An infant is to be deported alone to the bloodbath in Iran – despite the fact that his parents have a residence permit in Sweden. This is the news that has topped Swedish news and social media for the past 24 hours. But is it true – or yet another (shameless) move in the election campaign?

Eight-month-old Emanuel is to be deported from Sweden to Iran – alone. The so-called Tidö government will separate the child from his parents and send him to the theocratic dictatorship of the mullahs. This is how basically all Swedish media, human rights organizations and Christian communities portray the high-profile tragedy that tax-financed Sveriges Radio was the first to report.

“Emanuel was born in Sweden in May last year and has received a deportation order, even though his family has a residence permit here,” Sveriges Radio wrote in the feature.

Unsurprisingly, a collective howl of protest is heard from the Swedish population and criticism of the government is massive on social media, among voters from left to right. The decision to deport a lonely baby whose parents have a residence permit is described as heartless, inhumane and “an unprecedented scandal”.

There is only one problem: The claim is not true.

The leader of the Sweden Democrats (Sverigedemokraterna), Jimmie Åkesson, writes in a post on Facebook:

“No, not even a government supported by us nasty, sulfur-free Sweden Democrats would think of introducing a regulation that deports an eight-month-old baby. Yet that is the impression one can easily get when reading the media reporting on a current case. The image of uniformed police officers tearing a crying infant from the arms of its desperate parents at dawn and putting it alone on the first plane to Farawayistan. Horrible, of course.

But! There is simply no legal basis for doing so, and therefore it could not happen.”

What the media “forgets” to tell is the truth: Emanuel’s parents Mehrad and Masoumeh came to Sweden from Iran four years ago and applied for asylum, an application that the Swedish Migration Board rejected after a thorough review. But instead of leaving the country, the parents chose to change tactics and make a so-called “track change”, which meant that they instead applied for a work permit to stay in Sweden.

That application was approved, and the family was therefore granted a residence permit in Sweden for two years and, after a renewed application, for another two years.

During these years, Emanuel was born.

The possibility of track change was introduced by the previous, Social Democratic-led government, but last year the rules were changed as part of tightening up the previously very generous migration policy. The new rules mean, among other things, that relatives of people with work permits are no longer entitled to an automatic residence permit, and that a person who has had their original work permit extended once (i.e. has resided in Sweden for four years) must submit a new application – from their home country.

The logical consequence of these rules is that Emanuel cannot be granted a residence permit before the parents have received one, and since the mother’s work permit will soon expire and she is therefore obliged to leave Sweden, Emanuel is also covered by that obligation.

It is therefore the parents’ time-limited work permits that expire. A new application must be submitted from their home country and that is why Emanuel – together with his parent – ​​formally needs to leave the country.

But this will not happen in the near future, since all deportations to Iran have been stopped due to the current security situation.

“There will be no deportation of the child in practice. Everyone who wants to understand understands that. The family is kept together until it is time to return home, if that is what is relevant,” writes Jimmie Åkesson.

All editorial staff could have dug up the above information during a coffee break, but they have not done so. Instead, they have chosen to convey and reinforce the image of a terrified family that risks being torn apart when their baby is torn from their arms and sent alone to the bloodbath in Iran due to the government’s inhumane policies.

“If deportation becomes an issue, the parents are expected to accompany Emanuel to Iran because they have a work permit and not a residence permit due to protection reasons,” writes Sveriges Radio.

Of course, you can phrase it that way to create the image you want, but it is rather Emanuel who is expected to accompany his parents, just as babies usually do.

That the “news” about Emanuel has been reproduced completely uncritically in so many channels and has received such wide distribution is a clear sign that the opposition and its support organizations are now gathering strength to force a change of government in the upcoming elections in September.

Emanuel is only eight months old, but already a pawn in the socialist power game. It is distasteful but hardly surprising.