- We had discussions about who can become minister, says Sweden Democrat Göte Färm when he is about to sum up the election campaign over a plate of body cakes with fried pork and lingonberries.
During election night, around 70 Sweden Democrats from Scania had gathered at a restaurant in Kristianstad to follow the results via the big screens. But the good mood turned into shock, he says, looking out the window towards Broby church.
- I don't want to experience that night again.
Göte Färm is group leader for the Sweden Democrats in Östra Göinge and sits on the board of the heavy Skåne district. The small municipality has long been one of SD's strongest strongholds. But in the election, Östra Göinge became one of the municipalities where the party lost the most in the parliamentary election, 7 percentage points.
After the election, he lost his seat as a municipal councilor, and instead took a seat in the regional council.
At the national level, SD decreased by 3 percentage points compared to the 2022 election. At the same time, they backed down in 285 out of 290 municipalities.
Almost two months have passed, but the shock remains.
- What happened? Why? And how are we going to win back our voters? Göte Färm asks himself.
That's the question they all ask themselves.
*****
The week after the election, SD leader Jimmie Åkesson stepped into the Riksdag's press room. He brought with him a bundle of explanations for the election result: that the Tidö compromise had chased away the core voters, either to the sofa or to small parties further to the right, such as Alternativ för Sverige and Örebropartiet.
- Sometimes SD has drowned in the collaboration. The differences between our four different parties have not been obvious, said Åkesson.
Or as Göte Färm in Östra Göinge puts it: M, KD and L took the whole candy bag, while SD lost his DNA.
The SD leader also believed that his party was to blame for the so-called teenage expulsions, which were debated right up until the election.
Around the country, the question of the deportations had long aroused strong feelings.
- I understand people's anger. We had a case in 2025 with a deportation of a teenager who worked and spoke reasonably good Swedish. Then I want to claim that you have earned the points to stay in the country. And I fought for that, says Göte Färm.
But there is something else too, the thing about the party's appeal in the election campaign. He carried out part of Jimmie Åkesson's election tour on a larger motorboat, of the fancier model. Not everyone liked it.
- What the hell was that about messing around on a luxury yacht in the Göta canal? Or Miss Snusk? says Göte Färm.
That's what he was told when he met the voters.
- I don't think we attracted our voters with a half-naked girl with a robber's cap. It was too much of a stunt. We are going to introduce a veil ban, but we allow a girl with a robber's cap? It should have been less of a party. It's easy for things to become too cheerful, says Färm.
The brain behind the Sweden Democrats' election campaign is Joakim Wallerstein, SD's head of communications. Internally, he is regarded as a communicative genius. Even in other Tidö parties, people have looked jealously at Wallerstein's ability to create headlines.
Last spring, he told DN that the SD campaign would breathe "party".
But Göte Färm is not impressed. He raises the election posters ahead of the 2024 EU elections, with the message "We are building walls" as a bad example. The quote alluded to former Prime Minister Stefan Löfven's (S) speech at the beginning of the refugee crisis in 2015, when he said "my Europe does not build walls".
- It was not brilliant. It's not good to build walls somewhere, is it? I don't think the common man got it, it was more of a negative tone.
Now the party must go back to its core issues, says Göte Färm. For him, that means taking back the position of the party most trusted on issues such as migration and law enforcement. And to recapture the countryside.
- We will fight for our identity. We must not disappear, as we did.
****
When a party loses an election, the floodgates are opened for internal fighting. So also in the Sweden Democrats. Shortly after the election came the list of how SD distributes its committee seats. It was a total refurbishing. Heavy Sweden Democrats such as Oscar Sjöstedt, Tobias Andersson and Ludvig Aspling have been given less prominent positions.
Petting and power struggles, say some in the party. Re-prioritization, say others.
And so the conflict broke out over the view of Swedishness. The battle between ethno-nationalists and those who stand behind the Sweden Democrats' official position: that of a so-called "open Swedishness".
The discussion culminated the other week when SD leaders Richard Jomshof and Mattias Karlsson smoked together on Facebook. In the end, Jimmie Åkesson put his foot down in a debate article in Expressen: Anyone who does not support the party's position must step down or be kicked out. Jomshof's future in the party's innermost core of power is now being discussed, according to information to DN.
That there was an open argument in the party's top echelon surprised people in the party country.
- We cannot afford to start arguing about things like this after the election when we know we lost to the Moderates, says Göte Färm, who would have liked to see more talk about integration in SD's election campaign.
The definition of "open Swedishness" was adopted in SD's party program from 2023 and means, in short, that the party considers that one is "assimilated" to the Swedish nation if one speaks fluent Swedish, perceives oneself as Swedish, lives in accordance with Swedish culture and sees Swedish history as one's own. And that one feels "a greater loyalty to the Swedish nation than to any other nation".
- If you live here, have adapted and meet the requirements, you have qualified regardless of skin color or ethnicity. This discussion about Swedishness must not get out of hand, says Göte Färm.
At the same time, the government issue continues to bubble in the party, despite the Tidö parties losing the majority. Can they get the Center Party to change its candidate for prime minister?
Jimmie Åkesson made an attempt when he dropped the demand for ministerial positions last week and announced that SD will put Kristersson forward in a prime ministerial vote.
Göte Färm believes that it can benefit his party.
- Then SD becomes the adult in the room. While the red-green ones go completely bananas.
