As Hungary went to elections on April 12, the polls showed that Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who had been in power for 16 years, was likely to lose. How badly he would lose the election was the question. Peter Magyar, the leader of the Tisza party, urged voters to continue going to polls.
“Record turnout! The last minute and every vote counts,” he wrote on X/Twitter. “Please go vote, or if you’ve already done so, call up every acquaintance, friend, and relative you suspect hasn’t gone yet! The regime is living its final hours; we stand at the threshold of systemic change. Let’s step through it!”
When the day was over, it was clear that Magyar had won by a landslide. With roughly 98% of votes counted by the morning, BBC reported that Tisza was on course for 138 seats in parliament, against Obran’s Fidesz, which only got 55. Hungary’s elections were closely followed by both Europe and the international community.
Days prior to the election, on April 7, US Vice President JD Vance had traveled to Hungary. He gave a speech, in which he said, “What the United States and Hungary together represent under Viktor Orban and the president of the United States’ leadership is the defense of Western civilization… the defense of the idea that we are founded on a certain Christian civilization and Christian values.”
He also said, “We want you to make a decision about your future with no outside forces pressuring you… The bureaucrats in Brussels, those people should not be listened to. Listen to your hearts, listen to your souls, and listen to the sovereignty of the Hungarian people.”
Vance said he loved both Hungary and Orban. “He’s a fantastic man,” he stated. “We’ve had a tremendous relationship, and he does a [good] job. Remember this: he didn’t allow people to storm your country and invade your country like other people have.”
In Israel, Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism Minister Amichai Chikli recently wrote on X: “Budapest under Viktor Orban is one of the safest capitals in Europe for Jews, and one of the very few where a Jew can walk to synagogue on Shabbat morning wearing a tallit and kippah without fear.”
He added, “As someone who has seen the sharp rise in antisemitism across Europe, I feel compelled to express deep gratitude for Viktor Orban’s courageous leadership. I wish him every success in the elections tomorrow.”
A right-wing idol who defends Hungary from the West
For some, Orban has become a symbol – a right-wing figure who has supposedly defended Hungary and the West. Many of Orban’s supporters oppose the European Union, and some also oppose NATO. Many of those drawn to Orban tend to denounce Ukraine and Ukraine’s leader, Volodymyr Zelensky.
This is part of a worldview that puts Russia and President Vladimir Putin in a positive light. For some reason, this worldview sees Putin and Orban as embodying the West, while actual Western countries such as Spain, France, the UK, Italy, Germany, and Poland fail to do so.
This reversal of what is “Western” among these parties has led them to create a kind of totem around Orban and his 16 years in power. They saw him, along with a handful of other politicians, as part of an imagined community of right-wing leaders. However, it is unclear who the other members of this small and dwindling club were.
The reality of what was going on in Hungary and the myth created around Orban was always very different. Hungary’s economy – as well as other measures of its success – had generally stagnated. Hungary was falling behind other countries (such as Romania). This is surprising, because Hungary is a central European country that has played a key role in Europe for centuries. As part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, it was a major player. Also, Budapest was a center of European travel and culture.
Even under the Communist yoke, Hungary rebelled in 1956 against the Soviets. It didn’t gain its freedom immediately, but, similar to Czechoslovakia in 1968, it became a symbol of how people would refuse to bend to the Communist-Soviet agenda.
Orban was born in 1963 and his political rise in the 1990s coincided with Eastern Europe’s revolutions and breakaway from the Soviet orbit in 1989. Orban was, in those days, an example of the new hope for central and eastern Europe.
Orban was outspoken about the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. He was elected to parliament in 1990 and became prime minister in 1998, serving for four years. He later returned to office in 2010. Like many leaders when they are first elected, he was an inspiring figure. However, he stagnated in his role. What was once inspirational as a kind of right-leaning European brand of politics, became progressively more authoritarian and less inspirational.
Some people view Hungary as a bulwark against the mass immigration that some European countries have faced. For instance, Hungary stood against the decision by Germany’s former chancellor, Angela Merkel, to open the borders to more than a million people in 2015. During that September, myriads of immigrants went to Greece.
I traveled with them, covering this mass migration, as people crossed from Greece into North Macedonia and then Serbia, and then tried to gain access to Hungary. Hungary closed its border with a fence, and I was there the day the fence was being closed. I slept on the border with the migrants.
At the time, I believed Hungary was likely correct to enforce its borders. In other countries, the migrants had been moved illegally and were not documented in collaboration with local authorities. Europe had proverbially thrown its doors wide open; no migrants were checked or IDed. It was a chaos not befitting of modern European countries.
However, where Orban and Hungary were right in 2015, their overall policies were not always correct. Orban’s bizarre obsession with opposing Ukraine has been shameful for Hungary.
Ukraine is a victim of Russian aggression. There are no two sides to this fact. I also covered the Ukraine conflict after 2014, heading to the ceasefire line near Marinka in Donbas. Marinka, a quiet Ukrainian town, is now completely destroyed because of Russia. Any defender of the West and Europe would stand with Ukraine. It remains a mystery why Orban did not see Ukraine as a friend.
What has been proven in Hungary is that following the “one man, one party” rule for too long does not produce good results. But Hungary isn’t the only country dealing with this. Russia went further than Hungary in its authoritarianism. Turkey has also gone further, as it arrests and jails opposition figures and journalists.
Hungary, however, showed that it is ultimately a democracy in electing a new leader on April 12. India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi wrote, “Heartiest congratulations to Mr. Peter Magyar and the Tisza Party on your resounding election victory. India and Hungary are bound by deep-rooted friendship, shared values, and enduring mutual respect. I look forward to working closely with you to further strengthen our bilateral cooperation and to advance the vital India-EU Strategic Partnership for the shared prosperity and well-being of our peoples.”
India, the world’s largest democracy, is embracing the future.
Not everyone is as quick to embrace Magyar. Even so, there is much to admire in Magyar’s victory. Magyar, born in 1981, was once a member of Orban’s Fidesz, but later left that party. His victory has demonstrated that Hungary demands new, younger leadership. Because he was born in 1981, Magyar represents the new generation. He grew up in an era free of the Soviet yoke. He understands the new Europe and the challenges that it currently faces.
The fact is that today’s Europe requires a lot of new leadership. The right wing that began to rise in many countries in the 1990s represented a rebellion against years of Social Democratic stagnation. This was true of the Freedom Party in Austria, the Northern League in Italy, and the National Front in France. It was true of many new types of populist parties and leaders, from Pim Fortuyn to Geert Wilders, from the True Finns to the Alternative for Germany and Sweden Democrats. Every country in Europe has seen its electoral landscape changed.
But the Right and far-right have not always found success in governance. Orban was seen as an admirable figure by some because he had risen to govern. However, his many years in office eventually took its toll.
Hungary has shown the world that elections matter. The cult that formed around Orban will likely wither. His brand of right-wing populism will be seen as hollow, especially as Magyar is expected to guide Hungary forward with vigor.