“We will not take part in further meetings with [Frederiksen] unless she takes that request seriously,” said Rasmussen, as he called for center-right parties to be brought into government talks after two weeks spent negotiating with left-wing parties yielded scant results.
Known as the kingmaker, Rasmussen wants Frederiksen to put the idea of a center-left government “on pause” and sit down with Troels Lund Poulsen, leader of the center-right Venstre party, who ran against her for prime minister after serving as deputy PM in the outgoing coalition government.
Poulsen reached out to Rasmussen on Friday to consider the possibility of finding cooperation on economic policy, which Danish analysts suggest led to his decision to pressure Frederiksen into calling it off with the left-wing “red bloc.”