For years, Viktor Orbán’s Hungary has long been idolized by MAGA Republicans and served as a point of reference for conservatism around the world. Now that he’s been knocked from power, Democrats could stand to take some lessons from the man responsible, Péter Magyar.
The new prime minister, who ended Orbán’s 16-year rule in Hungary’s April 12 elections, showed that it was possible to take down a corrupt authoritarian in a country where democracy had long been on the ropes. But crucially, he did it with a playbook that seems just as suited for America in the age of Trump as it was for Eastern Europe.
Lesson one? Wage a fight against the corrupt establishment. Magyar previously served in Orbán’s Fidesz government. But he broke with the party and rocketed to fame in 2024 as a whistleblower against official graft and fraud, releasing secret audio that revealed members of Orbán’s circle had interfered with a corruption prosecution case.
He had a flair for spectacle, too: In February, for instance, he filed a public police report accusing the government of surreptitiously recording a “honey trap” sex tape involving him and an ex-girlfriend as a means of blackmail.
