the nation’s major political parties requesting an op-ed for our Opinion pages on why this election is so crucial and why their party deserves the citizens’ vote. We are publishing all those who responded.