🇪🇺🏳️🌈⚖️🇭🇺 A legal earthquake - CJEU finds Hungary to have violated EU law on multiple counts with its anti-LGBT+ legislation (as expected) but also for the first time in history, in an EU law-reshaping precedent, finds Hungary to violate Art 2 TEU in a self-standing manner.
1/ All the hallmarks of a neo-royalist lollapalooze. Syrian billionaire, ties to Kushner, sanctions relief, preferential contracts. This is not the rules based order or spheres of influence. Global politics is being run by court insiders.
www.nytimes.com/2026/04/19/u...
NYT INVESTIGATION: As the Trump administration & Congress last year moved to repeal sanctions on Syria, the Qatar-based family that most stood to benefit was privately negotiating a real-estate partnership with Jared Kushner and proposing a Trump golf course in Syria www.nytimes.com/2026/04/19/u...
Have been wondering when candidates would start talking about this. One of the biggest corruption scandals is U.S. history playing out in real time.
Pleasure to join Andrea Kendall-Taylor, Jim Townsend, & @rosabalfour.bsky.social on @cnas.bsky.social Brussels Sprouts podcast to discuss the Hungarian election and its impact on European politics www.cnas.org/publications...
Politico went looking for who picks up Orbán's chief disruptor crown — and found Fico already holding it, Radev calling Ukraine "doomed," Meloni confessing sympathy for Orbán to EU leaders, and Babiš demanding the same loan carveout.
🔗 euromaidanpress.com/2026/04/15/p...
Orbán will be gone, but will the Kremlin soon have a new Trojan Horse in Brussels?
Donald Trump has become so politically toxic in Europe that even his closest ideological allies increasingly view him as a liability.
🔗 www.politico.eu/article/trum...
Apart from this, Magyar also thrashed the public broadcaster in a radio and a TV interview, recounting the lies they broadcasted and adding that "the factory of lies" would be closed, and waved at Orbán, reading on the terrace of his office, from the terrace of the office of the Head of State.
👋 More and more Fidesz insiders are jumping from the sinking ship. Suddenly they blame each other, the circumstances, the party leadership, even Viktor Orbán himself. And of course they all claim they “saw it coming” long ago. 🧵
Peter Magyar displaying a ruthlessness that Biden and Starmer seem devoid of
I was thinking this morning how both Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan would have been delighted to see a Westward-looking, centre-right party defeat a pro-Russian autocrat in a former Eastern Bloc country.
On a more serious note, this does show the necessity of a big-tent single-issue pro-democracy coalition. Autocrats lose when anti-authoritarianism is the opposition-uniting priority, and win when they can play divide and conquer on lesser issues.
Hungarian PM Viktor Orbán misread his electorate by bashing the EU and Ukraine.
His crushing loss yesterday showed voters cared more about cronyism and economic mismanagement.
🔗 www.politico.eu/article/orba...
Hungarians celebrated the landslide defeat of Orban by singing "We Are the Champions" out in the streets
Orban's system was rigged to give plurality winners with widespread support in the countryside super-majorities in the parliament - so Peter Magyar generated widespread support in the countryside and has been rewarded with 69% of the parliamentary seats. Now he can undo Orban's constitution!
Perhaps now is a good time to share the @financialtimes.com investigative series on Viktor Orban. To start with here’s the one we sent a reporter up in a plane for … (300 free clicks)
as.ft.com/r/8cd54659-d...
Magyar says he’s starting work with the EU and NATO immediately.
“The EU doesn’t have to worry anymore.”
Magyar: “No mercy, they will need to take responsibility for all their actions.”
Opposition leader Péter Magyar at a rally.
Orbán's electoral crushing is a far greater achievement than most people outside Hungary realise.
He systemically consolidated power for 16 years, fixed the electoral map, abused govt power for political purposes & censored media.
The hurdles that Hungarians overcame for this moment were immense.
This is Hungary's new electoral map. What a day!
Hungarians showing how to win big in an unfair election: organize AND protest AND vote AND demand profound change.
People outside my hotel in central Budapest are honking their horns "hm-hm-hmmhmm" in the rhythm of "Ruszkik haza", which means "Russians go home"
I spent 16, SIXTEEN years fighting this crap.
I can’t believe it 😭
one immediate dramatic consequence of the Hungarian result:
Magyar has promised to repair relations with the EU and unblock a €90bn EU loan for Ukraine
3.
Magyar reiterated that joining the European Public Prosecutor's Office and restoring 🇭🇺 as a constructive partner in 🇪🇺 will remain top priorities for his government.
In response, Hungarian citizens gathered at Batthyány tér, across the Danube from Parliament, chanting: “Europe, Europe, Europe.”
🇭🇺🎉THREAD 1/3
The dismantling of state capture is already beginning today
In his victory speech, Péter Magyar called for the resignation of
– Tamás Sulyok, President of Hungary
– the President of the Constitutional Court
– the President of Hungary’s Supreme Court (the Curia)
– the Prosecutor General
Orban used his autocratic rule to create a mafia state- with him & his cronies enriching themselves on EU & Hungarian state funds. A lot of nervous oligarchs in Hungary today.
Delicious irony here: Orbán assumed opposition would be divided and rigged the electoral system to hugely favor the largest party. But seems Magyar’s movement won such a huge victory that it benefited from that system
