The rise of a new party led by Péter Magyar has added unexpected drama to Hungary’s European Parliament election campaign. Zsolt Enyedi writes the result could now have important implications for both Hungary and the European Parliament.

This article is part of a series on the 2024 European Parliament elections. The EUROPP blog will also be co-hosting a panel discussion on the elections at LSE on 6 June.

Any assessment of Hungarian parties’ European Parliament election campaigns must begin with the question: are there any? Just five months ago, at the beginning of 2024, none were visible. It seemed that the elections would only serve as a test for opposition parties that hover around the five percent electoral threshold: the liberal Momentum, the extreme right Our Homeland and the Two-Tailed-Dog Party, a joke party.

The stakes were so insubstantial because the 2022 national parliamentary elections ended in a landslide victory for Fidesz and demoralised the opposition. The six-party opposition alliance fell apart. The 2024 European Parliament election was expected to bring about a change only in the sense of eliminating the weakest opposition parties and thereby helping to reduce the coordination costs within the opposition.

The most likely victims of the expected cleansing were the once dominant Socialist Party, the once terrifying radical-right Jobbik and the once dynamic Politics Can Be Different. But none of these party-deaths were expected to be particularly consequential: Jobbik has long abandoned its radical credentials, Politics Can Be Different turned into an ordinary centrist party whose membership in the European Green Party has been suspended and the Socialists haven’t run alone in any election since 2014.

The anticipated failure of these small parties was meant to strengthen the Democratic Coalition, a splinter from the Socialist Party. But the Democratic Coalition has never been able to get more than a third of Fidesz’s support and its leader is the most hated politician in Hungary. Overall, this configuration guaranteed easy sailing for Viktor Orbán. Especially so given Fidesz’s record at previous European elections, where the party’s worst performance was 47% (2004). In the last three elections, Fidesz has received an absolute majority of votes: 56% (2009), 51% (2014), and 53% (2019).

A new challenger

In the first months of 2024, however, there was an unforeseen twist. A vigilant (and so far, anonymous) attorney spotted that the President, Katalin Novák, granted a pardon to a man convicted of covering up a child sexual abuse case. The ensuing protest led to the resignation of Novák and the Minister of Justice, Judit Varga – incidentally the only two prominent female politicians in the country. The scandal was particularly painful for Fidesz because the party was in the middle of an anti-LGBT campaign under the slogan “leave our children alone”. The public outrage was expressed by tens of thousands of protesters who were called to the streets by influencers and civil society activists.

Not even this crisis suggested, however, a different outcome for the European Parliament elections. The confusion among the Fidesz rank and file was apparent, but it was not clear how the turbulence could lead to any politically consequential change. The demonstration initiated by the opposition parties was attended only by hundreds.

The political configuration changed when Péter Magyar, the ex-husband of Judit Varga, launched a new party. Coming from the political subculture of Fidesz, Magyar’s statements on the corruption of the Orbán-regime attracted enormous attention. Rallies called by Magyar have been attended by hundreds of thousands, while his interviews have been watched by millions. The ideological profile of his new party, Tisza, is amorphous, but the centre-right label appears to be fitting. In contrast to Fidesz, Magyar offers a non-illiberal version of conservatism, a non-paternalist version of populism and a non-ethnocentric version of “civilisationism”.

New stakes for Fidesz

Fidesz had a two-pronged response to the new challenge: an intense negative campaign against Magyar, primarily aimed at tarnishing his credibility, and an electoral campaign that focuses on core voters. Tamás Deutsch, a veteran Fidesz politician and someone with limited appeal in the country at large, was appointed to lead the party list (a position originally meant for Judit Varga) and the party’s campaign efforts appear to have targeted mobilisation, as opposed to persuasion or conversion.

The current expectation is that Tisza will receive close to 20 percent, surpassing the bloc dominated by the Democratic Coalition (whose electoral list was joined by the Socialist Party and the tiny Dialogue for Hungary). Such a meteoric rise for new parties is common in the region, but unprecedented in the over-institutionalised Hungarian party system.

The remaining parties are all struggling and may fail to enter the European Parliament. The new focus of the media is on the percentage gained by Fidesz. If this figure goes below 40%, then the opposition is likely to demand early national elections.

Finally, it is important to emphasise that despite the personality-related hype around Péter Magyar, the Hungarian election campaign is a truly European one. Fidesz stands for the weakening of the rights of the European Parliament (Orbán is even against the direct election of MEPs), for the depoliticisation of the European Commission (meaning turning it into an administrative body that is no longer involved in the monitoring of rule of law issues) and for the maintenance of national veto rights.

In contrast, most of the opposition supports current European structures and is ready to move further towards federalisation. There is also a sharp divide on Ukraine: Fidesz has framed the election as a struggle between peace and war, suggesting that a less anti-Russian European Parliament is instrumental for avoiding a conflict between Putin and NATO. Péter Magyar is in between, but closer to the left-wing opposition on most issues.

Given these differences and given Orbán’s sustained efforts to create a coordinated anti-migration bloc in the European Parliament, the Hungarian election results may play a role in shaping the post-2024 outlook of the European Union.

Note: This article gives the views of the author, not the position of EUROPP – European Politics and Policy or the London School of Economics. Featured image credit: Zoltan Galantai / Shutterstock.com