Anne Onstad
Anne Redd Onstad | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Onstad in 2021 | |
| Mayor of Maledonia | |
| Assumed office 30 May 2017 | |
| Preceded by | Kapolcs Gyula |
| Leader of the Truth Party | |
| Assumed office 10 December 2016 | |
| Preceded by | Office established |
| Personal details | |
| Born | December 4, 1981 |
| Political party | Truth Party |
| Other political affiliations | Social Liberal Party (1998-2001) Pirate Party (2001-2015) |
| Domestic partner | Andrea Pál |
| Mother | Emilie Onstad |
| Father | Kåre Onstad |
| Alma mater | University of Maledonia |
| Website | https://onstad.en/ |
Anne Redd Onstad (born 4 December 1982) is an Entropanian politician, radio host, and columnist who has been mayor of Maledonia since 2017. She is the founder and chair of the Truth Party. She was editor-in-chief of the satirical magazine Nyetene Ma from 2005 to 2010, and of the left-wing news outlet A Herolden from 2011 to 2016.
Onstad was born in the Bergen municipality of Holan, Rockrsea. In 2000, she attended Vászoly College, University of Maledonia, for an undergraduate in philosophy and economics. During her studies, she became involved in the pirate politics scene in Maledonia, joining the Pirate Party and participating in the Maledonia Today protests. In 2003, she began writing for the satirical magazine Nyetene Ma, becoming its editor-in-chief from 2005 to 2010, after which she became a columnist for A Herolden, running a weekly column from 2011, and becoming its editor-in-chief from 2012 to 2015. In 2009, she became the host of Stories of our Times, a semi-satirical political radio show, which, on 13 January 2016, surpassed state broadcaster EMT's The Weekly to become the most popular radio show in Entropan.
In 2016, disillusioned with the Pirate Party due to "increasingly conservative tendencies" within the party, Onstad founded the Truth Party to contest the 2017 municipal election in Maledonia. Her party, parodying Entropanian politics, managed to gain a plurality in the Maledonian City Council, a plurality which was increased in the 2023 elections, defeating the incumbent Social Liberal administration and making Onstad mayor of Maledonia.
Contents
Early life and education
Anne Red Onstad was born on 12 March 1981 in University College Hospital in Bergen, Holan, the only daughter of Emilie Onstad, an economics lecturer and corporate finance expert, and Kåre Onstad, a mathematics teacher. For the first eleven years of her life, her family lived in Ma. Lien, a small village in the outskirts of central Holan, where she attended Marken Primary School. Her parents were both members of the Social Liberal Party, meeting at the party's national convention in 1969.
In 1992, Emilie left her post as a lecturer at the University of Holan to become a professor of economics at the University of Maledonia, and her family moved to Áron, a small village outside central Maledonia, with her. There, Onstad attended Imre Primary School, and later Zsolamészáros High School, where she became increasingly interested in politics, joining the Young Libertarians in 1998 and the Young World Federalists in 1999. Gál József, who was in the Young World Federalists at the same time as her, would go on to say in 2013: "She was very idealistic, very enthusiastic. If there was a week that would go by without activity [in the Young World Federalists], we could assume she was on holiday."
In 2000, at the age of 18, Onstad got accepted by the University of Maledonia to study philosophy and economics. In her first year, she led a student campaign against rising rents in the city, and in her second year, she began to take an interest in the nascent pirate politics scene in the city, joining the Pirate Party and forming the Pirate Society at the University of Maledonia, where she met Andrea Pál, her future partner. In 2001, she canvassed for the Pirate Party in the 2001 general election.
In 2002, Onstad attended the Maledonia Today protests, to protest against the incumbent Conservative government's income tax reforms abolishing the additional rate -- the highest rate of income tax, then levied on personal income exceeding ƒ125,615 - at 65%. As a result of her blocking the entrance to the National Council alongside several other protestors, she was detained for 3 weeks in police custody, before being fined ƒ1600, a move which made national headlines, alongside other such incidents in Veli and Mogyóroska.
She went on to graduate from the University of Maledonia, with lower second class honours, and expressed want to continue education, but failed to obtain the bursary necessary to cover the costs of the further course.
Columnist (2000-present)
Nyetene Ma (2000-2010)
In 2000, Onstad undertook an internship at the popular satirical magazine Nyetene Ma (The News Today), which she started writing for later that year. Her first article in Nyetene Ma appeared in February 2003, titled "AIs can't run for election, Electoral Commission tells Vea", referring to former Conservative leader Olav Vea, who was deselected in his seat of Holan. She primarily contributed to the online articles published on Nyetene Ma's website, becoming the de facto head of the website's operation around 2004, wherein she also secured a place on the company's editorial board. After Balogh Rudolf, the previous editor-in-chief of the magazine, retired on 8 September 2005, she replaced him, shifting her work towards becoming a syndicated columnist at the monthly publication of the magazine.
In the issue following the Vászoly Square bombings of 2006 (number 663), Nyetene Ma's coverage was widely criticised as downplaying the bombings, including an article entitled "Arnold hides in fear", by Vincze András, in which the coverage of a 2005 University of Rockrsea study which found 47,000 excess deaths occurring between 1995 and 2005 as a result of the policies of then-prime minister Boros Arnold and the coverage of the bombings were compared. This article was seen by many as downplaying the bombings, which killed 98 people, leading to condemnations from several political parties. In response, Onstad issued a satirical apology in the following issue, defending the coverage. Onstad has repeatedly defended this statement since, despite ongoing criticism.
During Onstad's tenure as editor-in-chief, the magazine was repeatedly condemned by religious organisations for its hostility towards religion. The March 2007 issue (number 668), coinciding with the Tumanitun holiday of Ráfi, featured an article, written by Onstad, titled "Arnold doesn't see anything wrong", a satirical article contrasting Boros Arnold's support for expanding oil and gas licensing and his Tumanitun beliefs. This article was condemned by the Maledonian Church for its satirical depiction of several Tumanitun deities throughout. While initially Onstad was defensive of the article's content, in 2014 she issued a statement apologising for it, believing the depiction of Tumanitun deities to be "wholly unwarranted and inappropriate". The December issues of Nyetene Ma from 2006-2010 (issue numbers 665, 679, 691, 703, and 715) have all received criticism and condemnation from Christian organisations for their annual comics, the "Nativity jelenet" ("Nativity scene"), in which various known to have been committed by Catholic nationalist organisations and Catholic nationalist states are satirised through their depiction in the Nativity scene. Onstad has repeatedly defended these comics since.
A Herolden (2010-present)
On 16 June 2010, Onstad stepped down as editor-in-chief of Nyetene Ma. Soon after, she began work as a columnist in the left-wing national newspaper A Herolden, which she had written several articles for in previous years, running a semi-satirical weekly opinion column called "A ertelmisus velemena" ("The intelligentsia's view"), published in the Vasarna Herolden (Sunday Herald), described on her website as "Speaking for the working man, the disaffected youth, and the elites". This column has ran since, and has become known primarily for its use of varying literary styles to satirise various columnists, politicians, and political commentators. It has received praise for being ideologically eclectic and scathingly critical, and has been credited with popularising modern monetary theory and pirate politics, and influencing several passed acts, including the General Data Protection Act 2014, which provided comprehensive regulation on data collecting and processing, and the Nature Protection (Legal Reform) Act 2019, which recognised the environment as a legal entity entitled to protection by Entropanian law.
In 2012, she expressed interest in becoming a war reporter, covering the Dubătemir Insurgency, but her request was turned down. Instead, she was offered a regular column in A Reporter, the sister publication to A Herolden, which she entitled "Notatek va a vahkku let hetrol" ("Notes of the week on business"), a less satirical column focusing primarily on matters of policy.
On 8 September 2012, the former editor-in-chief of A Herolden, Emil Holtan, stepped down, with Onstad stepping to replace him. During her tenure as editor-in-chief, the circulation of the newspaper grew by 9% to 47 000, but the content of the newspaper - and Onstad's editorship - came under frequent criticism for its broad range of opinions resulting in controversial and extreme articles being published regularly.
On 11 May 2013, an article written by self-proclaimed "anti-civilisation" activist Ággi Biehtár appeared in the paper, following the Sivast Bouleveard bombings -- perpetrated by the primitivist paramilitary organisation Year Zero Committee -- in which Biehtár condoned and wrote apologetics for the bombings. The article, "Why Sivast isn't what it seems", lead to hundreds of complaints to the newspaper, with Onstad issuing an apology for the article, and removing it from A Herolden's website.
Onstad stepped down as editor-in-chief of the newspaper on 9 December 2016, citing her wish to go into mainline politics.
Radio host (2009-present)
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On 1 February 2009, Onstad, alongside co-hosts Andrea Pál, Jáhko Vuolát, and Frank Osness, started the weekly Stories of our Times radio show on Radio i. It came about as an extension of Radio i's existing political radio show The Decibel, and was originally planned to primarily cover the the 2011 Rockr Parliament and Uryha Congress elections, and the 2012 general election.
Stories of our Times became widely popular during the Rockr Parliament and Uryha Congress elections, and continued to increase in popularity during the general election, reaching a peak of 5.8 million listeners in July 2012 and surpassing any other radio program during that period. A Sentinel attributed this wide success to the lighthearted nature of the broadcast, which made news more accessible, and Onstad's rapid style of presentation, making the program an efficient source of news. As a result of the success of Stories of our Times, Radio i decided to continue it indefinitely.
In June 2014, Stories of our Times surpassed EMT 1's The Weekly to become the most widely listened-to radio program in Entropan, with 5.4 million listeners, credited primarily to its fast adoption of an online medium for its commentary.
Stories of our Times has received wide critical acclaim for its concise commentary, and Onstad's hosting.
Mayor of Maledonia (2017-present)
2017 candidacy
Campaign
On 9 December 2016, after stepping down as editor-in-chief of A Herolden, Onstad announced her exit from the Pirate Party in an article entitled "What the pirates did wrong". She criticised the leadership of the party under Vass Géza, for their increasing shift towards libertarian economics, with their published manifesto ahead of the September general election including what Onstad calls "irresponsible, horrible, and economically illiterate" proposals, such as the "Cent Plan" -- a proposal to cut one cent out of every spent felco, which Onstad highlighted as "populist rubbish", and the party's proposal to abolish corporation tax as "elitist nonsense". In the article, she stated her intention to form a new party -- the Truth Party -- to "poke fun at everything we take for granted"; a party to represent the "liberal's pirate politics".
The same day, the party's website came online, with an announcement that Onstad and several other candidates would be running for the Maledonian City Council -- half a year before the election itself was to take place - and the following day, the party was officially registered with the Electoral Commission, with a five-point policy plan for the mayoral election:
- Tax the poor to disincentivise poverty
- Create thousands of jobs in repeatedly blowing up and rebuilding the Eszécs Bridge in south Maledonia
- Found a government commission to oversee and make recommendations to ensure a sustainable level of transparency by 2030
- Maledonia to join the Ostlandet Union
- Eliminate unemployment by opting out of the Department of Statistics
The Truth Party's campaign for the city council election caricatured and satirised the slogans and advocacy of other parties. Examples include the Conservative Party's "Modernity and stability" ("Modernitet i stabilitet"), satirised as "Post-modernity and post-stability" ("Postmodernitet i poststabilitet"); and the Social Democratic Party's "Revitalise!" ("Ujaleštenade!"), satirised as "Rethink!" ("Ujargondolade!"). Their leaflets satirised other parties, including claiming that the only two viable parties to vote for were the Conservative Party and the Truth Party (satirising the widely circulated Social Liberal leaflets of the 2016 general election which encouraged tactical voting despite a single-transferable vote system being in place); and promising to "completely abandon this manifesto and its contents when it becomes politically useful to do so", satirising the Progressive Socialist Party's failed implementation of the majority of its manifesto after its victory in the 2012 general election.
The Truth Party managed to gain a plurality on the Maledonian City Council with 19 seats out of the 58 on the council, with a plurality of first (29.76%) and second (35.84%) votes, forming a coalition with the Social Liberal Party and Progressive Socialist Party as their junior partners. The election result was widely covered in international news, described as "a shock" by then-chair of the Social Liberal Party Lalla Nuhtte, whose party had traditionally been dominant in the city, and by then-prime minister Dobos Renáta as "worrying". Onstad gained her seat on the council, with 48.1% of the borough of New Sálasza voting for her as their first choice, and 13.8% as their second. At the first convening of the council, Onstad was elected as mayor unopposed.
Watching paint dry, and other activities
Nearly two weeks before the city council election, on 17 May 2017, Onstad published a "party political broadcast" for the Truth Party's campaign featuring a static view of white paint drying on a brick wall, lasting 10 hours and 2 minutes. National broadcaster EMT refused to air it on television, and Onstad indicated she would sue them for breaking electoral law, but this charge was later dropped, after consultance with lawyers. Instead, on 21 May 2017, the campaign decided to hold a political event, in the Rábana Live venue, wherein the entire party political broadcast would be played throughout the day, with free entrance for any member of the public, and the seating for the venue cleared to make way for a large marketplace, wherein small Maledonian businesses were encouraged to set up stalls in the venue during the ten-hour event, without any oversight from Onstad's campaign at large.
The venue and time was chosen because of its conflict with the far-right National Democratic Union's planned fundraising event in the same venue. Due to the wording of section 6, subsection 2 of the Party Financing Act 1989 ("During an election cycle, no party shall be denied access to a venue for which they have tendered a higher financial remuneration than other entities"), the Truth Party's campaign was given priority over the National Democratic Union for such an event, the fact being featured prominently in advertising for the event. The event itself was heavily anti-Romerist, at the specific request of Onstad, ("out of justifiable spite"). Copies of an updated Šebukeli translation of Wrath of CODECO were available at the entrance, in a box under a sign that read "Ba a esetben ha der be barmeli ehipida..." (a common anti-Romerist slogan, translating to "In case there was any doubt..."), and the Rakeoian Government-in-Exile was specifically invited to set up a stall at the event -- next to the National Democratic Union, who had set up one in protest -- with the news coverage leading to a nearly three times surge in purchases of honorary citizenship from the government-in-exile the following month.
The event, headlined as Watching paint dry, and other activities, made national news, resulting in a surge of publicity for the Truth Party. It raised an estimated ƒ2.7 million (₵2.1 million) for the businesses in attendance, while costing ƒ21,000 (₵16,154) to rent out for the day. The publicity from the event, with increased coverage for the Truth Party's campaign from the media, resulting in a five percentage point boost in polling for the party, widely believed to be one of the primary factors in their ultimate victory in the election.
Since the original event, "Watching paint dry, and other activities" became a yearly event, in which the Truth Party would rent out the Rábana Live venue for ten hours, every 21 May, for a now-depoliticised event. The latest event, held on 21 May 2024, raised ƒ1.8 million (₵1.38 million).
Re-election in 2021
In the run-up to the 2020 general election, there was some speculation on whether Onstad herself would run for the National Assembly, especially given her vigorous support of the constitutional reforms proposed by the Progressive Socialist Party. She left whether she would run in the general election vague, up to the end of the nominations period of the election itself, and on 2 January 2021, announced she would be seeking re-election to the Maledonian Council, leaving it unclear "to watch the media gossip". The second campaign of the Truth Party in the Maledonian City Council focused less on political satire and more on "making the life of citizens more fun", while running on the back of their performance while in the council's administration. Onstad engaged in a series of public stunts, including setting up a bouncy castle obstacle course in the venue of a party event on 1 May 2021, but ultimately, the Truth Party faced slightly worse results than in 2017, losing 3 seats, but still gaining a plurality on the council, and of first (26.57%) and second (45.18%) votes. Onstad retained her seat, and went on to form a broader coalition with the Social Liberals, Greens, and the one Progressive Socialist member of the council, with three left-leaning independents - Vincze Ivett, Soós Kamilla, and Fehér Martin. At the first convening of the council, Onstad was elected via majority as Mayor, but faced challenge from the New Liberal candidate, Csonka Géza.
Mayoralty
Economy and taxation
On 8 January 2018, Onstad announced the replacement of the Maledonian Council Tax with a new system - a Service Tax -- a tax on household incomes rather than on property values. She justified this change by saying it to be vital, citing reports of falling local intake from the council tax system, and the planned increases on Land Value Tax by the national government being more than enough to accomplish the progressive goals of the Council Tax scheme, without the loopholes caused (including of empty and unfurnished homes, which Onstad particularly cited as regressive). According to the difference between the 2017-18 and 2018-19 budgets, this new Service Tax raised ƒ3.8bn (₵2.47bn) more for the City Council than the previous Council Tax, resulting in increased funding for policing and her plan to mitigate the negative economic effects of a living wage in the city.
Tax rises were included in both the 2017-18 and 2018-19 budgets - 9.5% rise in council tax for Band C homes in the 2017-18 budget, and a 5.7% rise in service tax for the Advanced Rate band - before reports came, from the Institute for Responsible Government, that, on current growth trajectory, tax rises would have to continue year-on-year for 13 years in order to make the difference between rising expenditure and tax intake, even with the increased tax intake from the introduction of the Service Tax. Onstad publicly acknowledged these reports, responding by meeting with the Confederation of Business, Confederation of Small Businesses, and the Convention of Estates, to discuss their recommendations on encouraging private investment, especially in respects to the financial services sector of Maledonia. On 8 July 2019, a week after these meetings, Onstad published a 17-page document, entitled "Plugging the hole: investment for a renewed Maledonia", where she set out her plan to prevent the need for further tax rises, including by cutting managerial positions in public services, and reforming Maledonian planning law to remove the right of boroughs to petition against city-wide infrastructure. According to a subsequent report in 2020 by the Institute for Responsible Government, these measures were successful.
Onstad inherited a ƒ2.1bn (₵1.61bn) budget surplus from the preceding Social Liberal administration, and with the spending rises initiated by her administration, turned it into a ƒ15.7m (₵12.08m) deficit by the 2019-20 budget. This was a point of contention in the 2021 election, with the New Liberal Party and Conservative Party both running on the idea that the "unserious" administration of the Truth Party had led to an unaffordable deficit, a claim which Onstad repeatedly denied, noting the small overall deficit, accusing those making the accusations as "desparate".
During her first term as mayor, tourism, air traffic, and hotel occupancy increased, while unemployment decreased to 2.1% from 2.9%. 31 new companies and 28 new biotech firms opened in Maledonia, with Onstad supporting tax incentives for biotech companies to encourage more to move to Maledonia. From 2021-22 and 2022-23, Maledonia's per-head GDP increased by 4.9%, with relative poverty decreasing by 1.8%.
Despite Onstad's support of worker cooperatives, the her pro-business policies not emphasising cooperative development led to Maledonia's rate of cooperative firms falling 4 percentage points from 81.2% to 77.2% from 2017-18 to 2022-23. While this has resulted in criticism from the Progressive Socialist Party, whom the Truth Party is in coalition with, Onstad has repeatedly defended this record, saying that "the national government deals with this, I am only loyal to the city, and firms are firms".
Urban development
Since Onstad took the office of mayor, Maledonia's total square footage of office and residential space has increased by 11%, and 40 million square feet of development has been constructed.
On 18 July 2017, Onstad drew criticism for encouraging the Maledonian Council to refuse planning permission to a project undertaken by the Catholic Maledonian Association to build a catholic church in the Sibosza borough, justifying by alleging ties between the KMS and National Catholic organisations, saying that "it's very clear that the Bible they preach is not the civilised Bible, but the Bible of tyrants". The Catholic Church of Maledonia condemned Onstad's comments, claiming that they represent "a bigoted attack against Catholicism", and a significant rebellion occurred in the administration of the Maledonian Council, when the Social Liberal Party refused to vote to deny planning permission (with the party's Maledonian branch stating that it was a "disgrace" to interfere in religion in such a manner; "an attack on the secular nature of the Entropanian government"). The allegations of ties between the KMS and National Catholic organisations has not been proven, but Onstad has repeatedly defended this claim, justifying it through the Creeperian Catholic ties of the organisation. Ultimately, the development passed through the Maledonian Council, but was vetoed by the borough council of Sibosza.
In the latter half of 2017, Onstad made an effort to redevelop Vászoly Square in the New Town that would have cost ƒ191 million (₵146.9 million), but the plan was shelved after revelations about the city council's budget from 2017-18 meant that the development was unaffordable for the city council without cutting other areas of expenditure.
In January 2018, Onstad proposed two major construction projects that would have significantly impacted the city, but which ultimately failed to materialise, after local objection. The first was the International Plaza, a 319-metre (1,047 ft) tall tower to be built on a city-owned car park in the Pódesára borough of Maledonia's New Town. The building would have served as one of the first in a new series of informal office buildings, where worker co-operatives could move into the officespace for low cost, and a long-term qualitative study on worker efficiency and job satisfaction in formal workplaces in other parts of Maledonia, and the informal workplaces in the International Plaza. However, the Pódesára borough council vetoed these plans, and a revolt over the funding of the plan caused it to be shelved indefinitely. The second proposal called for the creation of the Emblem Building, a 50-metre (160 ft) building on the eastern waterfront of the New Town that would have provided 9,000-square-metre (97,000 sq ft) of officespace and 8,000-square-metre (86,000 sq ft) of housing, but this development faced local opposition, resulting in the borough council of Lósa vetoing the plans.
Onstad supported the proposed redevelopment and expansion of the Nemzeta Køpesent shopping centre in the Central Business District. This development was fast-tracked by the Maledonian Redevelopment Authority in 2018, but was halted due to budgetary restraints.
In 2020, Onstad controversially opposed a proposed casino development in the neighbouring town of Moród (which would have used a small portion of land located within the city limits of Maledonia), describing gambling as "a horrible thing to allow".
Since Onstad's election, the city has been undergoing a construction boom, with the Investor Service of Entropan having credited the city in 2022 as having the "strongest commercial real estate market in the country".
Onstad substantially focused on neighbourhood development in Maledonia, organising neighbourhood councils to better co-ordinate provision of public services throughout the city, and as part of a belief that development should happen in every neighbourhood. The "neighbourhood council" model has spread to other cities, including Veli and Mogyoróska, due to its effectiveness.
Environment and climate change
On 18 July 2018, Onstad announced a phased plan to ban plastic bags city-wide by 2020, one which inspired the nationwide ban enacted two years later. The following week, she proposed a city-wide rollout of a deposit-return scheme, which was implemented on 6 August, in which a surcharge at 20% was applied onto the purchase of products with plastic bottles, that was then returned to the buyer upon return of packaging, with this scheme being extended in 2019 to include aluminum cans, glass bottles, tyres, automotive oil, and batteries. The redemption rate for the deposit was around 90% in 2020 for bottles, and 70% for other items, with a higher rate of recycling, city-wide, than any other city or province in Entropan. This success prompted nationwide rollout of a deposit return scheme.
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In 2021, shortly before the 2021 local election, Onstad indicated her support for what she termed a "Maledonian Green New Deal". She elaborated on it following the election, stating her objective to "protect the planet while taking the golden opportunity of environmental investment". On 30 July 2021, she announced the "first steps" of this plan; the Maledonian Investment Bank to shift its priorities invest in environmentally-friendly capital stock, and the creation of a Maledonian Resillience Task Forceg to coordinate efforts across the city to with unexpected extreme weather or temperatures. These two promises were fulfilled in the following week.
On 8 August 2021, she signed an ordinance to divest city investments from all companies that derive more than 20 percent of their revenue from fossil fuels, with this figure being due to drop to 15 percent in 2022, and 10 percent in 2023. By the end of the stated timeframe of the ordinance, it in total entailed a city divestment of ƒ130 million (₵100 million) in assets.
Onstad has announced a ƒ25 million (₵19 million) housing program to launch the "Green Retrofitting Program", providing eligible building owners with support of up to ƒ10,000 (₵7,700) to support efforts to reduce their buildings' energy use.
Political reform
On 8 July 2021, a scandal emerged in regards to the Pinósza Development in south-western Maledonia. The development, initially supposed to result in the creation of 1,021 social homes as part of the Onstad administration's housebuilding program. However, due to a local campaign against the development, despite attempts to reconcile their demands by the City Council, the borough council of Dólvanes denied planning permission for the development to go ahead. This incident became highly publicised as an example of a borough council directly overruling the City Council, with Onstad releasing a statement 3 days later on 11 July 2021 condemning the decision and promising to legislate a way for the city council to overrule boroughs.
This statement caused considerable backlash from several members of the Maledonian City Council, with Ábel Deák, one of the two Leintan Democratic councillors, calling it "authoritarian idiocy". Despite this heavy resistance, including from Gabriella Halász - a Green councillor, describing the proposition as a "betrayal" of voters, but who eventually relented - it managed to get through in the form of the Political Reform (Boroughs of Maledonia) Act 2021, which reformed the planning system of Maledonia to eliminate borough-specific authority over the planning process as a whole, as well as reforming the relationship between borough councils and the City Council to remove the ability for the borough councils to overrule the City Council.
Housing policy
In 2018, Onstad supported Maledonia being the centre of the national pilot for the proposed Housing First program. From May to September 2018, 942 Maledonians were enrolled in the pilot, causing housing poverty in the city to decrease to its lowest level on record, resulting in a nationwide rollout of the scheme in 2021. Housing costs as a percentage of income increased to 42.9% for low-income families from 2017-18 to 2018-19, and over the three years prior to July 2021, housing rents in Maledonia rose faster than inflation-adjusted incomes, resulting in Onstad increasing city funding for the development of new affordable housing, creating an estimated 160,000 affordable housing units in the city.
More than 16,000 new college dormitory rooms were constructed during Onstad's tenure, with Onstad pushing through a binding target for student accommodation as part of a goal to "make studying affordable".
Transport
In July 2018, Onstad gave her support to the proposed Route 17X bus which state transit officials had proposed to enhance the heavily used Route 17 bus, with busways being created to deal with increased usage. While the program was delayed several times, the route eventually opened in March 2024.
In June 2019, Onstad supported the introduction of a universal free train fares at Maledonian Central Station, with the program eventually materialising in October of that same year. She continued to voice support for national provision of universally free bus, train, and tram fares, until the nationwide rollout of the program in November 2019.
In December 2022, Onstad announced the "20/20 Plan" for improving bicycle routes within the city. While Maledonia was already ranked as the best city in Entropan for cycling by the Bicycling magazine, Onstad did not believe this to be enough, as daily car traffic still outranked bicycle traffic in the city. The "20/25" plan was a plan to reduce car traffic by 20 percent, while increasing the total mileage of bicycle paths by 25 percent, by 2025. The Maledonian Redevelopment Authority invested ƒ9 million (₵7 million) in building new bicycling paths, with 125-kilometre (78 mi) more built by June 2024, ahead of schedule. However, as of June 2024, car traffic has only reduced by 9 percent compared to December 2022.
Arts and culture
In 2017, Onstad supported the construction of the Nordland Theatre, attempting to negotiate a deal between the Maledonian Centre of Arts and the Core Daller Company, but ultimately failing in reaching a deal between the two after the Core Daller Company withdrew from the negotiations. Instead, Onstad announced the Maledonian Redevelopment Authority would directly fund the construction of the venue.
In 2018, she created a position of poet laureate for Maledonia, appointing Sebastian Rosholt to the position.
Policies and views
Ideologically, Onstad has been described by herself and others as a "libertarian socialist". In the about section of her website, she describes herself as "a pragmatic communitarian and libertarian municipalist" - that is, someone who primarily prioritises community ownership of industry and services. She advocates for high public investment in public services, as well as the "democratisation" of public utilities - bringing them into community control. She has been a long-standing advocate for pirate politics, primarily, in her own words, to "broaden political participation to the whole of society". Since 2018, Onstad has supported modern monetary theory as an economic ideology, and is credited with its spread around Entropan.
Onstad's political stance is variable on an issue-by-issue basis, but most commentators agree her political stance to be far-left. According to political scientist Kjetil Haug, Onstad is a "broadly left-wing populist variable on everything but an absolute support for liberty and democracy". Some publications, including A Nap, A Upa Napilap, and A Kozgazo, describe Onstad as a communist, although most political scientists, including Náinnas Loken, Marcus Vinje, and Péter Zalán, disagree with this view, despite Onstad's occasional endorsement of communist governments and ideologies.
Economy and taxation
Originally, Onstad identified economically as a libertarian, supporting the privatisation of state-owned entities such as Entropan Rail, Entropanian Water, and the National Care Service, despite her support of progressive taxation. From the mid-2000s, she began to become gradually more inclined towards economic progressivism, following rising poverty rates under the economically liberal Conservative government. In 2005, she published an article in A Herolden entitled "How a job guarantee would work", becoming among the first to advocate for a national Job Guarantee, nearly twenty years before its nationwide implementation in 2023.
Following her shift into progressive economics, she became a consistent supporter of a package of policies she called the "Citizenship Guarantee", proposed by the Economics of the Real World Institute in 2007, creating a legal requirement for the Ministry of Public Welfare to ensure that every person in Entropan is able to cover their essentials, with a Job Guarantee program guaranteeing the availability of a state-provisioned job for every citizen. This marked Onstad's economic shift towards modern monetary theory, which she has consistently advocated for since, attending several events by the Economics of the Real World Institute and consistently arguing for an MMT interpretation of government spending and taxation.
Constitution
Onstad has consistently been an outspoken advocate for direct democracy. She is a member of the Constitution Society, and has advocated for a model of direct e-democracy mostly implemented by the 2020 constitution. During the consultation period for the Referendum on the Transition towards a Participatory Democracy Act, she attended several public meetings of the newly formed Constitution Committee, and repeatedly advocated for the provisions of the proposed constitution in her columns and on Stories of our Times.
However, she has criticised the 2020 constitution as "not going far enough", establishing a "semi-direct democracy that doesn't fulfil its goal of creating a modern participatory democratic state", particularly criticising the lack of support in the new democratic institutions for online methods of voting and deliberating, with some of the solutions proposed by the Constitution Society - solutions which Onstad helped to create - becoming part of a package of reforms to the system in 2022.
Foreign policy
ACES
Onstad has been a consistent supporter for Entropanian membership in the Global ACES program. In November 2013, she called out the "hypocrisy" of the Entropanian government in an article published in A Reporter, saying that "the Government's rejection of Global ACES membership - at a time where the spectre of Romerism looms large, and only ACES opposes it - is irresponsible and hypocritical. Strongly worded letters don't bring down tyrants". In 2017, she joined the Referendum Coalition - an organisation founded to campaign for a referendum on Entropanian membership of Global ACES - campaigning for the group consistently until its disbandment in July 2019.
In September 2020, Onstad faced criticism for calling reports of the Kavardan ethnic cleansing published by Ernest Pyle "wild conjecture dreamt up in a CODECO wet dream". While she has repeatedly condemned the Terranihilian government for being undemocratic, she has frequently engaged in denial of its human rights abuses. In 2021, she called the Kavardan re-education camps a "sensible anti-terrorist measure", stating that "while the conditions in the camps are horrific and should be investigated, I'm not sure whether anyone can deny that it's a sensible response to February 7th". In 2022, she mediated on her position, saying that "with the fascistic tendencies of the Terranihilian government, it's definitely possible and highly likely that they're committing genocide of the Kavardans", and acknowledging her previous remarks as "rash, horrible, and genocide-denying", but "motivated by rational zealotry against CODECO-aligned states".
During the 2023 Global ACES referendum, Onstad campaigned in favour of joining Global ACES, dedicating 3 special two-hour long versions of Stories of the World to "making the case for not being neutral in the face of a global alliance so absolutely evil that it's nearly impossible to find anyone in the free world willing to defend it", referring to the inability of the radio show to find CODECO-supporting interviewees. However, she has criticised the Entropanian government for not holding a referendum sooner, saying that "it took there being a genocide committed by the communists for once to get them to do something", referring to how the Shaoyu Island genocide prompted the referendum.
Communism
Onstad is a member of the New Illyricum Solidarity Campaign, which opposes military intervention in New Illyricum and supports the Illyrian Communist Revolution. In February 2015, following the election of Ernesto Luçeo as Grand Marshall of the Union, Onstad congratulated Luçeo on his victory, and has openly supported the Vanguardist Party of New Illyricum through the 2015 and 2024 grand marshall elections, and through the 2022 and 2024 congressional elections. Onstad opposes ACES intervention against New Illyricum, and has condemned the Free Feruian Army.
Additionally, she is a member of the Girisko Solidarity Campaign, which campaigns for better relations between Entropan and Girisko.
CODECO
Onstad has been a frequent critic of what she calls the "free world ignorance" of human rights abuses taking place in CODECO and CODECO-aligned states. She is a member of the anti-Romerist protest organisation Coalition for Freedom, has received honours from the Rakeoian Government-in-Exile, and has frequently raised funds for individual dissidents from these states.
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During her time writing for Nyetene Ma, Onstad expressed a more isolationist position in regards to CODECO states. She frequently wrote articles satirising the Entropanian government's foreign policy focus on condemning human rights abuses committed by CODECO, often comparing it to writing letters to the Easter Bunny. In 2011, she changed her position, in a column entitled "We are too lenient against the Romerists", wherein she said: "The free world ignores these atrocities, for no real reason - Creeperopolis is just as reliant on us as we are on them", decrying democratic countries' tendencies to "write strongly worded letters against genocide but keep the perpetrators as valued business partners".
Since 2011, Onstad has campaigned consistently against human rights abuses in these states. Hundreds of episodes of Stories of our Times focus on abuses in countries such as Creeperopolis, El Salvador, Lurjize, Pavulturilor, Sequoyah, and Rakeo, interviewing defectors, journalists, and prominent dissidents. In 2018, she received the Red Cross from the Rakeoian Government-in-Exile for her coverage of human rights abuses in Rakeo, her role in prompting the official Entropanian recognition of the government-in-exile as the legitimate government of Rakeo through recognising such at the Maledonian City Council, and her fundraising efforts for the government-in-exile.
Public image
Polls by research and data analytics firm Ba Favørup have consistently shown Onstad to be among the most well-liked politicians in Entropan. As of June 2024, 93% of Entropanians recognise her, and 55% view her favourably, higher, currently, than any other politician Ba Favørup surveys public opinion of. She has been referred to by most commentators as a unique figure in Entropanian politics, with her favourability staying roughly the same regardless of party support, despite her pronounced political beliefs.
Her personal style includes a level of unique brashness and disregard for conventional political norms which has won her both support and opposition across Entropan. She has a unique appeal to most economic groups, with what journalist Kent Bratt termed as "anti-populist populism", where "she both critiques the establishment and the radicals, finding a middle ground where the professional and working class meet".
Onstad's public character is built upon her trustworthiness as a source of information, and the notable dips in her popularity with the public come after notable false assertions she has made, including her comments about the Kavardan ethnic cleansing (referring to it as "nonsense"), and about the OU military intervention in Ajakanistan (referring to it as "a horrific act of imperialism").
World federalism
Onstad has been an outspoken supporter of the establishment of a democratic, federal world government; describing it during an episode of Stories of our Times in 2014 as "the rational answer to the extistential crises of climate change, totalitarianism, and war". She has been a member of Entropan's World Federalist Organisation since 1999, promoting the organisation and speaking at several of its events. In 2016, she explained her support for world federalism in a column for A Reporter, saying that "of course it's utopian, of course it's unachievable in the next decades or the next century or whenever the pessimists deem the right time to implement it. But it represents a new world, free from the scourge of totalitarianism, where everyone is free to do what they want, believe what they want, and everyone is prosperous. I don't care whether it's unachievable. It's a damned good goal."
Personal life
Alongside her native language of Šebukel, Onstad is fluent in Rockr, Leintan, Uryha, and Quebecshirite. She also has conversational knowledge of Ladin and Reykani, making her the second-most multilingual political party leader in Entropan after Green Party leader Lill Stave. She is engaged to Andrea Pál, the Head of the Faculty of Advocates, and they live together in a semi-detached house in the Viségasid borough of Maledonia, which Onstad represents in the Maledonian Council. They have three maine coons, named Bavri, Jovás, and Sommer, aged 14, 10, and 3 respectively.
Onstad has admitted to using cocaine while she was at university, and has frequently used cannabis "since 2011". She partakes in cycling and skiing, and won a chess tournament in university, playing it casually since. She has been a vegetarian since she volunteered at a dairy farm at age 19, and doesn't have a car, preferring to ride by bicycle.
Religion
Onstad's parents are Clovitan, and she was brought up with Clovitan beliefs throughout childhood. However, in 2006, she began to take a more agnostic approach towards religion while still maintaining the moral framework of Clovity, stating in an interview in 2010 that around that time she "started to question some of the presuppositions I'd been accustomed to for most of my life", later describing her religious beliefs as "heavily influenced by Clovity, but not theistic - post-Clovitan, you might say". She has repeatedly used the term "post-Clovitan" to describe her religious beliefs since.
