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SWEDEN DEMOCRATS

Leading Sweden Democrat criticised for Brussels attack tweet

A tweet by Sweden Democrat MP Jessica Stegrud's following the terror attack in Brussels which killed two Swedes has been harshly criticised by Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson and the leader of the Social Democrats, Magdalena Andersson.

Published: 18 October 2023 10:35 CEST
Leading Sweden Democrat criticised for Brussels attack tweet
Jessica Stegrud on stage in Sölvesborg this summer before a speech by Sweden Democrat party leader Jimmie Åkesson. Photo: Johan Nilsson/TT

The Euro 2024 qualifier between Belgium and Sweden, which took place in Brussels, was called off at half time on Monday night after two Swedish football fans were murdered and another injured in a terror attack a few kilometres away.

Fredrik Reinfeldt, former Moderate prime minister and current chairman of the Swedish Football Association, attended the game.

After the attack, Stegrud wrote a now-deleted post on X, formerly known as Twitter, which received harsh criticism.

“Reinfeldt was given a police escort out of the arena – after two (probably) Swedish football fans were killed by an islamist. He, if anyone, should have been forced to stay there with no police protection at all. My thoughts go to the dead and their families. My contempt goes to all the politicians – including FR [Fredrik Reinfeldt] – who laid the foundations for this.”

Stegrud, who was a Sweden Democrat MEP before entering the Swedish parliament last year, joined the party’s leader Jimmie Åkesson on the campaign trail prior to the 2022 election and has been widely touted as his possible successor. She was listed as Sweden’s fourth most influential politician on social media by Medieakademin’s 2022 power barometer.

Her criticism of Reinfeldt and her accusation that he “laid the foundations for this”, is most likely a reference to a now-famous summer speech, often referred to as the öppna era hjärtan (open your hearts) speech.

Reinfeldt in August 2014 called for Swedes to “show patience and open their hearts” to refugees seeking safety in the country. In the 2014 election which took place one month after the speech, around eight percent of former Moderate voters switched to the Sweden Democrats, who climbed from 4.8 percent in 2010 to 12.9 percent in 2014, becoming Sweden’s third-largest party. 

At a press conference on Tuesday about the Brussels attack, Ulf Kristersson commented on Stegrud’s tweet.

“A lack of judgement,” he said. ” This is not the time for carelessness, recklessness or comments of that nature. This is not the time for making any of this party politics at all.”

“It’s time to come to our senses, I think, and think about Swedish security.”

When asked how the Sweden Democrats – who Kristersson’s government relies on for support – should respond to the post, Kristersson did not want to comment.

“The Sweden Democrats will have to handle that themselves.”

Social Democrat leader and former prime minister Magdalena Andersson criticised Kristersson for not acting on the post, pointing out that Kristersson was a minister in the Reinfeldt government which Stegrud expressed contempt for.

“That tweet is also aimed at Ulf Kristersson,” Andersson said, adding that she believes the responsible thing to do would be to tone down the rhetoric and not risk fuelling the already tense situation.

She also argued that by allowing the Sweden Democrats to support his government, Kristersson is responsible for giving them more power.

“These tweets we’re seeing from Sweden Democrats carry a different weight now than they did before they were in the position of power Ulf Kristersson has put them in.”

Andersson said that she was “shocked” when she saw the tweet.

The Sweden Democrats’ group leader in parliament, Linda Lindberg, said in written comment to TT that, as far as her party is concerned, the tweet requires no discussion.

“The security situation is worse than it has been for a long time. Shootings are taking place on Swedish streets. Innocent Swedish football fans are being murdered by Islamists. Given the situation, some people are choosing to get fired up over an MP who expressed her frustration over the situation on social media. I think that’s ridiculous.”

Stegrud has deleted the original tweet and reposted a more toned-down version, which still criticises Reinfeldt for “getting more protection than others” and accuses him for “laying the political groundwork for this accelerating insecurity”.

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INSIDE SWEDEN

Inside Sweden: Why troll factory won’t spark a government crisis

The Local's editor Emma Löfgren rounds up the biggest stories of the week in our Inside Sweden newsletter.

Published: 18 May 2024 09:22 CEST
Inside Sweden: Why troll factory won't spark a government crisis

Hej,

News that the Sweden Democrats are operating a far-right troll factory – which among other things the party uses to smear political opponents as well as its supposed allies – has caused probably the biggest rift yet between them and the three other parties that make up Sweden’s ruling coalition.

The leaders of the Moderates, Christian Democrats and Liberals all strongly criticised the Sweden Democrats’ blatant violation of the so-called “respect clause” in their Tidö collaboration agreement – the clause that states that the four parties should speak respectfully of each other in the media.

But after crisis talks held on Thursday, the conflict appears to be dying down.

The Sweden Democrats hit out strongly at the TV4 Kalla Fakta documentary where the troll factory was revealed, calling it a smear campaign and disinformation, but simultaneously went as far as to confirm that they do run anonymous social media accounts for which they refused to apologise.

They did say sorry to the Tidö parties for including them in the smear campaigns, and promised to remove some of the posts that had offended the other three parties, plus reassign a couple of members of staff to other duties until they’ve been given training on the Tidö “respect clause”.

But that doesn’t remove the fact that they vowed to continue the anonymous social media accounts whose existence they had prior to the documentary consistently denied, or the fact that some of the social media posts shared not only vague anti-immigration content, but white power propaganda.

The Liberals took the row the furthest, with Liberal leader Johan Pehrson describing people in his party as skitförbannade – pissed off as hell. He said ahead of the crisis meeting that they would demand that the Sweden Democrats cease all anonymous posting, which the latter rejected.

The party had two choices: walk out of the government collaboration and possibly spark a snap election, or walk back its strong words ahead of the meeting and wait for it to blow over.

They chose a kind of middle way, and called for an inquiry to be launched into banning political parties from operating anonymous social media accounts. The Social Democrats immediately accused the Liberals of trying to “bury the issue in an inquiry” – a classic Swedish political method of indecisive conflict avoidance which the Social Democrats themselves are well familiar with.

The Christian Democrats and Moderates both said that the Sweden Democrats had accepted their criticism and welcomed the party’s reshuffling of staff within its communications department, adding that it still had to prove its commitment to the Tidö agreement going forward.

So why isn’t this causing a bigger government crisis?

We asked Evelyn Jones, a politics reporter for the Dagens Nyheter daily, to come on the Sweden in Focus podcast to explain it to us:

“The Sweden Democrats are the biggest party in this coalition, even though they’re not part of the government. So the government really needs them. It’s hard for them to just stop cooperating with the Sweden Democrats,” she said.

“The cooperation between the government parties and the Sweden Democrats has been going pretty smoothly since the last election – more smoothly than a lot of people thought. This is probably the biggest crisis so far, but how big it is, is hard to say.”

You can listen to the full interview with her and the rest of the Sweden in Focus podcast here. 

In other news

If you are a descendant of a Sweden-born person and would like to find out more about them, there are ways to do that. I wrote this week about how to research your Swedish ancestry.

That guide was prompted by my interview with the chair of a community history group in a small parish in north-central Sweden, which has tried to get to the bottom of rumours that US mega star Taylor Swift’s ancestors hail from their village. I had so much fun writing this article.

The EU elections will be held on June 9th, but advance voting begins next week in Sweden. And poll cards are already being sent out, so if you’re eligible to vote you should receive yours soon.

Sweden’s consumer price index fell to 3.9 percent in April, below 4.0 percent for the first time in two years, reinforcing predictions that the central bank will keep lowering interest rates.

Sweden’s four-party government bloc has broken with the other parties in a parliamentary committee on public service broadcasting, adding what the opposition complains are “radically changed” proposals. How shocking are they?

Many people move to Sweden because of their partner’s career. Perhaps you’re one of these so-called “trailing spouses”. I’ve been asking readers in this situation how they’re settling in, and will have an article for you next week. There’s still time to answer our survey to share your experience.

Thanks for reading.

Have a good weekend,

Emma

Inside Sweden is our weekly newsletter for members which gives you news, analysis and, sometimes, takes you behind the scenes at The Local. It’s published each Saturday and with Membership+ you can also receive it directly to your inbox.

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