US president Donald Trump on Tuesday sent his vice-president to back Viktor Orbán’s uphill run for re-election on a visit to Budapest, five days in advance of Hungary’s closely watched parliamentary election.
JD Vance lavished praise on Orbán, who has become a fixture at Maga [make America great again] events in the US and Europe. “The president loves you and so do I,” said Vance said at a joint press conference with the Hungarian leader, who has presided over Hungary during his 16 years in office.
Vance later on Tuesday phoned Trump during a pro-Orbán rally in Budapest. The vice-president held up the phone to a microphone, with Trump telling the crowd: “I love Hungary and I love Viktor. He is a fantastic man. Remember this: He didn’t allow people to storm and invade and ruin your country like others have. He’s kept your country good.
“I’m a big fan of Viktor, I’m with him all the way, the US is with him all the way ... I wish you a lot of luck. And I love you all!”
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Orbán has trailed in the polls behind an upstart rival, Péter Magyar, by a double-digit margin as voters have focused on domestic issues, including the economy, social services and corruption. The prime minister’s campaign, vilifying Brussels and Kyiv as the main culprits for Hungary’s economic woes, has proven less effective.
At the rally, Vance bellowed to booming cheers: “Will you stand against the bureaucrats in Brussels? Will you stand for sovereignty and democracy? Will you stand for western civilisation? ... Then, my friends, go to the polls at the weekend, stand with Viktor Orbán, because he stands for you and he stands for all these things.”
In backing Orbán, the White House is “going out of their way to help a leader in Europe who has a foreign policy that’s the most at odds with American interests”, said Thomas Wright, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.
“This administration seems to be backing him for culture war reasons,” said Wright, who served as senior director for strategic planning at the National Security Council in Joe Biden’s administration.
Vance arrived in Hungary’s capital on Tuesday morning for meetings with Orbán. The pair then headed to a Budapest sports arena filled with thousands of cheering fans, handpicked by Orbán’s Fidesz party.
The US vice-president accused “bureaucrats in Brussels” of attempting to meddle in the Hungarian election. Vance accused the EU of trying to “destroy” Hungary’s economy and drive up prices, describing it as “one of the worst examples of foreign election interference that I’ve ever seen”.
Last year, Vance shocked European leaders gathered at the Munich Security Conference with his tirade against the EU and its alleged attempts to influence the outcome of several European elections, including in Germany and Romania.
The European Commission has denied the allegations.
During Trump’s second term, the US has sought to bolster its ties with far-right and ultraconservative parties in Europe with a shared antipathy towards Brussels and immigration policies.
Trump’s national security strategy, released last year, portrayed Europe as at risk of “civilisational erasure” and called for the US to bolster the “healthy nations” of central and eastern Europe.
Vance became the standard-bearer for the administration’s confrontational approach in his remarks in Munich last year, where he described “the threat from within” as a greater challenge to Europe than Russia or China.
Orbán and Vance on Tuesday spoke about their shared defence of western civilisation.
“What the United States and Hungary together represent under Viktor’s leadership and under President Trump’s leadership is the defence of western civilisation,” said Vance. “The defence of the idea that we are founded on a certain Christian civilisation and Christian values,” he said. − Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2026
