WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 The big election over the weekend was in a small European country nearly half a world away from Washington, but the\u00a0defeat of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n\u00a0has significant reverberations in the United States.<\/p>\n
That’s because President Donald Trump and many U.S. conservatives have\u00a0long embraced Orb\u00e1n, who has become an icon among the global right for his anti-immigrant stance. The American president’s agenda has\u00a0striking parallels\u00a0with the way the Hungarian leader used the levers of government to tilt the media, judiciary and electoral system to keep his party in power for 16 years.<\/p>\n
Trump\u00a0supported Orb\u00e1n\u2019s reelection bid\u00a0and even\u00a0dispatched\u00a0Vice President JD Vance to Budapest last week \u2014 in the midst of the Iran war \u2014 to stump for the incumbent.<\/p>\n
Orb\u00e1n’s loss was a reminder of how\u00a0the war has diminished Trump’s ability\u00a0to help allied politicians overseas, as well as of the limited ability of leaders to use their power to tilt voting in their direction in an age of\u00a0worldwide discontent over incumbents\u00a0of all ideological stripes.<\/p>\n
\u201cOppositions can win despite a tilted playing field,\u201d said Steven Levitsky, a politics professor at Harvard and coauthor of the book \u201cHow Democracies Die.\u201d \u201cDemocracies are facing many challenges in many parts of the world, but so are autocracies.\u201d<\/p>\n
Orb\u00e1n\u2019s defeat has immediate global implications because he was the European leader closest to Russian President Vladimir Putin and had blocked European Union aid to Ukraine, which is defending itself after Russian’s 2022 invasion.<\/p>\n
His fall was celebrated on Sunday by both Democrats and Republicans, some of whom criticized their own administration for such overt support for the Hungarian leader.<\/p>\n
\u201cDon\u2019t fiddle-paddle in other democracies\u2019 elections,\u201d Republican Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska said on the social media site X.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe freedom-loving people of Hungary have voted decisively in favor of democracy and the rule of law,\u201d posted Republican Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi.<\/p>\n
Matt Schlapp, chairman of the American Conservative Union, is part of the wing of the American right that\u00a0embraced Orb\u00e1n. The Conservative Political Action Conference, which Schlapp’s group hosts, held its first European session in Budapest and has made Hungary\u00a0a regular destination.<\/p>\n
Orban was a\u00a0featured speaker\u00a0at the group’s conference in Dallas in 2022.<\/p>\n
Schlapp said there’s an easy explanation for Orb\u00e1n’s loss.<\/p>\n
\u201cEventually, democracies just want change,\u201d he said. \u201cIn democracies, you don’t have kings, and the people in the end speak.\u201d<\/p>\n
“The people of Hungary were saying, ‘We’re having a difficult time with inflation, the economy and the war. Let’s try the new guy,’\u201d Schlapp said, noting that he backs Trump’s Iran war but the turmoil it’s created, especially in European energy markets, hurt Orb\u00e1n.<\/p>\n
Diana Sosoaca, a far-right member of the European Parliament from Romania, on Sunday called Vance’s Hungarian visit \u201ca big mistake\u201d given widespread revulsion at the Iran war on the continent.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou invite a representative of the United States of America, who created the big disorder in this world?\u201d Sosoaca said in an interview posted by the Kremlin-controlled network RT, formerly known as Russia Today. \u201cIt was the biggest mistake he could do before the elections.\u201d<\/p>\n
An anti-communist activist in his youth, Orb\u00e1n was initially elected prime minister in 1998 but took a turn to the right after being voted out in 2002. Upon returning to office in 2010, Orb\u00e1n and his Fidesz party implemented a legal framework to consolidate authority that he and his allies developed while he was out of power.<\/p>\n
Orb\u00e1n embraced what he dubbed \u201cilliberal democracy,\u201d building a barrier on Hungary’s southern border to block migrants from Africa and Asia who were moving northward through Europe. He and his party\u00a0stifled LGBTQ+ rights, cracked down on\u00a0freedom of the press\u00a0and undermined\u00a0judicial independence.<\/p>\n
Orb\u00e1n cemented his power when his Fidesz party won enough seats in Parliament during the 2010 global recession to rewrite the country’s constitution. They restructured the judiciary to funnel appointments to the bench through party loyalists, redrew legislative districts to make it much harder for Fidesz members to lose elections and helped push Hungary’s media companies to be sold to tycoons allied with Orban.<\/p>\n
The European Union has declared Hungary an\u00a0\u201celectoral autocracy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Orb\u00e1n backers have scoffed at suggestions that the Hungarian leader is an enemy of democracy, and on Sunday he quickly conceded his loss. Democrats have worried that Trump will try to use his own executive power to tilt November’s midterm elections or the 2028 presidential vote to his party, much as Trump\u00a0tried to use his official powers\u00a0to overturn\u00a0Democrat Joe Biden’s win\u00a0in the 2020 presidential election.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost importantly for American voters, even a guy who rigs the system can be defeated when the people unite and turn out against him,\u201d said Ian Bassin of Protect Democracy, a nonpartisan group that says it combats authoritarianism.<\/p>\n
Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California took the opportunity to jab at Vance: \u201cYour ally Orban conceded. In 2028, will you @JDVance follow suit if you lose?\u201d he posted on X.<\/p>\n
Levitsky said defenders of democracy shouldn\u2019t take too much comfort from Orb\u00e1n\u2019s loss, noting that in some ways Trump has been more oppressive. He cited Trump\u2019s use of the Justice Department to investigate political opponents and the shooting deaths of protesters by immigration officers — steps that Orban\u2019s government never took, Levitsky said.<\/p>\n
But Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat, said he sees parallels between Trump’s and Orban\u2019s political projects, as well as the potential fate of their parties at the polls.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was essentially doing what Donald Trump is trying to do here in the United States,\u201d Van Hollen said of Orban. \u201cMy read of the election is that the people of Hungary rejected that, just like people in the United States are rejecting that here at home.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump made no public comments Sunday about the election results in Hungary.<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
Riccardi reported from Denver.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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