Parliamentary member Katja Nyberg has left the Sweden Democrats after tests showed narcotics in her blood during a police stop, but she will remain in parliament as an independent. The party views the expulsion as obvious given their emphasis on law and order. Nyberg was recruited from the police in 2018 but never became the asset the party hoped for.
Katja Nyberg, a Sweden Democrats (SD) member of parliament, was stopped by police between Christmas and New Year and suspected of drug driving. According to the Transport Agency, her blood contained narcotics, confirmed earlier in the day. This prompted SD to expel her from the party, a move that SVT's domestic political commentator Elisabeth Marmorstein describes as obvious. “A suspected drug driving offense is of course particularly sensitive for a party that has made law and order one of its main profile issues,” she says in Aktuellt. Marmorstein notes that Nyberg, recruited from the police in 2018, never became the asset SD hoped for and has instead been a burden in recent weeks. Despite the expulsion, Nyberg chooses to remain in parliament as a political independent, against the party's wishes. “After talks with my party leadership, I have decided to leave the Sweden Democrats. However, I stand by my mandate and will fulfill the trust given to me by the voters by continuing as a member of parliament,” she writes in an email to TT. This is the third seat SD has lost in this term in this manner, but since the left has also lost three mandates, it does not affect the power balance in parliament, according to Marmorstein.
