Despite seething disdain from many EU leaders towards Donald Trump, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán bet big on his reelection, giving his full-throated endorsement to Trump right before the Nov. 5 vote. Now, Orbán has already phoned President-elect Trump to offer his congratulations, while many other EU leaders prepare for the worst.
“Mar-a-Lago is calling Budapest! We had our first post-election phone conversation with President Trump. We have big plans,” Viktor Orbán wrote on his Facebook page.
All of this means that Viktor Orbán is likely to be one of the first leaders who could talk to Donald Trump personally after his re-election, and most likely the first European leader. Trump, who is known to value loyalty, is likely to view the EU’s pressure campaign against Hungary, including withholding billions of frozen EU funds, unkindly. Trump is expected to completely realign America’s stance towards the EU in many regards, and as Remix News previously reported right before the election, tariffs, sanctions, and other diplomatic actions could follow.
On Wednesday morning, the Hungarian prime minister was among the first to congratulate the results.
“I see a bright victory, perhaps the greatest comeback in Western political history. Huge win. They threatened him with prison, took his property, wanted to kill him, the entire media world in America turned against him, and yet he won,” he said.
In this video, he also hinted at what he might have meant by “big plans.” As he said, there is now a huge chance that by the end of the year the pro-peace forces will be in the majority in the Western world.
“There is a huge chance for this to happen, and if it happens like this, the economy may falter, and American-Hungarian relations may also return to their old golden age. We have several plans that we can implement with President Donald Trump in the coming year,” he said.
He has also been posting on social media about the strong bond between the two leaders, who had consulted on the phone right before the elections. “I just spoke on the phone with Donald Trump. I wished him the best of luck for next Tuesday. Only five days to go. Fingers crossed,” the Hungarian prime minister wrote at the time.
Trump also made countless references to Orbán during his campaign, highlighting the excellent relationship between the two men.
“Trump’s presidency can help promote Hungarian interests on the international stage, where sovereignty and the defense of the country are a priority,” Balázs Orbán, political director of the prime minister, said, as he assessed the effects of the Republican candidate’s re-election on Hungarian-American relations today in the Mandiner news portal.
