Sweden’s Left Party has removed eight more candidates from its electoral lists after an investigation found that they had shared antisemitic conspiracy theories, material praising Hamas or content supportive of Vladimir Putin. The decision comes less than a week before Sweden votes in its parliamentary, regional and municipal elections on 13 September.
The eight candidates were identified in an investigation by the Swedish newspaper Expressen. All were standing in municipal elections, while one was also a candidate for the Riksdag, Sweden’s parliament.
The party confirmed over the weekend that the candidates had been removed.
“These people have expressed various kinds of conspiracy theories and made inappropriate posts on social media. They are therefore no longer candidates for our party,” Left Party Secretary (partisekreterare) Maria Forsberg told Expressen.
Eight more Left Party candidates removed
According to the Expressen investigation, the material shared by the candidates ranged from established antisemitic tropes to conspiracy theories about Israel, the September 11 attacks and the war in Ukraine.
One candidate shared a video based on the antisemitic blood libel, claiming that Jewish people kidnapped children and used their bodies to produce food. Another shared a post referring to Adolf Hitler as “the painter” and saying that he “was right about them”.
Other candidates shared material praising senior Hamas figures including Yahya Sinwar and Mohammed Deif, conspiracy theories alleging Israeli involvement in Islamist terrorist groups, and content presenting Russia as having been forced into its full-scale invasion of Ukraine by NATO.
Some of those involved told Expressen that sharing material did not necessarily mean endorsing it. Others defended some of the views contained in the posts. Local and national Left Party representatives nevertheless concluded that the material was incompatible with representing the party.
The eight removals were also reported by Swedish public broadcaster SVT, which said the candidates had shared antisemitic conspiracy theories and material praising Putin and Hamas.
The Left Party had already removed 25 candidates
The latest cases add to a broader problem that has followed Vänsterpartiet, the Left Party, during the election campaign.
Expressen had previously identified 25 other candidates who had expressed support for terrorism, antisemitism or homophobia, questioned the Holocaust or praised authoritarian leaders. Most were subsequently removed from the party’s electoral lists.
The party also withdrew its entire list of 14 candidates in the municipality of Sävsjö after three candidates were removed following the earlier investigation. A new list was later submitted containing five people who had appeared on the previous one.
The latest investigation is particularly sensitive for Left Party leader Nooshi Dadgostar because she had publicly defended the party’s vetting process only weeks earlier.
During an interview with Sveriges Radio on 10 August, Dadgostar was asked whether she was confident that no candidates holding such views would be elected in September. She said she was “completely confident” that the remaining candidates knew what the Left Party stood for and represented it well.
The discovery of another eight cases after those comments has renewed questions over how effectively the party has been able to screen candidates across its local organisations.
The removals come days before Sweden’s election
The controversy has emerged during the final days of the Swedish election campaign. According to the Swedish Election Authority (Valmyndigheten), voters will elect the Riksdag, regional councils and municipal councils on 13 September 2026. Early voting has been under way since 26 August.
Parties can formally withdraw the nomination of a candidate until 10 September, according to the Election Authority.
The repeated removals therefore raise a wider organisational issue for the Left Party. While the party leadership has responded to the individual cases by excluding the candidates concerned, the investigations show the difficulty national organisations can face in enforcing common standards across extensive local candidate lists.
With voting already under way, the latest cases leave the party little time to contain the political consequences before election day.
