April 13, 2026
On Sunday, it happened: Viktor Orban was defeated. In an election with the highest voter turnout in Hungarys democratic history, Peter Magyar’s Tisza Party won a two-thirds supermajority, enough to alter the constitution that Orban had rewritten to shore up his power.
Some admirers of Orban have argued that the fact that he lost proves he was never an autocrat to begin with. What it really demonstrates, however, is that opposition to Fidesz was so strong it was able to overwhelm all the structures Orban put in place to protect his rule: wildly distorted voting districts, a captured media, state-sponsored propaganda, local patronage networks, and widespread threats and intimidation.
Everything I read about him, to me, reads as a controlled opposition / “alternative” and things will mostly be business as usual for him, with the caveat that his party is staunchly anti-government corruption, although I have seen anti-corruption gut perfectly good government offices and programs (looking at you DOGE and MUSKYBOI)
I don’t share the elation of everyone else, but I am also not Hungarian, my hopes and thoughts are with them.
I would agree, except that the controlled opposition is designed to:
I think that in this example, he doesn’t pass enough tests to be controlled opposition, but that does not mean that they can’t gain control of him after the fact through threats, intimidation, and bribery. There seems to have been plenty of that going around.
Yeah, that’s kinda my fear. That whomever comes after him, will not just be worse than him, but also worse than Orban. And it’s simply because the new guy won’t change a damn thing. But again, not a Hungarian, just speaking as someone in USA, that there was no change during Obama, and I expect the person after Trump will be a milquetoast/corporate Democrat, and it will lead to someone worse than Trump.