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IN BRIEF: What’s Sweden’s newest party and what does it want?

Two of Sweden's most divisive political figures have launched Folklistan, a new party with just a few months to go until the EU elections.

Published: 11 April 2024 14:49 CEST
Updated: 13 April 2024 15:51 CEST
IN BRIEF: What's Sweden's newest party and what does it want?
Sara Skyttedal and Jan Emanuel board a helicopter after presenting their new party. Photo: Jessica Gow/TT

What’s Folklistan?

A new party started up by ousted Christian Democrat MEP Sara Skyttedal and former Social Democrat MP Jan Emanuel.

What do they want?

They’re running for the election to the European Parliament in June.

As for their political platform, they had by mid-April put forward only two policies (but another eight are expected): scrapping asylum rights and renegotiating Sweden’s EU membership. Neither of these issues are single-handedly initiated or decided by the European Parliament.

They say they prefer not to think of themselves as a traditional party, and more like a gathering of politicians who are fed up with having to toe the party line, such as Skyttedal from a right-wing Christian Democrat background and Emanuel from the centre-left Social Democrats.

Who are they?

The party’s two main figureheads are Jan Emanuel and Sara Skyttedal.

Skyttedal, after a history of butting heads with Christian Democrat management, was in January abruptly replaced as the party’s top EU candidate on the grounds that she had betrayed her party by offering help to the Sweden Democrats after the Christian Democrats had already tried to remove her.

Emanuel has previously held political roles for the Social Democrats, including on a municipal level and as a member of parliament. He also won the Swedish version of Survivor in 2001. He has long advocated for a more open relationship with the far-right Sweden Democrats and in the run-up to the 2022 election took part in a so-called “conversation tour” with Sweden Democrat leader Jimmie Åkesson among others.

EUROPEAN ELECTIONS:

The party’s other four top candidates so far are:

Hans Palo, a Social Democrat from Övertorneå in northern Sweden.

Amilia Stapelfeldt, a political influencer who defines herself as independent-liberal but with her background in the Moderates.

Peter Söderlund, a former senior member of the Green Party who helped start up Kris, an organisation that helps former criminals return to a life without crime.

Håkan Wretsell, a former Christian Democrat and founder of local party Bättre Vellinge in the far south of Sweden.

Their ballot is however described as open, which means anyone can join and run for the EU parliament.

How will they fare in the EU election?

The party consists of a motley crew of people so it’s hard to say. 

Neither Christian Democrat leader Ebba Busch, nor Social Democrat leader Magdalena Andersson seemed too worried when they were asked by reporters, although Andersson pointed out that she thought the risk they would snatch voters from right-wing parties was greater than from the left.

Then again, Skyttedal has built up a lot of personal support over the years and Emanuel has a huge social media following. And even if they don’t manage to get into the European Parliament themselves, their performance could affect other parties’ chances of winning seats.

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SWEDEN DEMOCRATS

REVEALED: Sweden Democrats’ secret social media ‘troll factory’

A Swedish reporter went undercover for a whole year to confirm the existence of a far-right troll factory, run by the Sweden Democrats to spread content of benefit to the party and degrade its political opponents.

Published: 7 May 2024 15:34 CEST
REVEALED: Sweden Democrats' secret social media 'troll factory'

In the Kalla Fakta programme for broadcaster TV4, a reporter spent five months working undercover for the Sweden Democrats, first on the YouTube channel Riks, previously owned by the party, and later for the party’s communications team.

“I was undercover for a whole year, five months of which I was working [for the party],” Kalla Fakta’s reporter Daniel Andersson told The Local. “Two of them I was on Riks, the YouTube channel, and three of them I was in the communications department.”

During this period, Andersson wore a hidden camera to show how the YouTube channel, which the party claims is independent, is in fact closely linked with the party.

Andersson said he found out about the troll factory just before moving over to the communications department.

“They are in the same office building, Riks rents their office from the Sweden Democrats, so during lunch the departments often met, ate lunch together and talked a lot about it. That’s where I overheard secretive talks about anonymous accounts on social media, and they didn’t want to say what their name was or why they had them.”

The Sweden Democrats are also Riks’ largest source of financing, with daily meetings taking place between the channel’s owner, Jacob Hagnell, and Sweden Democrat head of communications Joakim Wallerstein.

Kalla Fakta’s report revealed that the party’s communications wing has been tasked with managing a large number of anonymous social media accounts, referred to within the party as a “troll factory”, an organised group of fake accounts with the aim of influencing public opinion and debate by spreading pro-Sweden Democrat content.

“We’re going to talk a lot more about how they operate in the next episode, in a week,” Andersson said. “But what we saw very early was that it was very, very systematic, it’s organised. And the purpose is to create a huge load of posts on different social media to create an illusion of the fact that the Sweden Democrats and their image of the world and of Sweden is larger than it is.”

“The boss is Joakim Wallerstein, the communications chief of the Sweden Democrats. He’s also the mastermind behind this – we also identified Riks as a part of it, where he is creating a conservative ecosystem, troll factory, to manipulate people’s views of the world,” he added.

Back in 2022, the Sweden Democrats were accused of running a “troll factory” by left-wing newspaper Dagens ETC. At the time, the party rejected the accusations, calling ETC’s article “unserious and obvious activism” in an email to SVT, while admitting that a group called Battlefield, responsible for moderating the party’s comments boxes on social media, did exist at one point.

In the new Kalla Fakta programme and in another interview with Dagens ETC, Wallerstein admits that these anonymous accounts exist, although he rejects the term “troll factory”.

“I don’t think I’ve been running so called troll sites, for the simple reason that I haven’t been spreading false information,” he told Kalla Fakta.

Andersson believes this is nothing more than damage control from the party.

“He doesn’t want to acknowledge that it is a troll factory. He doesn’t see a problem with the fact that they are anonymous, or the fact that the connection to the party is hidden,” Andersson said.

By Paul O’Mahony and Becky Waterton

Hear TV4’s reporter Daniel Andersson explain more about the investigation in the next episode of The Local’s podcast, Sweden in Focus. Out on Friday, May 10th. 

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