Mari Rantanen (born 29 March 1976) is a Finnish politician currently serving in the

Parliament of Finland The Parliament of Finland ( ; ) is the unicameral and supreme legislature of Finland, founded on 9 May 1906. In accordance with the Constitution of Finland, sovereignty belongs to the people, and that power is vested in the Parliament. The ...

for the Finns Party at the

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...

constituency. In June 2023, she was appointed

Minister of the Interior An interior minister (sometimes called a minister of internal affairs or minister of home affairs) is a cabinet official position that is responsible for internal affairs, such as public security, civil registration and identification, emergency ...

in the Orpo Cabinet.

Controversies

After appointment, Rantanen's past remarks came under scrutiny, as she had continuously written about the Great Replacement, even using the

hashtag A hashtag is a metadata tag that is prefaced by the hash (also known as pound or octothorpe) sign, ''#''. On social media, hashtags are used on microblogging and photo-sharing services such as Twitter or Instagram as a form of user-generated ...

#väestönvaihto (Finnish for the Great Replacement) repeatedly on

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

. Finnish Security Intelligence Service considers that the Great Replacement is one of the noteworthy ideological motivations of far-right terrorism and notes that it has been highlighted in several far-right terrorist attacks. Ahead of the

2023 Finnish parliamentary election Parliamentary elections will be held in Finland on 2 April 2023, or earlier if the parliament is dissolved ahead of schedule, and will elect members of parliament for the 2023–2027 convocation. Background The former prime minister, Antti Rin ...

, Rantanen wrote a candidate brief on her website in which she remarked on immigration: "we must not be so blue-eyed (a Finnish term for "naive") that soon we will not be blue-eyed (a feature often associated with

white people White is a racialized classification of people and a skin color specifier, generally used for people of European origin, although the definition can vary depending on context, nationality, and point of view. Description of populations as ...

)". In an interview with ''

Iltalehti ''Iltalehti'' (literally "Evening newspaper") is a tabloid newspaper published in Helsinki, Finland. History and profile ''Iltalehti'' was established in 1980 as afternoon edition of newspaper ''Uusi Suomi''. Alma Media is the owner of ''Iltal ...

'' Rantanen was asked what she meant by no longer being blue-eyed, and she replied: "I mean exactly what it says." She denied referring to racial theories, and when asked if she believed in the Great Replacement conspiracy theory, replied: "I believe in statistics." When asked what kind of statistics, Rantanen answered " demographics," instructed the interviewer to look at demographic changes in Sweden, and suggested trying to avoid such changes in Finland. Rantanen then ended the interview. In 2016, Rantanen wrote on social media, that the boats of asylum seekers crossing the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ea ...

should be stopped or otherwise "there will be a war". She also liked a comment, which states that refugees should be left to drown and another that calls refugees parasites.

References

1976 births Living people Social Democratic Party of Finland politicians Finns Party politicians Members of the Parliament of Finland (2019–2023) Members of the Parliament of Finland (2023–2027) 21st-century Finnish women politicians Women members of the Parliament of Finland Women government ministers of Finland Ministers of the Interior of Finland Female interior ministers {{FinnsParty-politician-stub