Orban's Lessons for Trump

If Trump is serious about national transformation, he should look to Budapest for inspiration.

Photo: Anadolu via AFP

"Orban should have been born in a large country like Germany," a Hungarian acquaintance once told me with a typical Eastern European attitude. "His genius is wasted in Hungary." An optimistic observer might say that everyone now has an opinion about Hungary, which is remarkable for a small, landlocked country with a population of less than ten million.

It was therefore no surprise that Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban made headlines during his recent visits abroad. In early December, he traveled to Rome, where he held discussions with Pope Francis and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, with peace in Ukraine being a priority. Following this, Orban also visited Mar-a-Lago, becoming one of the first foreign leaders to meet with Donald Trump after his victory in the November presidential election.

The foreign policy implications of these visits are numerous and well-documented.

If the Russia-Ukrainian war ends soon, it will be due in no small part to Viktor Orban's efforts; similarly, this will be the case if Europe's national political movements come to prevail over the transnationalists entrenched in Brussels.

American conservatives should hope that Orban's Florida visit also carried a philosophical dimension. The Hungarian leader’s political career has, in many ways, foreshadows Trump’s. Trump defined an era of American politics, but his first term was constrained by time and staff limitations. If Trump is serious about national transformation and not driven merely by the thrill of victory, he should look to Budapest for inspiration.

In Hungary, Viktor Orban has been a well-known figure since the late 1980s. As a young activist during the reburial of the martyrs of Hungary’s 1956 revolution, he defiantly called for the withdrawal of Soviet troops. By 1998, he became prime minister, only to face a bitter defeat four years later due to unified opposition from hostile institutions. Rather than retreat, the young idealist reorganized himself and his community into a tough political force.

"Orban’s 2002 defeat, when by any normal political calculations he deserved a clear victory, was traumatic," wrote British commentator John O’Sullivan in his book on the topic published in 2015. "He disappeared to a mountaintop, communed with nature, and returned with a new political strategy. Having been defeated because most of the institutions of society, privatized industry and media in particular, were in post-Communist hands, as he thought, he determined that Fidesz would have to build up its own institutions  to give it something like equality in the political struggle."

As during Trump’s first term, Orban's initial four-year tenure was marked by a "lack of experts necessary for governance," Hungarian political analyst Balazs Szolomayer pointed out. As a result, "the Right had to leave in place mid-level officials who did not support its policies. The Hungarian administration remained more loyal to the previous party than to the incumbent government."

Unlike Trump, Orban needed two terms in opposition to climb back to the summit. He suffered another painful defeat in 2006, and the post-communists—socialist in name only—seemed unassailable, particularly with enjoying widespread Western support.

"All those worried, hand-wringing allies in Brussels and Washington, who now fret over Hungary’s media and electoral system, were strangely silent when Orban was in opposition,” noted British-Hungarian writer Tibor Fischer. "Back then, he had to fight against nearly everything." This struggle made him wiser, and the 2006 defeat turned out to be a blessing in disguise. The socialist-liberal government clearly discredited itself during its second term, enabling Orban to storm back into power in 2010 with a supermajority.

He hasn’t lost since.

Trump, like his Hungarian colleague, is a fighter and a talented political operator. Both are willing to break new ground on certain issues and make unconventional personnel decisions.

But let’s address the differences. Orban reportedly dedicates one day a week to reading philosophical, historical, and political theory books—undoubtedly reflecting on the Hungary of his grandchildren and their descendants. His raison d'etre could be described as The Will to Survive, the title of Bryan Cartledge's 2011 book on Hungarian history. Survival is an instinct ingrained in all Hungarians, a people of Central Asian origin surrounded by Germans, Slavs, and Romanians.

Trump, the real estate mogul and television star, had no need for such a survival instinct. The re-elected president, having recently endured an assassination attempt and a time in political isolation, might consider revealing a more reflective side. For example, the Mar-a-Lago summit of leaders shouldn't have been as one-sided as it appeared. Trump would do well to understand Orban the strategist, not just Orban the politician.

Several Americans have already failed on this front. Outgoing activist-ambassador David Pressman ended his Budapest tenure with an anti-Orban speech on the night of the US  elections, accusing the prime minister of "playing the odds in the casino" and "gambling with our alliance". Pressman was also unintentionally comical: "I don’t do politics. I represent the United States of America, not a political party within it, and I don't comment on partisan politics, ever!" he claimed.

Dostoevsky would have noted that gamblers typically don't win, and they aren't particularly consistent.

Orban didn’t merely flip a coin in the US presidential race. He expressed confidence in the former president during his darkest days of isolation—when Republicans barely scraped through the mid-terms, and Ron DeSantis was on the rise. Orban recognized the neoliberal order’s decline and positioned Hungary to avoid the ensuing turmoil.

He has defeated all domestic political rivals—left, right, and center—including those bolstered by substantial foreign support. In 2026, Orbán will seek his fifth consecutive term with a parliamentary supermajority.

Meanwhile, the Biden administration’s political appointee will return home without notable achievements. China and Russia have gained influence at America’s expense, and the long-standing US–Hungary agreement on the avoidance of double taxation is no longer applicable.

Europe today writhes like a decapitated snake. France, Germany, and the United Kingdom face political and economic crises. 

In response, their governments have restricted free speech and dissent while sending weapons and military advisors to Ukraine. The West’s coup in Romania was a caricature, exposing the hypocrisy of the "defending democracy" discourse. Hungary, a small country, has suddenly become a power broker of sorts. (I'll leave the odds to the statisticians.)

Tibor Fischer recounted an anecdote about traveling with a young Orban to a rural town in Hungary. The future prime minister insisted on finding a functioning ticket machine near an empty station. He claimed that traveling without a ticket would provide ammunition to his political opponents. "And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why Viktor Orban leads Hungary. I can categorically assure you that no one else would have bothered to buy a ticket. I doubt any of them would have thought of it".

This is Orban's essence—an aspect both friends and foes often overlook when describing him as a reckless gambler or an odd type of genius. It is his sheer willpower that has elevated Hungary's role in foreign policy. And this is why Viktor Orban will undoubtedly be remembered as one of Mar-a-Lago’s most significant visitors this winter.

The author is an American-Polish writer,

a visiting fellow at the Danube Institute.