Ekeroth: ”SVT manipulerar – och kallar det ”public service”

LEADER • That BBC has been exposed for cutting and manipulating Donald Trump’s speech to attribute something he never said does not come as a surprise. At least not for those of us who have long seen through the old media. When SVT has been revealed to do something similar, it is equally unsurprising. But the problem seems to be that people still continue to trust them to a too high extent.

In the case of BBC and Trump, the British public service entity has now issued an apology. There have already been resignations from BBC, and Trump threatens with a massive lawsuit. I can only hope he follows through. But BBC’s apology is of course not because they suddenly woke up and felt guilty, but because they found themselves in a situation where they could no longer talk their way out of what had happened.

READ ALSO: BBC apologizes to Trump

Even the Norwegian state television NRK backtracks in the same way. ”From what we have seen so far, it is a segment in ”Supernytt” from January 2023 that we see the need to change”, said NRK’s foreign editor Sigurd Falkenberg Mikkelsen, to VG.

And there is no overlooking the parallel with SVT. Sweden’s state television did a similar thing where they manipulated Trump’s statements to create a political narrative. It may have been slightly less manipulative, but a hairline difference. What happened when this began to be noticed was, unlike in England, the usual defense speech. They are now trying to clear themselves and attack those who scrutinize them. No apology, no self-examination, no responsibility.

SVT did choose to change their segment, but in classic Swedish manner, they try to make their manipulation sound completely innocent:

– So that it is clearer for our audience in what context it has been published, said Karin Ekman, program manager for SVT News, to Expressen.

But the day before, she told DN that ”I am confident in the journalism that we have done in connection with it and afterwards”.

Assess SVT’s clip from that day:

Kvartal shows that SVT has done essentially the same deceptive editing of Trump’s speech as BBC did. This is the smoking gun that SVT’s critics have been looking for. Does the revelation mean that even managers within Swedish public service will now be fired? The clip is from SVT. pic.com/CyfI2CWybU

— Jonathan Kärre (@JonathanKarre) November 13, 2025

Water off a duck’s back

When SVT is caught with the same manipulation as BBC – they pretend it’s nothing.

Here lies the core of the problem. In the UK, BBC is indeed a heavy institution, but it is still subject to scrutiny. Journalists, competitors, and the public can express criticism without immediately being labeled as ”democracy haters”. In Sweden, the climate is completely different. When SVT is criticized, no matter how factual the criticism is, the discussion is never taken on its merits. It is diverted to emotional terms: ”hat and threats”, ”attacks on free media”, ”worrying development for democracy”. The message is clear: those who scrutinize SVT are the problem, not SVT themselves.

It is no coincidence. It is a rhetorical armor that SVT has honed over many years and has become part of their identity: they define themselves as defenders of truth and democracy, and thus always have the prerogative of interpretation. When the facts speak against them, facts are replaced with indignation. When viewers react, the viewers become the problem. When surveys repeatedly show how strongly left-leaning their editorial staff is, it is not the starting point for improvement but an ”insignificant detail” only mentioned by ”the wrong kind of people”.

It is the same logic that underlies the tactic I described earlier: Crocodile tears as a method to avoid responsibility.

The BBC affair, which has now led to an SVT affair, should therefore be a wake-up call even in Sweden. Exactly the same culture exists here but only more protected and less transparent. The only reason BBC was forced to take responsibility is that they could no longer hide from other media. SVT has not yet experienced that moment.

But more and more people are questioning the old dogma of ”public service” as a guarantee of truth. The real question is not whether SVT is doing wrong. They are – time and time again. The question is why they get away with it every time it happens. And the answer is simple: they have been allowed to define both reality and the criticism of reality. As long as this continues, all forms of responsibility are lacking.

It is not healthy for any democracy.