Published: Less than 40 min ago
Sweden Democrats’ party leader Jimmie Åkesson is now speaking out about Riksdag member Elsa Widding who quit SD.
– She should leave her seat in the Riksdag, he says to SVT Nyheter.
Widding was elected to the Riksdag last year. Recently, she received criticism for having attended a conference together with known vaccine opponents, climate deniers and people who relativized the Holocaust.
Education Minister Mats Persson (L) tweeted like this: “Widding shows a contempt for knowledge that is not befitting a member of the Riksdag.”
When Widding felt that she did not have the support of her party, her announcement of the defection came. “The border has been crossed, I’m leaving SD,” she wrote on Twitter.
Widding intends to continue working in the Riksdag as a political savage and vote in line with SD in decisive votes.
Åkesson regrets that she intends to remain as a Member of Parliament.
– I think that if you have left the party you sit for and have been voted for, then you should also leave your party in the Riksdag, he says to SVT.
Åkesson, who has not spoken to Widding since the party exit, does not seem worried about her voting going forward:
– I find it difficult to see that she has become an environmentalist or a social democrat overnight.
– With hindsight, it was of course not a good recruitment, because she is now no longer in the party, he says to SVT.