The ‘Budapest playbook’: A blueprint we can’t afford to follow

And these MAGA Republicans have been described as being ‘obsessed’ with Viktor Orbán. JD Vance, Trump’s 2024 running mate, said that the US “could learn a lot” from Hungary, while Trump himself said, “There’s nobody that’s better, smarter, or a better leader than Viktor Orbán. He’s fantastic.”

The winning side of history?

Orbán, once politically isolated in Europe, has positioned himself as the leading figure in the far-right movement, promoting a vision of a Europe that resists multiculturalism and globalism. He has long asserted that he and his growing coalition of nationalist allies are destined to emerge on the winning side of history.

And it’s not difficult to understand the far-right’s adulation of Orbán. While electoral success is one thing, maintaining power is another, and Orbán has been prime minister of Hungary, with a constitutional majority, for 14 consecutive years. As such, he has had remarkable influence on reshaping the country to his own vision.

Similar to Trump and Nigel Farage, some of Orbán’s appeal is owed to his ability to address people with convincing messages centred on national pride, defending borders, prosperity and more, in a simple way.

However, Orbán’s ‘success’ is, more broadly, rooted in his ability to avoid unpopular measures by constructing a political, media and economic infrastructure on personal connections.

Under his leadership, Orbán and his party have effectively seized control of Hungary’s democratic institutions. Today, every major institution is headed by individuals that have been hand-picked by Orbán.

Hungary has also seen the orchestration of a nationwide right-wing media network that promotes government narratives and suppresses dissent, creating a political climate reminiscent of propaganda regimes. 

The Voice of America reported in 2022 that Orbán’s allies “have created a pervasive conservative media ecosystem that dominates the airwaves and generally echoes the positions of the Orbán government.”

Additionally, Orbán’s government has manipulated electoral processes to maintain its grip on power. This has included gerrymandering electoral districts and staffing critical institutions with loyalists. 

The same can be said about Hungary’s judiciary system. In 2018, a law was passed to set up courts overseen directly by the justice minister. Critics warned that the move would allow interference in judicial matters and further undermine the rule of law.

“[The law] is a serious threat to the rule of law in Hungary and runs counter to values Hungary signed up to when it joined the European Union,” said the rights group Helsinki Committee.

The same year, the European Parliament voted to impose sanctions on Hungary for flouting EU rules on civil rights, democracy and corruption. Hungary rejected the accusations. So far, the EU, which Hungary has been a member of for almost 20 years, has suspended around 20 billion euros in funding for Hungary due to concerns over democratic backsliding and rule-of-law violation.

Exploiting state-of-emergency laws

Just last week, Orbán secured parliamentary approval to extend his authority to govern by decree for another six months, extended until May 2025. Being able to legislate by decree can occur in democracies during periods of crises, and Orbán cited the ongoing state of emergency related to the war in Ukraine as such a crisis. In 2016, he declared emergency powers because of the migration crisis and did the same in 2020 during the Covid pandemic.

His continuing reliance on state-of-emergency laws has raised concern. Human rights organisations, including Amnesty International, have warned that state-of-emergency laws are being exploited to weaken checks and power balances, diminishing the role of other governing bodies with little connection to the emergency at hand.

A ‘heroic protector’?

To sustain his populist appeal, Orbán presents himself as a “heroic protector” of Hungary against external threats, particularly from the European Union.

He regularly uses ‘national consultation’ surveys to give the illusion of democratic inclusion, but which are really manipulative surveys designed to solicit public support for anti-EU sentiments. Critics argue these consultations serve as propaganda tools rather than genuine democratic engagement.  

Hungary under Orbán has been described as a “hybrid regime of electoral autocracy,” where elections are held without adhering to fundamental democratic principles. A 2022 report by Members of the European Parliament concluded that Hungary is no longer a fully functioning democracy, attributing this decline directly to Orbán’s policies.

“There is increasing consensus among experts that Hungary is no longer a democracy,” the lawmakers said, citing a series of international indexes that have in recent years downgraded Hungary’s status.

In their resolution, MEPs blamed Viktor Orbán, and condemned his government’s “deliberate and systematic efforts” to undermine the EU’s core values.

“Everything has fallen apart in Hungary. The state essentially does not function, there’s only propaganda and lies,” said Peter Magyar, the leader of the Respect and Freedom, or TISZA, party, which has campaigned on promises to root out deep-seated corruption in the government. Magyar has been outspoken about what he sees as the damage Orbán’s “propaganda factory” has done to Hungary’s democracy.

“It might be very difficult to imagine from America or Western Europe what the propaganda and the state machinery is like here,” Magyar said in an interview before the European elections with the Associated Press.

Hardline position on immigration and LGBTQ+ rights

Orbán’s government has also faced criticism for its hardline position on immigration and LGBTQ+ rights. His administration has enacted controversial laws, including the ‘Stop Soros’ legislation, which criminalises assistance to asylum seekers and positions migrants as a threat to national identity, fuelling anti-immigrant sentiment within Hungary and beyond.

In 2018, Orbán called refugees “Muslim invaders” as he defended his country’s refusal to take part in the EU’s resettlement programme. He added that a large influx of Muslims “inevitably leads to parallel societies”. He claimed Christian and Muslim communities “will never unite”.

“Multiculturalism is only an illusion,” he said.In 2021, in a long-running row over Hungary’s migrant rules, the EU’s top court ruled that the nation’s law criminalising activists and lawyers who help asylum seekers was in breach of European law. Orbán said Hungary had no plans to change the controversial laws.

A UN report into the state of democracy in Eastern Europe found that democracy in Hungary under Orbán has deteriorated more than any other country in the region except Russia. The report noted that in 2022, Hungary was 43 percent democratic compared to 45 percent a year earlier, the report noted. 

The report particularly denounces the conduct of the last parliamentary elections, which were marred by “irregularities, abuse of administrative resources and media distortions,” as well as “the Orbán regime’s growing intolerance for dissenting voices.”

The threat of a broader resurgence of authoritarianism

As Europe’s far-right parties gain momentum, with Orbán’s Hungary serving as a model, the threat of a broader resurgence of authoritarianism is increasingly concerning, especially with Trump’s imminent return to the White House. While, as Magyar remarked, Americans and Westerners may struggle to comprehend the extent of propaganda and state machinery in Hungary, they may soon face similar challenges at home.

Like Orbán, Trump has long targeted the mainstream media. He has routinely labelled the press as ‘dishonest’ and ‘scum’ and has singled out individual news organisations and journalists. As well as a distrust in the media, both leaders share the same populist, nationalist, anti-immigration, centralisation of power, and cultural conservatism values.

But what about in Britain, where, with Labour landsliding in July, the political landscape has diverged from the growing far-right momentum seen across Europe and now, in the US?

We might now have a centre-left government but admiration for Viktor Orbán is not absent in Britain. In 2023, three veteran Conservative MPs – Sir Edward Leigh, Ian Liddell-Grainger, and Sir Christopher Chope – were criticised for their close association with Orbán during a conference in Budapest, where they mingled with leaders from other far-right parties such as Belgium’s Vlaams Belang and Spain’s Vox. Leigh even tweeted a photo of the trio with Orbán, bragging they had been “learning about his country’s effective ways of combating illegal migration.” 

In 2022, Nigel Farage, whose Reform UK party helped topple the Conservatives in July and who is of course a close friend of Trump, was among a number of right-wing speakers at America’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). The event, which took place in Hungary, also featured Viktor Orbán. Just days before it, Orban had made reference to the ‘great replacement’ conspiracy theory which claims that there is a liberal elite plot to replace the white populations of Europe and the US through immigration and demographic growth with non-white people.

The event marked the first time that CPAC was held in Europe, as was seen as part of wider efforts to cement bonds between far-right movements both in Europe and America.

Having exited the EU, and with Donald Trump’s impending return to the White House, Keir Starmer finds himself somewhat politically isolated on the global stage. Instead of the centre-left/social democratic alliance he may have dreamt of, Starmer faces a US administration that is not only ideologically distant but also openly hostile to Labour, which Trump’s campaign labelled as “far left.”

Meanwhile, Orbán’s authoritarian playbook, which Trump and his fellow MAGA Republicans seem to idolise, shows just how vulnerable democratic institutions are in the face of rising populism, and how quickly democratic models can be eroded. The need for a robust defence of democratic values has never been more critical. 

“The great hope is that the ‘Budapest Playbook’ never becomes an international bestseller and eventually fades into irrelevance, even in Hungary,” wrote Tibor Dessewffy, a council member of the European Council on Foreign Relations.

Right-wing media watch – Daily Mail accused of ‘rank hypocrisy’ after running to ECHR

If there’s one newspaper that has called the loudest for Britain to leave the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), it’s the Daily Mail.

‘Rishi Sunak leaves the door open to Britain quitting ECHR – as he ‘would choose UK’s security over being a member every single time,’ was a headline in January.

In February, Daniel Hannon, a columnist for the paper and staunch Brexiteer having co-founded Vote Leave, wrote: ‘If Euro judges block Rishi Sunak’s new plan to stop small boats, quitting the ECHR is the only way to protect our borders.’

And last month, the Mail shouted about Boris Johnson’s calls for the UK to have a referendum on its ECHR membership. Johnson is, of course, also a columnist for the Mail and vocal campaigner for quitting the Strasburg court.

This week, news emerged that the publisher of the Daily Mail has won a court battle in the ECHR, leading to cries of ‘rank hypocrisy.’

The publisher took the UK government to the court in Strasbourg about its own human rights, which it claims were breached by being forced to pay “success fees” to lawyers representing people it had paid damages to.

Associated Newspapers won the ruling opposing “excessive” costs incurred by claimants in privacy and defamation cases. The publisher argued that its right to freedom of expression, under Article 10 of the European Convention, had been breached.

It won on conditional fee arrangements (CFAs) and the UK was ordered to pay it €15,000 in costs and expenses. A further decision will be made on any pecuniary damages. But Associated Newspapers was not successful on the part of its case relating to After the Event (ATE) insurance premiums for two recent cases for which it had to pay the extra costs.

News of the hearing sparked disbelief, ridicule and calls of ‘hypocrisy.’

“Daily Mail wins ECHR case against ‘success fees’ paid to lawyers, well well. Daily Mail having slagged off ECHR (Court) endlessly for clickbait…goes “bleating” to the court Funny how their “human rights” matter to the Mail when money is involved!” Carol Vorderman posted on X.

“Beat this for rank hypocrisy. The Daily Mail has been calling for the UK to leave the ECHR for years, yet when they think their human rights have been breached what do they do?…” wrote Leeds for Europe in a Facebook post.

Another reader simply asked: 

“Just how hypocritical can you get?” 

Smear of the Week – Right-wing press continue its absurd campaign to paint Starmer as an antisemite

It seems we’re witnessing something of a (watered-down) replay of 2019, when the right-wing media used every vitriolic headline in the book to present Jeremy Corbyn as an antisemite.

Fast forward five years, and the same media outlets are now targeting Keir Starmer with similar accusations. Having regularly expressed solidarity with Israel and whose formula of moderation and caution about the Gaza conflict and lack of speed in pressing for a ceasefire, has upset many on Labour’s left, you would think that Starmer would be absolved from such accusations.

But that’s not been the case.

In an article headlined: “Starmer accused of allowing anti-Semitism in Britain to ‘deteriorate,’ the Telegraph describes a “string of “performative” policies which “only serve to satisfy an extreme cadre” of ultra-left-wing groups.”

Jewish Labour members, according to the article, assert that Starmer’s actions have emboldened “increasingly aggressive” pro-Palestinian protests and have “added to a climate of intolerance and hate” faced by British Jews.”

The Telegraph cites Labour Against Antisemitism (LAAS), a grassroots group of predominantly Jewish party members, who criticise government actions such as the embargo on arms sales to Israel and the resumption of funding to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine (UNRWA) after claims of its members’ involvement in the October 7 attacks.

The irony of the article did not go unnoticed.

Posting the article on X, children’s author Michael Rosen wrote: “Poor old Starmer. He purges the Labour Party of antisemites, he says he a Zionist, he says Israel has the right to defend itself, he says he ‘does Friday nights’ with his Jewish wife, and yet… he’s still dodgy.”

The latest feeble attempt to associate Starmer with antisemitism, follows absurd claims in September when the PM made a slip during his conference speech, inadvertently calling for a “return of the sausages” when addressing the subject of Gaza.

The gaffe was seized upon by Allison Pearson – described by comedian Stewart Lee as Britain’s worse columnist – who suggested that it proved that Starmer doesn’t care about Israel.

“If the Labour leader can’t make a minor slip in a speech without being accused of being anti-Israel, no wonder he’s retreated to Arsenal’s corporate box,” Lee mocked.

Ultimately, smear articles like these one in the Telegraph serve only to blur the lines between credible, fact-based journalism and right-wing ‘news’ opinion and misinformation. They degrade political discourse and distract from meaningful debate, revealing more about the smearers than their targets.

Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead is author of Right-Wing Watch