Peter Magyar's Eight Most Memorable Lies

Peter Magyar lied about not becoming a politician, not becoming an MEP, about wanting to do away with the right to immunity, about not being invited for TV interviews, about his political opponents, about hospitals in the country, and last but not least he started spreading fake news that threatened the security of the nation. This could be posed as a riddle: Which Hungarian politician said these? Naturally, anyone who has been paying the slightest attention to public events in Hungary in recent months will immediately recognize the above list as the main stations of Peter Magyar's barely a few-months-old political career. We have compiled the Tisza Party chief's most glaring false statements - by no means a complete list.

Attempting to put together a compilation of Peter Magyar's falsehoods is no small endeavor as there are so many to choose from. Magyar Nemzet has taken up the task. Here are eight typical lies of the Tisza Party leader.

1. He will not become a politician

Peter Magyar kicked off his political career with a fundamental lie at the beginning of the year.

In an interview for Partizan at the end of February, Magyar called the notion of his entering into the political arena a bad joke.

By contrast, a few days later he created a movement with the explicit aim of overthrowing the government, and promptly organized a purely political rally under the banner "Rise up Hungarians" for March 15 [one of Hungary's national holidays - ed]. Shortly afterwards, Peter Magyar took over the Tisza Party, which he then launched in both the local government and the European Parliament (EP) elections.

2. Not going to Brussels

Although as the party's EP list-topping candidate he repeatedly vowed to not go to Brussels even if he wins a mandate, in his post-June 9 election statements, he argued that it would be more useful for him to take up his seat in the European Parliament. And so he did.

It is worth noting that on a chat forum Magyar had described the position of MEP as the "world's biggest sham position for 20,000 euros a month".

3. No need for right to immunity

Magyar has also contradicted himself on the immunity issue. During the June 9 EP and local elections campaign the chairman of the Tisza Party had pledged to abolish the institution of legal protections for politicians. But following his disco scandal on June 21, he adopted an entirely different view, and suddenly had no intention of renouncing the legal impunity he was entitled to as an MEP. 

It is worth noting that, as a result of an ongoing investigation under Hungary's Central Investigating Prosecutor's Office into theft, Prosecutor General Peter Polt submitted a motion to the president of the EP to waive Peter Magyar's right to immunity.

So it is up to the European Parliament to decide on whether the authorities can start legal proceedings against Peter Magyar. He himself will not relinquish his immunity.

4. The case of the Syrian plane

In addition to misleading his followers on the fundamental points of his politics, Peter Magyar has also spewed lies on a wide variety of other topics.

One of the most serious of these cases happened not long ago, when Peter Magyar took over a piece of fake news from the Magyar Hang portal and on his social media page started spreading that the fallen Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad had landed in Budapest secretly, under the security of the Hungary's Counter-Terrorism Center.

Although the portal shortly after the publication admitted that it was fake news and issued a public apology, Peter Magyar has not apologized in any way and the fake news can still be found on his Facebook page.

The Office for the Protection of the Constitution launched an investigation into Magyar's distribution of fake news and prompted the convening of a meeting of the National Security Committee of Parliament with the participation of the civil secret services, as the false information also posed a serious risk to the security of the country.

5. The thermometer case

Peter Magyar has also tried to rile up public opinion by portraying conditions in public health institutions as much more dismal than they actually are. During the summer, the politician took and shared misleading photos while visiting various hospitals. During one of his visits to Heim Pal Children's Hospital, for example, he took pictures of a room that happened to be under renovation. And when he checked in from the Peterfy Sandor Street Hospital, he tried to get the public believe that the temperature in the whole institution, including the wards, was over 38 degrees Celsius.

However, the statement put out by the hospital revealed that the president of the Tisza Party had found temperatures above 38 degrees Celsius on the top floor, in the glass-walled, metal-framed staircase that was later added to the building.

6. The red dossier

Relations between the media and the Tisza leader were also constantly being poisoned by Magyar's lies.

Peter Magyar regularly insulted the press and accused even those organs, among others ATV, which could be considered friendly toward him and his party, of not inviting him for live broadcasts.

But when, at the beginning of June, he did - for the umpteenth time - accept ATV's invitation to the studio, presenter Egon Ronai countered his allegations to the contrary with a dossier of documents proving that the station had on numerous occasions invited him into the studio for airtime. Caught in a lie on live television, Peter Magyar responded by simply storming out of the studio.

7. The big sandbagging

Magyar, who consistently criticized the alleged lack of invitations by media organs, similarly tried to discredit Hungary's public television, but MTVA also denied accusations that they had not sought the politician. In fact, they even publicly announced that on October 3 they would provide the president of the Tisza Party the opportunity to publicly debate Balazs Orban, the prime minister's political director, but Magyar cancelled his participation almost immediately, citing the emergency flood situation on the Danube.

It soon became clear that Magyar's use of helping to sandbag was just an excuse, as the opposition politician was not satisfied with any of the other alternative dates offered.

8. Caught lying by his own colleagues

The most telling of Magyar's exposures was when he was contradicted by his own fellow politicians: the Tisza Party chairman came up with a lie that was too much even for his own party colleagues.

In a YouTube video published on October 10, Magyar together with his party colleagues assessed the previous few days' debates in the European Parliament. At one point in the assessment - as he also put out in a dedicated Facebook post - the party president essentially accused Fidesz MEP Tamas Deutsch of having "only come in [to the European Parliament - ed] to sign" one day, saying that he had taken his €350 per diem on top of his salary without actually being present in the EP.

But this was not true, as Magyar's fellow Tisza Party MEP pointed out, "No, I have to correct that, he [Deutsch] was at the CONT meeting at 8.30 in the morning and he spoke," Kinga Kollar pointed out.