How to Become a Candidate in Denmark

In this episode, we dive into a practical, real-world conversation about becoming a political candidate in Denmark — whether for local or regional elections. From eligibility requirements and party involvement to official registration and campaign steps, this 30-minute discussion offers clear insights for anyone curious about entering Danish politics.

You’ll join the full conversation with two international candidates and our two co-hosts, as they share honest stories and lessons from their own experiences running for office. Together, we discuss:

• What inspired each guest to run for local or regional election
• How the candidacy process really works — eligibility, party lists, signatures, and key deadlines
• What challenges or surprises came up along the way
• Advice for anyone considering becoming a candidate in Denmark

If you’ve ever wondered how to get involved in Danish democracy, stand for election, or represent your community, this episode is your go-to guide for understanding the process from the inside out.

Tip: Read Alina's interview with Last Week in Denmark here.

The podcast is made by AMIS (an NGO that has over 30 years of history of making projects aimed at developing better opportunities and inclusion in Denmark and Europe), Nyt Europa (an NGO that works for a sustainable and democratic EU) and Last Week in Denmark (a weekly newsletter about Danish latest news available in 6 languages - English, Romanian, Polish, Spanish, Turkish and Italian).

Transcript

Unknown Speaker  0:01  
Announcer, this episode is for you,

Unknown Speaker  0:05  
four international candidates,

Unknown Speaker  0:08  
four reasons to vote.

Unknown Speaker  0:12  
One shared message.

Unknown Speaker  0:15  
This is your Denmark two.

Unknown Speaker  0:18  
Welcome to the final episode of vote home Season Two. Today, we want to leave you with some stories from four people who didn't grow up here, but who now stand proudly on Danish ballots. So Let's meet them right now.

Unknown Speaker  0:34  
Hello everyone, and welcome to vote home two. So we will do a round. We will start basically to, let's say closer to Derek, or closer to me, because me and Derek are literally in both corners of the country.

Unknown Speaker  0:48  
Where should we start? Should we say 123, Derek, what number are you thinking of? How about the number eight? Eight? Okay, so we start from Copenhagen. I was thinking about two. What's the nearest from Copenhagen? I guess we have with us, Nico. Nico, please tell us who you are. Where are you from, originally, and where are you running? Actually, close to Copenhagen, as in I do in Copenhagen,

Unknown Speaker  1:12  
in the office that's actually on the Ofelia, plus close to new home.

Unknown Speaker  1:17  
So I'm running for Copenhagen, for the Copenhagen municipality, originally.

Unknown Speaker  1:22  
I'm assuming you guessed by now I'm French. The accent is there? It will stay. You could be from Canada. Yeah, no, they speak a different French. It's different. But yes, I'm from France, and

Unknown Speaker  1:34  
I've been here for 13 years now. I'm 45 married to a Danish Italian woman, 45 and I have two kids that are born and raised in in Copenhagen, okay? Nico, what does it mean for you to run for elections in Denmark shortly like, why are you running? You usually run because you're frustrated with the way things are and you feel that your voice should be heard, or at least you stand for something that that you want to change. I think for me, I've been, you know, like flirting with the ideas of politics for a long time. I've always been interested. I think it's, it's fascinating. I think it's, you know, the whole idea of, like, running countries and taking decisions for the greater good and so on. I think that's just very, very interesting. 13 years in Copenhagen. I think for me, the, you know, really, the click was adding kids that are now reaching an age 10 and eight, where I feel that I see things in the municipality that potentially would like to be run differently, right? And, and I think for, you know, a bigger picture for me, as being from, from the get go, is a we internationals represent a seizable part of Denmark, certainly in Copenhagen, and we've been voiceless. We are, you know, just part of this society without really having a voice or really being accounted for. You know, like recently, I was at an event at digital hub with with the Minister of of digitalization, and we were talking about, you know, the place of internationals, and why are so many internationals leaving the country, which is obviously a pain point for a lot of organizations, and I think, and maybe it's a bit brunt, but then again, that's my reputation. I think most of us, we feel tolerated here and not welcomed. And I think for me, it's really

Unknown Speaker  3:17  
trying to create some voice and some, some, you know, like awareness around like we shouldn't be tolerated. You should feel lucky to have us, and, you know, push in that direction. Super. Thank you so much. Nico, this was a great intro to Copenhagen. You're running for Copenhagen municipality, for Copenhagen city council, and you're actually the first candidate that is international running for Copenhagen City Council in the history of Copenhagen. So congratulations on that. Really, yeah, I win already. I don't know

Unknown Speaker  3:51  
if there's others. I actually don't know if this year might be others besides you, but in previous years, there haven't been any. Remember in international is someone which doesn't have Danish citizenship, that's that the then that's the definition of how they look at it. Yes, and I certainly don't super then we move forward to lowland, I guess. Candace, hello, hello. My name is Candace praglar Thompson. I live on the island of lowland, which is just across the bay ephemeral from Germany. I come originally from the United States, but I became part Danish when I came here as a 16 year old exchange student through rotary and I lived here for one year, and I knew then that I had to help others explore the globe, cross cultures, and, yeah, take this leap. So that's actually what I've been doing ever since. And after a period of doing this in the US, I moved here and worked at Copenhagen Business School to do the same. And I've been to the Middle East and back doing the same work.

Unknown Speaker  5:00  
Work. After I moved to Denmark, I met a Danish man, and things started falling into place. We started a family, and then we took our family abroad, from Denmark to Saudi Arabia, and then we repatriated to Denmark. So it's been really interesting, these different experiences I've had moving abroad as a single professional, but then moving a family already, you know, bilingual, bicultural family outside to a dramatically different but then also to repatriate to Denmark and repatriating after having been here originally as a teen. So I'm an adult, Third Culture kid. You know, I was still a very developmental stage in my life, but it actually is what transpired my career. And I've had the chance to do that in three places, three continents, and I am doing this because, to be honest with you, the work that I do is my calling, and I believe I was called to be in politics because I've been advocating for decades for the well being, for promoting global mobility and crossing of cultures and learning about one another, but also supporting the individuals that I have helped by inspiring them, by helping to facilitate their global transitions. And when I was asked by our vice mayor one year ago about representing their party with the international perspective here in lowland, because we're just growing and growing so much with our international population, and it's only going to be increasing, it wasn't something I personally ever really saw on my bucket list or on my journey, but it actually seemed to make sense to me, and I was to me, I think Danish politics can be very confusing, and politics maybe in any country can be but what meant a lot to me was a leader on our local city council who wanted my voice, who opened the door, who valued my opinion, my profession, all of that, and felt that it could add value to their party and add value to our increasingly international community here in lowland. Fantastic. Candice, that's a really cool start, and I can see, I can feel you already falling into the role of being a politician. So nice job. We're gonna go from lowland up north now, closer to me, we're getting to skive to Valentin. He is quite well known among the Roman community, but I guess now it's time to make Him known also in the international community. So Valentin, hello,

Unknown Speaker  7:45  
hi. My name is Valentin bhoromat, and I'm coming from Romania.

Unknown Speaker  7:52  
I came in Denmark in 2010

Unknown Speaker  7:54  
because of the chronic crisis around Europe,

Unknown Speaker  7:59  
and after I follow up some steps here in Denmark, about integration, about community, about different things, now I think I'm ready to take the next step. Somebody was saying to me, I'm a doer. I'm not talking so much, but I'm a doer. So that's why I would like to candidate I can't do because I think International, first of all, international, needs to have a voice and needs to be heard in skivek. Actually, I'm

Unknown Speaker  8:32  
one of the only one, or the only international that is going in meetings and meet with the mayor, with in council, I mean ethnic crowd and in different other committees from skive. So I think I would be a better person like Council,

Unknown Speaker  8:51  
and I would like to change some stuff also in skive the moon, because I'm coming with different perspective and different optic about it. So that's why I want to candidate them to

Unknown Speaker  9:05  
be a part of the concert in skive

Unknown Speaker  9:09  
Super. Thank you so much, Valentin, and we're gonna go to our last stop for today in teastead. If you don't know what that is, it's also called Cold Hawaii, you might know that better. And there we have, Karen. Hello. Karen, how is the weather down there? We had a little bit of sunshine today, but it's actually quite cold, always windy. You can expect that. That's why they made the core Hawaii team here, because you can always windsurf. Are you like a former windsurfer? That's why you end up in there? Or what's your origin story? My original story was that I met my husband just about after September 11. I'm American, as another candidate here said, but my story starts all over in Puerto Rico, on the little island, Spanish speaking island in the Caribbean. That's also American. I was, I come from there, and I lived in New York, and I met my husband just right after September 11, and we were.

Unknown Speaker  10:00  
Dating and the environment in New York was very, very sad. So it actually pushed me to the make the leap to Denmark. Because in the beginning, we originally thought it was going to be the US, but he kept talking about Denmark. So happy, so wonderful. And here I am, 20 something years later, it was supposed to be just a try, but it was really, really hard move. He used to live in ohhs When I visited him, but he lost his job, and because of the international rules, he had to take something really quick, and he found. The first one he could find was in tist, so that was not planned as well. So I think my life has been made up of very not planned decisions, and that's how I ended up in tste. We've been here 20 years. We've made a life here. And I met Narcis around the end of Corona where we were invited for the first ever international meeting in T still, that's never happened before.

Unknown Speaker  10:54  
That was that was an amazing moment for me, because I never thought there was going to be anything for internationals in our town until that meeting. And so I remember talking to you. I don't know if you remember talking to me about how excited I was, but we should have more events like this. In T stood and you encouraged us to make a foreigning, and helped us make a foreigning. And here we are, four year later, because now it You came because you were campaigning for the regional and now we are here four years later, where I've been running an organization, a nonprofit organization, for four years. It's been really, really hard. Half of the people that helped me found the organization have moved out of kistan because I heard some of the people say that, you know, people don't feel welcome. They don't feel accepted. Integration is really hard. Even trying to make an organization like ours has been very, very difficult for me to figure out everything, to get funding, to everything about it has been really hard. And now that it's a political year, of course, my organization has fell into the political team. It was not something, of course, that I planned again, but we came into a lot of discussions with the current mayor. He's been stripped, which is where the party that I am now. He sat us down. My organization invited us basically to a roundtable at the beginning of the year where we were going to make a plan for helping internationals in history at TED, that there was something being discussed for internationals, and that, to me, was very motivating, and it really put the fire on those and we got really involved, and there's money in the budget for next year, for the first time ever in teastead, to help internationals integrate. And we feel like we've been a really, really big part of that. And it just shows how getting a little bit political involved can make a difference, can change something. And to me, that that really fired something in me, that showed that if we do make an effort to make a change, we can make a change. It's not easy. It took us four years to actually get that sit down discussion. It took us four years to actually make a priority list, but it's actually happening. And it's, I almost want to cry. I get so excited, because it's, I've been living here 20 years, and there's been nothing for internationals in our in our area, like ever. If anything, you had to sign a paper that you couldn't get help. So now when, when everything was planned, actually, it was this to the summer

Unknown Speaker  13:27  
that he could see that I was really, like, motivated and excited and everything the ideas were running and we were so we almost became friends. Tim and I, he invited me to run in his party, and then we had the whole discussion about the blue side and the blue party, and he he's completely against it. He's never been for the things that happened when there was a blue side. And he said they'll never have be that way when he's there. So that also motivates me and sparks me. And today I was in a meeting with him as as well, where we discussed it again, because I was telling him how hard it is sometimes to be the brown person in the room. I am Brown, you know, and you know, it is a hard discussion, and it's never going to be easy to be the one making the change, but I am motivated by the thought that tomorrow will be better because of what I do. So if I have to be the one that has to sit in an uncomfortable room with a lot of old men that maybe have really bad thoughts about brown people, then I'm going to do it, because maybe tomorrow will be better for the next brown person that sits in that room talking to all of these old people. You know what I mean? So that's basically what drives me. The thought that I'm making a change, I'm making it better, is even driving me to think about my career choice, because I have been marketing and selling products, but now I can see that I can actually make a difference in people's life. It really, it really, really puts another fire in me that I never had before to do things that I do. You know what I mean? Why did I get involved? Because change doesn't happen by chance. It happens when you show up. I believe in.

Unknown Speaker  15:00  
Using your voice, your vote and your presence to shape the future. And this is because I come from America, a place where people don't vote, place where people are shocked by the president that gets elected, because most people didn't vote than those that voted for him. What does that result in chaos.

Unknown Speaker  15:20  
You can't just sit back and wait for others to do what you think needs to be done, to fix the things you think should be fixed.

Unknown Speaker  15:30  
If it was easy, everybody would be doing it. But creating a better tomorrow takes courage, takes commitment, takes action and takes change.

Unknown Speaker  15:40  
I got involved in politics, not because I plan to, but because through my volunteer work, I met politicians that talked a lot about change, that said all the keywords that you want to hear. But it wasn't until I actually met one that not only listened but acted, that I realized that you need to be part of the change you need to get involved,

Unknown Speaker  16:04  
and if not. Now, when history is not made by people that don't get involved, and history is happening now in teastep commun,

Unknown Speaker  16:14  
this is the first time our commune has put budget, or money into the budget to support internationals. Coming into our commune next year will be the first time that this is happening. And this is not a coincidence. This is a result of many years of advocacy that we worked on. We and I mean, many of us that were involved in this, worked really hard to make internationals not invisible anymore. We gave them a voice. We gave them valued. We made them feel welcome, we made a community, and we make ourselves be heard. Now the real change is happening in teased commun.

Unknown Speaker  16:54  
I may not have chose the party that some people expected me to, even the color people have disagreed that I picked the wrong one, but I picked the side that listened to me, that helped me make this change possible. That's why I'm standing here, and I'm standing proud as the first international for minister in eastern commun

Unknown Speaker  17:17  
I am making my voice heard. I'm making international voice heard, and that is what I'm proud of, to be the first vinstra in our commun that is running for office, and I'm running for every international that has felt unseen and unheard. I am here to give them a local voice to make a better future, to make a future with Unity, inclusion and prosperity for everybody that calls teased at home in this moment, we are creating history, and that's why I believe we need to get involved to make the change together. I think that's a fantastic message, and I think the people who will be listening to your story most likely will be motivated to also try it. I know it's maybe a bit late now, but there's four years, and preparing for four years is not never a bad idea if you actually want to win from your first try. That was my part. We met the four candidates that we have here today. Derek, I think you can go deeper into their stories now. Yeah, wonderful. Thank you. Thank you all for sharing so much and very, very motivating, very, very emotional and very, very relatable, because I think anybody listening is going to be able to hear themselves in some of your stories, whether it's what it's like to be authorized in a room full of Danes or other factors that may have you feeling that way, feeling tolerated but not necessarily wanted Here or embraced here, wanting something better for your community as internationals for you know, something that feels better as bringing up your children here, you know, definitely feels really nice also to hear that there were people in your local communities, in politics already that reached out to you, whether it was for your political action, or to motivate you to get involved. So really love hearing about why you decided to run. I'd love to also kind of take it back so our listeners who maybe haven't reached that level yet. Of course, it's not possible in this election, but in the next four years, it could be. But what we really want is for people who may be even doing it for the first time to understand why Voting is important. And I'd love to hear from each of you what voting means to you, or how that process was for you. The first time that you even just voted here in Denmark, four years ago, I cast him my first vote. I didn't really know much about politics or anything about shaping the future, but I met Narcis. The reason I voted was because I'm a narcissist. He was running for regional elections before that, I never cared or paid attention to local politics. I didn't think it was for me, the thought of something simple and profound, as internationals have a voice and to vote and to use them was something that I learned about with narcissists and.

Unknown Speaker  20:00  
That message really stayed with me, and now four years later, I'm not just voting. I'm running because I have seen what happens when you speak up, when you organize, when you believe in change, when you make your voice heard, when you get active and involved. I've seen how advocacy and action can lead to the results, and this is why I think it's so important for us to vote now we have a chance for a better future, and we need to use our voice to make those dreams happen. We can build on it together. And this journey has given me a new meaning to my work, to my life. It's showing me that being a part of making change is not only possible, but it's necessary, and it's it's really a drive factor for me. Your voice matters. The future needs you to vote. You can't let others decide the future. You need to be part of it. So we have to vote. We have to vote as International. Let's leave this movement together, and let's make history together,

Unknown Speaker  20:58  
if I may add, from my personal experience of voting as an international in Denmark. My first time voting was in November, 2013 and I had achieved my permanent residency that year, which was a big milestone for me and for our family, because we owned a home. Our children were both born by that point, and I felt extremely integrated, professionally, personally, culturally, so that was wonderful to have that opportunity to vote.

Unknown Speaker  21:33  
Still, I'm not sure I fully understood the whole system and that I did real research, but I voted anyway and use my right. And I think for me, when we have the opportunity, when we have the right, we should use our voice, even for our own countries. It's, you know, a shame not to it's almost like a responsibility that we have, and what we're doing is not just for ourselves, but for future generations, right? Or however you might see that. And so as this time around, there are more people, more internationals that are running, you know, this momentum. Let's keep this momentum going and just keep this effort growing. And as you said narcissists across parties across the country, and us being stronger together. And there's a book called The Power of us, and it's so important that we work together to make this difference in whatever ways that we can. So I feel that I can be an active part of that here locally, but I'm fascinated by all of you, and I hope that we can work across the country in this space. But also, for example, I'm highly engaged one of the co founders of in internationals of Denmark, which is intentionally to support internationals living here and to try to

Unknown Speaker  23:01  
break down barriers and help them thrive. So I just try to represent in whatever way possible. But for me, it's it's a wonderful opportunity and a responsibility to make a difference for myself, for my community that I'm living in. We live here. My children grow up here, but also for the international community at large, that's amazing. Candice, and I feel, I feel it's not going to be as intense from my side. Now, you put so much pressure on me to to say something beautiful and engaging. I think I've been voting.

Unknown Speaker  23:36  
I assume by now, it's twice for the municipality, right? And and actually, at the last European election, you know, when you EU citizen, you can decide to choose a representative from your own country, or, let's say, your country of birth, or the country that you're residing in. And for the first time, actually decided to vote for some representative of Denmark and not from France. So I voted three times. I think my my thoughts on on voting is, you know, maybe blunt and French, if you don't vote, then you're not allowed to complain. It's pretty simple, you either do it or you shut up and and I think we tend to forget how lucky and privileged we are to have those votes, to have that ability to live in maybe, you know, I

Unknown Speaker  24:20  
don't want to paint a pretty dark,

Unknown Speaker  24:23  
version of the world right now, but if we're bluntly, unless in in, you know, some of the last functioning democracy when it comes to having a voice and that voice being heard. So use that chance. I think it's a shame if you don't, it truly is specifically as an international where we can move the needle. We really can. There's a lot of us, and I think we have a massive impact in society, certainly in Copenhagen, I can't really talk for all the cities the rest of the panel is coming from, because as a true Copenhagen I basically never go out of Copenhagen unless it's to leave the country.

Unknown Speaker  24:58  
But like.

Unknown Speaker  25:00  
Use that vote like seriously, and if you don't, if you, if you literally show excuses, I can't allocate 20 minutes of my time to get up and go to a school or a city or whatever to vote. And then, I mean, I think it's very sad. I'll tell you what, one of my biggest, genuinely frustration here is that I cannot vote for the parliament Kristen Borg, this I get really, really pissed with and, you know, I'm always told, Well, you know, you just need your citizenship.

Unknown Speaker  25:31  
But there is this little thing about, like, looking at integration only from the spectrum of you speak Danish, which I am strongly against. I think that's reducing so many things when it comes to integration, I think

Unknown Speaker  25:46  
taxation without representation is stealing. I'm using some us old school terms of the of the of the US revolution, from from the UK empire. I think there must be different ways of looking at access to citizenship, and therefore the right to vote at the parliament, municipal is good, and it's a start. Local politics is basically the base of everything. So also you should go and vote.

Unknown Speaker  26:12  
I encourage people to vote. I do it in my organization where I work. I do it with the parents from the school of my kids, and they go to public schools, but there's a fair amount of foreigners in that area of Copenhagen. I mean, if you think about it, just about the vote, right? And the number of internationals. There's places in Copenhagen like ersthele or no harm, where there's close to 40% of the population that are non Danish. And if these people don't vote, then what do we do? Then that means there's a very short majority of people that are deciding for the rest. That's just not what democracy should be.

Unknown Speaker  26:47  
Spot on.

Unknown Speaker  26:49  
I'll take it over right now. First time when I vote, it was back in 2013

Unknown Speaker  26:54  
when I moved to skive. And I think also voting is very important, because being part of society. I know it's an optional but I think it should be a need to go to vote

Unknown Speaker  27:09  
in the same time. I think people not just to go to vote. I think they should International. They should read a little bit about local politics and what politics they stand for, and what politicians they want to do, and who to vote, because it's easy or not easy, maybe just to go to the school like 20 minutes, take a pen and make an X and go home. But I think it's also important to see what the party staying for, what how they can help international and so on and so on and in common. So, yeah, I think it's important to vote. And like other people like you, I Nico, I also tried to convince a lot of people around me to vote. And last time I made the campaign for peace candidate from skivekomun, and we was making some YouTube video, and I convinced my neighbors, international, my wife, to vote. So I think it was very good that exercise. And now I think more people will come out and vote from skive internationals. We are not so many. We are 3000 people from 45,000 people. So it's not a big, big international community, but still, we matter, I think so, yes,

Unknown Speaker  28:29  
I love everyone's passion about getting internationals to engage and us being a voice. But one thing that I'm concerned about the reading up about the politics, but also the lack of meetings, for example, being held in English, the lack of budget reports, you know, white papers, everything that is coming from the municipality, all of the meeting minutes, The city council meetings, everything is in Danish. So if we really want internationals to vote, we have to start

Unknown Speaker  29:11  
long before internationals, I think, need to feel included. I believe they should be aware to make an informed decision. But if we don't actually invite them in to the conversation and help them be informed about what's happening so they actually can join in the conversation, and ideally in English, maybe other things, but at least English, then how will they feel empowered to actually engage and use their voice, but maybe they could voice and advocate for exactly this, which is one of the things I'm advocating for, is, you know, information is power. Here, I would like to disagree with you. I think it.

Unknown Speaker  30:00  
Long as we live in Denmark, we should speak in Danish. And if you would like to know some information about commun you should learn Danish, because we are coming here, and I think they are not obliged to learn English, just for internationals, because, for example, Valentin, just for the sake of counter argument, nobody is obliging them to speak English they do from a six year old. I love this is becoming a debate. Now, that's nice in ulan, I'm gonna stick off for you, Steve, at least in ulan, I'm teased that I'm north of from him. It's not English. The dominant language in international sense is also experiencing coming out to us. So we shouldn't push English as an international language. We should. We should put Danish. Danish is the language we should learn. I gallantly disagree. One country has done it, the Netherlands. They have a language that is almost as nice sounding as Danish. Yes, I'm being sarcastic here. And they have actually made it that English is the second official language for the country, because of the realization that you cannot keep on forcing you will lose people. You'll simply lose some internationals in this part of Denmark, in Copenhagen, I know very good and I have also a story about Copenhagen and English, but I will come soon to it. For example, in this part where I'm leading in skiff and not everybody speaking English, and I experienced on myself when my son was registered to dhauplai, I go there, and that woman was not speaking English at all. So suddenly I wake up and I'm trying to find out things about my son and about how he's going with him to visit, and we don't understand each other because she's not speaking English, and I don't speak Danish. So then I was forced a little bit to start to learn Danish. And again, here in this part of the region, like me, to land, I would say not, or whose, or the other big cities, not everybody speak English, and you are forced somehow to learn Danish. I don't say it's not possible to be just with English, but you are forced somehow for a better life. I have a colleague at work. I was working in twisted common and I had a colleague from work about my story with English and Copenhagen, and he's coming to work one time, and he was very upset. And he's telling this story my mother, he's telling, I'm telling, I'm quoting from here, my mother, 80 years old, she's traveling for the first time to Copenhagen. She's going there and going to some shop. Want to ask something coming in English. She don't speak English. Going to ask for food coming in English. She don't speak English. And she was very upset to see and I understand his frustration. How it's possible that I'm traveling from tisted to my capital in Denmark, I'm not going outside of Denmark, and I cannot understand these people. So I think they are a little bit right, my opinion.