It is no secret who Viktor Orban favours in the US presidential election on Tuesday, with Hungary’s nationalist leader saying publicly that he will pop open bottles of champagne if his “dear friend” Donald Trump wins.
It is a political friendship that the Hungarian prime minister — whose illiberal policies and pro-Russian stance has made him a bete noir in the European Union — has spent years cultivating and he could gain a powerful ally if Trump returns to the White House.
One of the key people tasked with making the connection between Orban’s “illiberal democracy” and US conservatives is Rod Dreher, a renowned American right-wing thinker and writer who works a few minutes’ walk from Orban’s seat of power inside Buda Castle.
“He had nothing to lose by coming out 100 percent for Trump,” Dreher told AFP, adding that Hungary could “hit the jackpot” and gain a “powerful friend in its eternal struggle against the Brussels bullies”.
Hungary, which currently holds the EU’s rotating presidency, has frequent run-ins with Brussels over the rule of law and a wide range of other issues.
‘Hungarian model’
The Danube Institute, where Dreher works, is one of the pro-government think tanks focused on cultivating relationships with conservative figures on the other side of the Atlantic.
According to the investigative site Atlatszo, at least $1.64 million of public funds were spent on the institute’s efforts over the past three years.
Proudly advertising the so-called Hungarian model of conservatism, Dreher invites like-minded figures to Budapest and praises on X the politics of Orban, who has been in power since 2010.
The Danube Institute has also been building a partnership with the Heritage Foundation, an ultra-conservative US-based think tank.
The two organisations co-hosted conferences and even signed a formal cooperation agreement in 2022.
Heritage is behind “Project 2025” — a sweeping blueprint to remake the federal government in Trump’s image by replacing thousands of federal workers with ultra-conservative loyalists, centralising power in the White House and pushing policy to the right on everything from abortion to immigration.
Trump has publicly distanced himself from the controversial plan, which opponents have characterised as an authoritarian, right-wing wish list.
“Project 2025 is reminiscent of Hungarian government practices of keeping the facade of democratic structures in place, but bringing strategic areas such as media, judiciary or education under political control behind the scenes,” independent analyst Mate Kalo told AFP.
‘Shallow ties’
A public bromance between the two has bloomed.
Trump recently described Orban as “one of the most respected men” and “a tough person, smart”.
The Hungarian leader said on X he had called Trump on Thursday to wish him “the best of luck” for the elections.
They express strikingly similar political views, both fancying themselves as tough on immigration, for instance.
Orban was the first Western leader to have given Trump his support just after he was nominated by the Republicans as their candidate in 2016.
Their last in-person meeting was in July, when Orban travelled to see Trump at his Mar-a-Lago luxury estate in Florida. Orban went there in March, too.
Still, Kalo cautioned against overestimating Orban’s influence with Trump, pointing to Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) Hungary, an off-shoot of a major US conservative political gathering.
Trump has never attended in person an event that attracts many European and US right-wing figures, sending instead pre-recorded videos to the event held in Hungary since 2021.
While “a united front” is presented at these events, Kalo said, “these are shallow ties” and “there are a lot of unspoken disagreements in foreign policy on the basis of differing national interests”.
Prominent Republicans have expressed concerns about Hungary “cosying up” to China, with the party’s outgoing Senate leader, Mitch McConnell, denouncing fellow conservatives for forming “a cult of personality” around Orban.
Still, a Trump victory could be beneficial for the Hungarian government, with Orban “hoping that a Republican administration would be less critical of his domestic policies,” said Zsuzsanna Vegh, a programme officer at the German Marshall Fund.
One expectation is that Trump would appoint a less confrontational ambassador to replace David Pressman, an openly gay former human rights lawyer who frequently slams the Hungarian government over restricting LGBTQ rights and democratic backsliding.
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