Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s populist prime minister, met with former US president Donald Trump in Florida after the NATO meeting in Washington.
In this year’s presidential election, Orbán has publicly supported Trump’s campaign and voiced his optimism that the Republicans will halt Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Some hardline populists look up to the longest-serving head of the European Union as a symbol of “illiberal democracy,” which he defines as policies that limit immigration. The European Union has accused him of breaking democracy and rule-of-law requirements, and he has repressed the press and the courts in Hungary.
Meeting at Mar-a-Lago was the most recent leg of Orbán’s “peace mission” to try to halt the Russian war in Ukraine. He met with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine during his surprise visit to Kyiv last week. After taking over the rotating presidency of the EU earlier this month for six months, some of his detractors saw Hungary’s visit to Kyiv as an indication that the country will adopt a more pro-Ukraine attitude, in line with the EU majority. But all optimism was dashed when, days later, he made the unusual journey of a European leader and met with Russian President Vladimir Putin—in Moscow, a move that Kyiv and other European cities denounced.
Afterwards, he took a flight to Beijing to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping. During their meeting, he lauded China’s “constructive and important” peace measures and characterized them as a stabilizing factor amidst global volatility.
According to NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, the military alliance does not have the authority to dictate which member nations may meet with which officials. Even while EU leaders have quickly clarified that not all European leaders supported Orbán’s trips to Moscow and Beijing, Finnish President Alexander Stubb scolded him for them. The fact that Orbán has adopted a foreign policy toward China and Russia that differs from his EU and NATO allies has prompted some to worry that he is trying to drive a wedge between them.
Suppose Trump was to reclaim the presidency in November and reduce U.S. payments. In that case, the European governments would have extensive discussions on how to preserve NATO, Western support for Ukraine, and the security of individual NATO members.
