US vice-president JD Vance bad-mouthed the EU on a pre-election visit to Hungary, overshadowed by president Donald Trump\u2019s wild rhetoric on Iran.<\/p>\n
For his part, the election front-runner, liberal P\u00e9ter Magyar, complained that Vance\u2019s arrival in Budapest on Tuesday (7 April) was outside interference in the vote on Sunday.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo foreign country may interfere in Hungarian elections. This is our country,\u201d said Magyar.<\/p>\n
Two leading US commentators also saw it the same way.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is nothing American about having to fly to a foreign country to try to influence its election, so that your own career can continue as planned,\u201d said US historian Timothy Snyder.<\/p>\n
Historian Anne Applebaum said: \u201cWhile interfering in Hungary\u2019s election, Vance baselessly accuses other people of interfering in Hungary\u2019s election\u201d.<\/p>\n
Vance arrived with his wife Usha to a red-carpet welcome, with a huge motorcade, and spent the day being filmed and photographed around town with populist prime minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe president [Trump] loves you [Orb\u00e1n] \u2026 good luck [on Sunday],\u201d Vance said in one clip posted on X by Orb\u00e1n.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m here to help him [Orb\u00e1n] in this election cycle \u2026 Viktor Orb\u00e1n is going to win this election,\u201d he also said in a press conference.<\/p>\n
He described Orb\u00e1n as a defender of \u201cChristian civilisation and Christian values \u2026 the rule of law and minority rights\u201d, as well as a \u201ctrue statesman\u201d seeking to end the Ukraine war, and as a top US economic partner.<\/p>\n
His civilisational remarks were in line with a US national security strategy from last December to promote anti-immigrant and anti-LGBTI leaders in Europe.<\/p>\n
His rule-of-law and minorities comments stood against Orb\u00e1n\u2019s storied democratic backsliding and demonisation of minorities.<\/p>\n
And it was China, the US\u2019 arch-rival, which was Orb\u00e1n\u2019s top foreign investor in 2025.<\/p>\n
\u2018At your service\u2019<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Orb\u00e1n\u2019s Russia statesmanship was punctured by a Bloomberg report on Tuesday, showing Orb\u00e1n\u2019s subservience to Russian president Vladimir Putin<\/a> \u2014 the same day Russia killed a mother and her two-year-old child<\/a> in Odesa as well as at least four civilians on a bus in Nikopol.<\/p>\n \u201cIn any matter where I can be of assistance, I am at your service,\u201d Orb\u00e1n told Putin in a phone call last October, according to Bloomberg\u2019s leaked transcript.<\/p>\n Applebaum also said: \u201cOrb\u00e1n\u2019s Hungary is one of the poorest countries, and certainly the most corrupt and least free country, in the EU\u201d.<\/p>\n Vance attacked \u201cBrussels bureaucrats\u201d \u2013 a phrase he used four times \u2013 as having \u201ctried to destroy the economy of Hungary\u201d by stopping him from buying Russian oil and gas and for treating Hungarians like \u201cchildren\u201d, in having tried to curb hate-speech and disinformation on X.<\/p>\n \u201cOne of the worst examples of foreign interference in elections I\u2019ve seen \u2026 all because they [EU officials] hate this guy Orb\u00e1n,\u201d said Vance.<\/p>\n Ukrainian intelligence had also tried to interfere, he alleged.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s simply what they do,\u201d Vance said, but stopped short of backing Orb\u00e1n\u2019s story that Ukraine had tried to blow up a gas pipeline to Hungary in Serbia, after this was discredited<\/a> by Serbian intelligence on Monday.<\/p>\n Silent on Iran<\/p>\n The press briefing saw two softball questions to Orb\u00e1n by pro-government media.<\/p>\n But the Washington Post and Reuters asked Vance about the Iran war, in which Trump had said \u201ca whole civilisation will die tonight\u201d in his latest ultimatum to Tehran.<\/p>\n