The Ombudsman has issued a ruling regarding the controversial text message sent by an advisor in the Prime Minister’s Office (Statsministeriet) to an employee at the public relations firm Rud Pedersen. This message was linked to the subsequent suspension of the employee. In the ruling, the Ombudsman disagrees with the Prime Minister’s Office regarding the nature of the message.

The core of the disagreement stems from the Prime Minister’s Office’s claim that the text message could not be made public due to its private or party-political nature. However, the Ombudsman has a different perspective, stating, “I note, however, that I do not agree with the Prime Minister’s Office that the contents of the SMS indicate it is a message of private or purely party-political character.”

Despite disagreeing with this aspect of the assessment, the Ombudsman concurs with the Prime Minister’s Office that the message is of a so-called “formless” nature. This determination means that, legally, the Prime Minister’s Office is entitled not to disclose the message.

The controversy began when the Danish news outlet B.T. revealed that one of Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen’s special advisors had contacted an employee at Rud Pedersen after lobbyist Sune Steffen Hansen criticized the Social Democrats (Socialdemokratiet) and Mette Frederiksen in an article in Jyllands-Posten, another prominent newspaper in Denmark. Hansen was shortly thereafter suspended from Rud Pedersen, raising questions about the content of the SMS in question.

Several media outlets, including B.T., subsequently sought access to the SMS but were denied based on the reasoning that it was a “formless” message of private or party-political nature. This characterization of the message’s private or party affiliation is what the Ombudsman disputes.

The Ombudsman emphasizes that determining whether a message has a private or party-political character requires a concrete assessment based on multiple parameters. These include the content and form of the message, the context in which it was sent, and whether the message relates to the advisor’s work responsibilities in the Prime Minister’s Office. Additionally, it must be examined whether the purpose or effect of the message was to influence the recipient’s work-related behavior.

Nevertheless, the Ombudsman has deemed it unnecessary to investigate these aspects further, despite the fact that Sune Steffen Hansen was suspended shortly after the exchange of messages.