Hungary – The Sick Man of Europe? | The Bottom Line

Dec 4, 2024 | By all accounts, the Hungarian economy is not doing well. The country just slid into a technical recession; the statistics office recorded the biggest slump in investment in 30 years; the Hungarian currency, the forint, is doing worse than its CEE peers; and the government's running a big deficit with access to some of the EU funds available to the country severed.

‘Cautionary Tale’: Trump Wants to ‘Remake America’ — Like This Recession-plagued Country

Nov 26, 2024 | Donald Trump is inspired by Hungary and its leader Viktor Orbán, seeking to remake America using authoritarian policies similar to his, critics say.

Mr Orbán, We Want Our Money Back! No More EU Funds for Hungary! Daniel Freund

Oct 15, 2024

Hungary's Orban Says Corks Will Pop If Trump Wins US Election! MEPs Reply Singing 'Bella Ciao'

Oct 9, 2024

Es redet Putins Marionette! – © Mark Alexander

Orbán's concern for the rights of gays in the EU due to illegal immigration is a bit rich, isn't it? Especially when the rights of gays in Hungary leave so much to be desired. Check out this article by Human Rights Watch as just one example of Orbán’s faux concern for gay rights in the EU!

LGBT Rights Under Renewed Pressure in Hungary: Children Harmed in the Name of Protection »

And this one:

As Governments Demonize LGBTQ+ Rights, Children Lose the Most »

EU Debates: Ursula von der Leyen Attacks Orbán’s Support for Russia in Fiery Speech to European Parliament

Ocy 9, 2024

America and Hungary, a Far-Right Love Affair

Aug 20, 2024 | Matthew Cassel travels to Budapest during Viktor Orban’s reelection to explore why so many right-wing Americans are traveling to Hungary, and what they hope to learn from Central Europe’s most autocratic ruler. This segment is from the show ‘VICE’ which originally aired in May 2022.

Former Estonian President on Why Hungary Should Leave the EU – Toomas Hendrik Ilves

Aug 11, 2024 | Is Hungary stretching the EU’s patience to its limit? Under prime minister Viktor Orbán’s leadership, it has exercised veto rights to block Ukrainian military aid and Russian sanctions, delayed the Nato accessions of Sweden and Finland and shrugged off EU asylum regulations. For the EU, Hungary is a diplomatic headache – and one that may be about to get worse. Do they have a place in the European Union? The Spectator’s editorial manager Lukas Degutis is joined by former Estonian president Toomas Hendrik Ilves to explain how Hungary has become a ’nuisance country’ and how concerned the EU should be with Hungary’s relationship to Russia.

What Is Hungary’s Orbán Trying to Achieve with His 'Peace Missions'? | DW News

Jul 12, 2024 | Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán traveled to the US state of Florida on Thursday, where he met with former President Donald Trump following a NATO summit in Washington.

The meeting is part of Orbán's self-proclaimed "peace mission" to end Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. It is likely to add to frustration among Western allies over similar secret trips he has made to Russia and China in the past few days.

This Is the Super-scandal that Should Bring Down Viktor Orbán – and It’s Far from Over

THE GUARDIAN: Hungary’s president quit over the fallout of a child abuse case, but the ‘pro-family’ prime minister still has questions to answer

Screenshot from the Guardian | Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán at a press conference in Budapest, December 2023. | Photograph: Denes Erdos/AP
After nearly 14 years running Hungary, Viktor Orbán’s regime is crumbling under the weight of its own hypocrisies. The country’s president, Katalin Novák, a close Orbán ally, was forced to resign in disgrace earlier this month for issuing a pardon to a man convicted of helping cover up a sex abuse case at a children’s home. The former justice minister, Judit Varga, who approved the decision, also quit. This followed a tumultuous week of public outcry and protests in Budapest.

The scandal has not only rocked Orbán’s autocratic government to its core, it has laid bare the phoney nature of his self-declared Christian, family-values agenda. It has also exposed what little power even high-ranking political figures wield under Orbán’s de facto one-person rule: at the drop of a hat, he appears ready to dispose of close allies, even the supposedly independent president of the republic, to avoid accountability himself. » | Katalin Cseh | Saturday, February 17, 2024

EU Agrees on €50 Billion Ukraine Aid Package | DW News

Feb 1, 2024 | Just one hour into the EU's special summit, EU leaders managed to reach a deal that will allow the bloc to send €50 billion ($54 billion) in funding to Ukraine over the next four years, according to European Council President Charles Michel.

The deal had been blocked by Hungary since the previous leaders' summit in Brussels in mid-December. "We have a deal," Michel wrote on X, formerly Twitter. "This locks in steadfast, long-term, predictable funding for Ukraine."

Putin Makes Emboldened Speech - as EU Opens Ukraine Accession Talks | Russia-Ukraine War

Dec 14, 2023 | EU leaders have agreed to open membership talks with Ukraine and Moldova. Hungary's prime minister - Putin ally Viktor Orban - wasn't in the room when the EU voted and said he did not wish to participate in the "bad decision".

Hungary Blocks €50bn of EU Funding for Ukraine | BBC News

Dec 15, 2023 | Hungary has blocked €50bn ($55bn; £43bn) in EU aid for Ukraine - just hours after an agreement was reached on starting membership talks.

"Summary of the nightshift: veto for the extra money to Ukraine," Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said after Thursday's talks in Brussels. EU leaders said the aid negotiations would resume early next year.

The aid blocking was announced by Mr Orbán shortly after the EU leaders decided to open membership talks with Ukraine and Moldova and to grant candidate status to Georgia.

Hungary - which maintains close ties with Russia - has long opposed membership for Ukraine but did not veto that move.


Hungary blocks €50bn in EU aid for Ukraine hours after membership talks approved: Viktor Orbán says extra money to Kyiv had been vetoed but talks would resume in the new year »

How Jews from Israel Are Seeking Refuge in Hungary | Focus on Europe

Nov 19, 2023 | Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, a Jewish refugee center in Hungary has been taking in families from southern Israel. It was initially set up in 2022 to house more than 600 Jews who fled Ukraine after the Russian invasion.

Hungarian Bookstore Fined for Selling LGBTQ+ Novel in Youth Section

THE GUARDIAN: Heartstopper by Alice Oseman was on shelves for young people and did not have closed packaging as required by controversial law

A government office in Hungary has levied a hefty fine against a national bookseller over a LGBTQ+ graphic novel series, saying it violated a contentious law that prohibits the depiction of homosexuality to minors.

The bookseller, Líra Könyv, is Hungary’s second-largest bookstore chain. It was fined 12m forints ($36,000 or £27,400) for placing Heartstopper by the British author Alice Oseman in its youth literature section, and for failing to place it in closed packaging as required by a 2021 law.

The Heartstopper webcomics and graphic novels were adapted for television and the subsequent series was a huge hit for Netflix, with a second season due in August.

The Budapest metropolitan government office, which issued the fine, told the state news agency MTI that it had conducted an investigation into the store selling the title.

“The investigation found that the books in question depicted homosexuality, but they were nevertheless placed in the category of children’s books and youth literature, and were not distributed in closed packaging,” the office said. » | Associated Press in Budapest | Thursday, July 13, 2023

Hungary’s Far-right PM Calls for Trump’s Return: ‘Come Back, Mr President’

THE GUARDIAN: Viktor Orbán, addressing European CPAC summit, attacks liberalism as a ‘virus’ and says his country is model for world

Viktor Orbán, the Hungarian prime minister, delivers the keynote speech in Budapest on Thursday. Photograph: Szilárd Koszticsák/EPA
The Hungarian leader Viktor Orbán has called for Donald Trump’s return to office, claiming their shared brand of hard-right populism is on the rise around the world, in a speech to US Republicans and their European allies in Budapest.

Orbán was addressing the second annual meeting of the US Conservative Political Action Coalition (CPAC) in the Hungarian capital, aimed at cementing radical rightwing ties across the Atlantic. He said that conservatives have “occupied big European sanctuaries”, which he listed as Budapest, Warsaw, Rome and Jerusalem. He added that Vienna “is also not hopeless” .

He noted that Washington and Brussels were still in the grip of liberalism, which he described as a “virus that will atomize and disintegrate our nations”. » | Flora Garamvolgyi in Budapest | Thursday, May 4, 2023

The very last thing this world needs now is another term of office with Donal Trump at the helm. Perish the thought! – Mark

The Lincoln Project: CPAC Texas Day 1

Aug 5, 2022 CPAC Texas Day 1 in 90 seconds. The Lincoln Project is a leading pro-democracy organization in the United States — dedicated to the preservation, protection, and defense of democracy. Our fight against Trumpism is only beginning. We must combat these forces everywhere and at all times — our democracy depends on it.

Hi Y’all! Don’t forget, we’re all gonna be seein’ Jeezuz together! – Mark

Hungary PM Viktor Orbán Addresses CPAC as American Right Embraces His Authoritarian Rule

Aug 4, 2022 We speak with international affairs scholar Kim Lane Scheppele on the rise and fall of Hungary's constitutional democracy and how Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has gained popularity among the American right ahead of his speech today at the Conservative Political Action Conference. "Orbán presents, especially for the American right, a kind of irresistible combination of culture war issues," says Lane Scheppele. "These culture war issues in Hungary disguise the fact that underneath the surface Orbán has been changing the laws of the country so that gradually he has shut down all of the independent institutions that might tell him no." She says U.S. Republicans are now engaging in a very "Orbán-like" campaign to rig elections so they win regardless of the popular vote.

Hungary PM Viktor Orbán rallies US conservatives to fight for ‘less drag queens, more Chuck Norris’: Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán has remarked the world needs fewer drag queens and “more rangers” in a keynote address at the Conservative Political Action Conference in the US. »

Why American Conservatives Love Viktor Orban: What was the prime minister of Hungary doing addressing a crowd of Republicans in Dallas? »

Tucker Carlson Under Fire for Fawning over Authoritarian Leader, Touting Hungary as Model for US

May 24, 2022 • The most influential conservative gathering on the right, CPAC, was recently held in Budapest, Hungary. Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who has fawned over Hungary’s authoritarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in past interviews, addressed the gathering, telling attendees the country’s ethno-nationalist regime offers a “better way” for America. MSNBC’s Ari Melber reports on the GOP’s embrace of “foreign exceptionalism” and the party’s decision to abandon policy.

Trump Shares CPAC Hungary Platform with Notorious Racist and Antisemite

THE GUARDIAN: Hungarian talkshow host who has called Jews ‘stinking excrement’ and Roma ‘animals’ addresses rightwing conference

Donald Trump is shown on screen speaking via a videolink at the CPAC conference in Budapest, Hungary, on Friday. Photograph: Szilárd Koszticsák/EPA
A notorious Hungarian racist who has called Jews “stinking excrement”, referred to Roma as “animals” and used racial epithets to describe Black people, was a featured speaker at a major gathering of US Republicans in Budapest.

Zsolt Bayer took the stage at the second day of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) Hungary, a convention that also featured speeches from Donald Trump, Fox News host Tucker Carlson, and Trump’s former White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows.

The last featured speaker of the conference was Jack Posobiec, a far-right US blogger who has used antisemitic symbols and promoted the fabricated “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory smearing prominent Democrats as pedophiles.

Bayer, a television talkshow host in Hungary, has been widely denounced for his racism. During the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests, he wrote on his blog: “Is this the future? Kissing the dirty boots of fucking [racist epithet] and smiling at them? Being happy about this? Because otherwise they’ll kill you or beat you up?” » | Flora Garamvolgyi and Julian Borger in Washington | Saturday, May 21, 2022

Orbán and US right to bond at Cpac in Hungary over ‘great replacement’ ideology: American far right has long embraced Hungary’s prime minister, who speaks of Europe’s ‘suicidal’ immigration policies »

Viktor Orbán tells CPAC the path to power is to ‘have your own media’: Hungarian leader also tells Republicans at Budapest conference that shows like Tucker Carlson’s should be broadcast ‘24/7’ »

Hungary Opposes EU's Russian Oil Ban Plan 'In This Form' • France 24 English

May 4, 2022 • Hungary warned on Wednesday that it cannot support the proposed EU ban on Russian oil in its current form as it would "completely destroy" its energy supply security. FRANCE 24's Florence La Bruyère reports from Budapest, Hungary.