The Last Word with Matt Cooper
Hungary Elections: Viktor Orbán Loses Power After 16 Years
13 Apr 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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I'm now joined by Shona Murray, who's Europe correspondent with Euronews. Shona, Victor Orban's 16-year reign in Budapest has come to an end. How big was the defeat?
It was a massive defeat, two thirds majority, emphatic support from the whole of Hungary. You should have seen the scenes in Budapest last night. It was like the end of the Soviet Union or akin to the fall of the Berlin Wall. It was really incredible. He had been trailing Peter Magyar for several weeks, but nobody could quite believe him. that this would actually emerge.
Chapter 2: How significant was Viktor Orbán's defeat in the recent elections?
I mean, Magyar's lead was into double digits about two weeks ago. But still, even in the days before the election, I was speaking to Hungarian experts and they all just were concerned that somehow Orban would pull it out of the bag by some sort of level of electioneering or some stunt or that there would be votes that would have been bought or people forced to the ballot box and so on.
But that didn't emerge.
And in terms of the new or the incoming Prime Minister, Peter Magyar, what do we know about him?
The Magyar is an Orban ally, former Orban ally. He only left Fidesz in about 2023. He left because of corruption, but he'd been there throughout the sort of high peaks of Orban really transforming the country into what he described himself as a liberal state. I mean, Hungary is no longer regarded as a democracy anymore.
um so he'd been there when Orban destroyed the separation between the the justice system and the government that where he fired judges uh deployed his own people within the justice system uh fired uh journalists and editors in the state media imposed his own people in place fired directors of museums historical sites you name it just put his own cronies all across the institutions of the state and Maguiar was part of that but
The EU has recently taken action against this illiberalism and has withheld billions and billions of euro, about 20 billion euro at the moment, but more in the past from Hungary in relation to subsidies, whether it's structural funds, cohesion funds and so on. And the country's economy is really slumped because it's so insecure and there's very little investment. So Magyar left Hungary
saying that corruption was his issue and that's what he campaigned on. He said that he would fix the country's economy, but also restore Hungary's rightful place at the heart of the European Union and do the reforms to ensure that corruption is no longer there and that the EU will then deliver all that money to Hungary. Hungary, which is so needed.
So given Orbán's connections with Europe being fractious, I mean, obviously he vetoed or has vetoed this loan, this 90 billion euro loan to Ukraine, obviously his relations with the Kremlin, etc., that have been in the spotlight. So where does this leave those future relations? I mean, where does Maillard kind of see himself in relation to Moscow?
In relation to Moscow, he gave a press conference today and he said that he wouldn't phone Putin, but if Putin phoned him, he would take the call and he would tell him to stop killing people and stop the war.
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Chapter 3: Who is Peter Magyar and what is his political background?
So they are over the moon. I mean, I've been speaking to diplomats, you know, members of the commission who are just breaking out the champagne that he is no longer there to obstruct everything. And remember, it's far more serious than that. You know, there was tapes of him speaking directly to Putin saying, I can be at your service. I will be your mouse, I'll be the mouse to your lion.
And also Peter Ziarto, his foreign affairs minister, taking calls from Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, guaranteeing that he would get names taken off the EU sanctions list, asking him what he could do to be of service to the Russians. I mean, that's basically Russian assets. So it was very harmful, their presence.
Has there been any contact from the White House in relation to this yet?
No, because as we know, Trump himself endorsed twice Orban in the remaining hours of the election. And then J.D. Vance came over with his wife for a whole two-day visit in the middle of the Iran war. J.D. Vance was in Budapest telling Hungarians that the European Commission has been interfering in their election while he interfered in their election.
And in fact, the commission, you know, has been extremely careful not to say anything about Hungary critical for lest they be accused of interfering in the election. So it was just it was kind of Orwellian, really.
Yeah.
What now for Viktor Orban? Does he quietly go away or does he become a stalking horse and making life very difficult for Magyar and his new government?
Well, he could try that, but then you can find he knows that there is probably a large swathe of corruption investigations that could take up his time if he were to be problematic to Maguiar. I mean, he did phone Maguiar himself and congratulated him. Obviously, the defeat was just so monumental that he couldn't dare maybe say,
say it wasn't, but Maguiar has said that he's going to take action and investigate criminal charges when it comes to Peter Siarto over his conversations with Sergei Lavrov. So you imagine Orban might be concerned that he might find himself in that position as well. So, so far, Orban is not, it looks like he is cooperating.
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