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How far-Right Sweden Democrats are bringing Trump's America to a small country town

Hörby - Udo Schröter
Hörby - Udo Schröter

Allegations of large-scale tax avoidance, the targeting of migrants, and a mass departure of civil servants. And on the other side, claims of a biased, crooked media and an entrenched "deep state".

Four years of the far-Right Sweden Democrat rule in the Swedish municipality of Hörby have brought a touch of Donald Trump's America to this country town of 15,000 people. Yet when the party's tenure was put to the test in this month's Swedish election, rather than punish it for its turbulent term, its share of the vote jumped by four percentage points to 39 per cent.

"We were shrieking with joy. This was something we could only dream of," says Cecilia Bladh in Zito, the town's Sweden Democrat mayor, when The Telegraph meets her in her office.

The election marked the final breakthrough for the far-Right party, winning a record 20.5 per cent of the vote nationally, leapfrogging the centre-Right Moderates to become Sweden's second biggest party.

Ulf Kristersson, the Moderates' leader, will have to implement a raft of Sweden Democrats policies in exchange for the party's backing as prime minister, and it's not impossible (though it is unlikely) that the party will end up as part of the ruling coalition.

The breadth of its victory is as staggering as its scale.

Hörby was one of four towns the populist Sweden Democrats controlled at the time of Sweden's general election two weeks ago. It grew its share of the vote between three and ten points in every one.

It grew in nearly nine out of every ten municipalities across the country, gaining both in its heartlands in Skane, Sweden's southernmost county, and in the icy north traditionally dominated by the Social Democrats.

Cecilia Bladh in Zito - Johan Nilsson/TT
Cecilia Bladh in Zito - Johan Nilsson/TT

It overtook Sweden's former farmers' party, Centre, as the most popular party among agricultural workers, it rivals the Moderates as the most popular party among business owners and is challenging the Social Democrats as the most popular party for blue-collar workers.

It was as popular among young first-time voters as it was among pensioners. As in Trump's America, the party's success has divided communities, and Hörby is no exception.

"It's completely crazy that so many people here vote for them," complains Johan Tinné, the co-owner of the central Café Innegarden. "I think they've grown because of all the shootings and the gang crime. They blame everything on immigrants, and when something bad happens, they use that as propaganda." When asked if any friends and family also vote for the party, he shakes his head. "The day they start voting for SD, I'll end all my contact with them."

Even the party's supporters have misgivings.

"There have been stories that haven't been so nice, but they've ridden it out," says 81-year-old Kerstin, as she drags her shopping in a wheeled bag across one of the town's two central squares.

She voted for the party both in 2018 and again this year because of what she sees as the complacency of the established parties.

"I think it's a protest, a protest against those who sit and rule the municipality, who haven't been listening to the problems people on the ground are facing."

Bladh in Zito and her team have certainly shaken things up, halving the municipal budget for teaching children with foreign backgrounds their home languages, stopping the gay pride flag from being flown on municipal buildings, scrapping an ambition to be "fossil-free by 2020", and, she claims, slashing the budget for social benefits by a quarter by tightening rules for immigrants.

But at the same time, it has been dogged by scandal. First Stefan Borg, the party's group leader, withdrew his candidacy for mayor after the activist magazine Expo revealed that he had been spreading pro-Russian propaganda, xenophobic theories, and homophobic statements online.

Jimmie Åkesson - Maja Suslin/TT News Agency via AP
Jimmie Åkesson - Maja Suslin/TT News Agency via AP

Bladh in Zito, who grew up in the town but spent her 20s and 30s working as a business executive in Stockholm, Germany and Rome, then stepped in.

At the start of 2020, when seven unions warned of a "toxic work culture" after a mass departure of top civil servants, Borg dismissed it on Facebook as "an attempt by the Deep State, through the unions, to take back political power."

Most recently, a tabloid accused Bladh in Zito of paying Polish builders 2.5 million kronor in cash to avoid tax when renovating her house. She claims her Italian ex-husband handled the payments, while the journalist who wrote the story, she says, is "as far left as you can go".

"They do not want Sweden Democrats to have the power, and they've been trying for four years, even before I was elected, to kick us out".

For Maria Westlund, the chief health and safety representative for the Saco union, the party is undermining local government.

"They don't answer the press, they don't answer when other parties ask them things," she says. "I feel like it's not a democracy anymore."

Bladh in Zito, on the other hand, thinks the party's local gains have proven it can rule responsibly.

"There will always be people who don't like us," she says. "But I hope they understand that we don't bite, we are not neo-Nazis, we are not fascists, and we are not racists. We are a party which has reality-based political views."

"We've done very well in all our four municipalities, and I hope that can give the Moderates the bravery to start cooperating with us at a national level."