Hungary's Orbán stakes his reelection on anti-Ukraine message

BUDAPEST, Hungary — Facing tough odds in an upcoming election, Hungary's pro-Russian prime minister is trying to convince voters that the greatest threat to the country is not economic stagnation — the focus of his top opponent — but neighboring Ukraine.

Viktor Orbán is running an aggressive media campaign replete with disinformation whose central message is that Hungarians should refuse to align with the rest of Europe in supporting Ukraine against Russia's invasion. That path, he argues, risks bankrupting the country and getting its youth killed on the front lines.

Billboards erected across the country show AI-generated images of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy flanked by European officials, holding out his hand as if demanding money. It's a not-so-subtle reference to the European Union's efforts to help Ukraine financially and bolster its defenses as the war enters its fifth year.

''Our message to Brussels: We won't pay!'' the publicly funded billboards read.

If there had been any doubt, it became clear on Monday why the outcome of Hungary's upcoming election will reverberate beyond its borders. Hungary blocked a new package of EU sanctions on Russia in response to interruptions in Russian oil supplies that pass through Ukraine, and vowed to veto any further pro-Ukraine policies until oil flows resume.

Orbán is widely seen as the Kremlin's strongest ally in the EU. While almost all of the bloc's other 26 nations have distanced themselves from Russia since it launched the war on Feb. 24, 2022, Hungary has deepened cooperation.

The prime minister has cast his relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin as pragmatic, stemming from Hungary's access to reliable supplies of Russian oil and gas. But Orbán's anti-LGBTQ+ policies, crackdowns on the media and nongovernmental organizations, and his labeling of critics as ''foreign agents'' have led to accusations that he's reading from Putin's authoritarian playbook.

Orbán, who retook office in 2010, faces the strongest challenge to his power in an election set for April 12. The EU's longest-serving leader and his right-wing Fidesz party are trailing in most independent polls to an upstart center-right challenger, Péter Magyar.

A 44-year-old lawyer and former Fidesz insider who broke with the party in 2024, Magyar has focused his campaign on stemming the rising costs of living, improving social services and reining in corruption. He also promises to restore Hungary's Western orientation and bolster democratic institutions which have eroded during Orbán's 16 years in power.

His rise was aided by political scandals that have damaged the credibility of Orbán's party; a presidential pardon given to an accomplice in a child sexual abuse case led to a public outcry, prompting the president and justice minister to resign.

Losing ground to Magyar and his Tisza party, Orbán and Fidesz have sought to change the conversation. They have blanketed the country with taxpayer-funded billboards, as well as advertisements on radio, television and social media. A petition mailed to every Hungarian of voting age claimed the EU's plans to help Ukraine financially would bring economic ruin.

Other ads, paid for by a shadowy pro-government organization with Fidesz ties, depict Magyar as a puppet of Zelenskyy and the EU who would sell out the country to foreign interests and draw Hungary into the war.

Disinformation is fueled by artificial intelligence

Orbán has recently claimed that the EU — not Russia — poses the greatest threat to Hungary. He says rising defense spending across Europe — driven by Russia's war and pressure from the U.S. to increase NATO contributions — is evidence that the EU is preparing for conflict with Moscow and plans to forcibly conscript Hungarians to fight.

In an AI-generated video Fidesz released on social media last week, a little girl asks her forlorn mother in Hungarian: ''Mommy, when is daddy coming home?''

In the next frame, the fictional father — bound, blindfolded and kneeling on a muddy battlefield — is approached by a soldier, and shot in the head. ''We won't allow others to decide on the fates of our families,'' a narrator says. ''Let's not take a risk. Fidesz is the safe choice.''

Although some EU countries have proposed sending troops to Ukraine to monitor any future ceasefire, they are not intended to engage in combat, and participation would be voluntary, said András Rácz, a Russia expert at the German Council on Foreign Relations.

''They are trying to max this out. They have nothing else,'' Rácz said. ''Populists often try to define an enemy, often an imaginary one, and then offer protection to the society from that enemy. Ukraine has been ideal from this perspective.''

Escalating tensions

For years, Orbán has sought to stymie EU efforts to provide financial and military support to Ukraine, and he has vigorously opposed sanctions targeting Russian oil and officials.

Tensions with Ukraine grew recently after Russian oil shipments to Hungary were interrupted; Ukraine blamed the disruption on a Russian drone strike in late January that damaged a pipeline. Orbán called it blackmail.

Last week, his government retaliated by halting diesel shipments to Ukraine and threatening to veto a 90-billion-euro ($106-billion) EU loan destined for Kyiv. On Monday, it blocked the 20th round of EU sanctions against Russia.

Still, many Hungarians are dubious of Orban's anti-Ukraine messaging. On Sunday, hundreds of Hungarians and Ukrainians, many of them refugees, gathered in central Budapest to commemorate the four-year anniversary of Russia's invasion. Marching toward a demonstration outside the Russian embassy, participants held Ukrainian and Hungarian flags, and chanted, ''Stop Putin, stop the war!''

Budapest's liberal mayor, Gergely Karácsony, told The Associated Press that Orbán's messaging and policies are ''a betrayal not only of Ukraine, but of Hungary's national interest.''

''I hope that this will go into history as a failed policy, but that history will also remember that there were some who stood up for what is right,'' he said.

One of the marchers was Ester Zhivatovska, a 19-year-old veterinary medicine student who came from the Ukrainian port city of Odesa to study in Budapest. She said the billboards depicting her country's president are laughable.