I’m returning to U.S.-Hungarians relations, focusing today on attempts by the Orbán administration to change the generally unfriendly attitude on the Hill and in the State Department toward the present regime in Budapest. I’m relying on information from 444’s new English-language site, InsightHungary. It got hold of two government documents that provide talking points to congressmen who are ready to do some campaigning on behalf of Viktor Orbán’s illiberal state.
In the past, relatively few legislators allowed their names to be associated with the Orbán regime. One of these was Dana Rohrabacher from California, who was an unabashed admirer of Vladimir Putin and, by extension, of Viktor Orbán. Thanks to the work of Connie Mack IV, a former congressman turned lobbyist, Rohrabacher, chairman of a subcommittee of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, held a hearing on “The Future of U.S.-Hungary Relations” in May 2015. Rohrabacher was a member of the House of Representatives between 2008 and 2016, and since he came from a very conservative district his position seemed rock-solid. But in 2018 he lost his seat to a Democrat, and I understand he retired to Maine to write movie scripts. Orbán lost a friend.
Fidesz’s second supporter on the Hill was Steve King from Iowa, a Tea Party Republican, also from a very conservative district, who used to win elections with huge majorities. In 2018 he was reelected, but with the slightest majority. Perhaps his extremism was too much even for his constituents. He is known as a white nationalist who hates Jews, African Americans, Latinos, and immigrants in general. His comments after the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting were too much even for his Republican colleagues, with whose help he was stripped of his committee memberships.
According to InsightHungary, the likely successor to these two is Paul Gosar, a dental surgeon turned politician from Arizona. At first his name didn’t ring a bell, but then I began reading the link Benjamin Novak, editor of 444’s English-language newsletter, provided for Gosar’s refusal to attend Pope Francis’s address to the joint meeting of Congress because the pope dared to talk about climate change. I then remembered that of Gosar’s nine brothers and sisters, six publicly endorsed his Democratic opponent because they consider their brother so much to the right that he should not be a member of Congress. In any case, Gosar seems to be the new patron of Hungary in Washington. Hungarian courting of the congressman has already begun. InsightHungary learned that Gosar’s chief-of staff enjoyed a free trip to Budapest at the invitation of the Hungarian government.
As you can see, past and current cheerleaders for the Orbán regime are not exactly the kinds of politicians one can be proud of. Some of the more mainstream Republican and Democratic supporters of the Hungarian government either quietly withdrew or, like Marcy Kaptur (D-OH), turned against the Orbán regime. In January 2017, Hungary awarded Kaptur the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Merit, presented to her by Ambassador Réka Szemerkényi. At that time, Szemerkényi called her “one of the greatest friends of Hungary.” Today Szemerkényi is no longer in the Hungarian diplomatic service, and Marcy Kaptur has become a critic of the regime, though she is still a great friend of the Hungarian people. As György Lázár reported in Hungarian Free Press in May 2019, she was one of the nine members of Congress who expressed their deep concern to Donald Trump about inviting Viktor Orbán to the White House.
Marcy Kaptur receives a high honor from the Orbán government in 2017
Marcy Kaptur was also one of the four representatives who, shortly after the Orbán visit, introduced a bipartisan resolution “supporting efforts to strengthen democracy in Hungary and its alliance with the United States.” In it, the signatories expressed their deep concern over Hungary’s weakening of democratic institutions, undermining free elections, and limiting civil society and a free press. They also brought up the matter of the establishment of the International Investment Bank in Budapest. They urged the secretary of state “to bolster efforts in Hungary to combat corruption, counter malign influence by the Russian Federation, strengthen independent media, encourage a vibrant civil society.” Finally, they wanted the United States to express “its support for the shared principles of democracy and collective security” and to remind Hungary that “the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is an alliance meant above all to safeguard basic freedoms, democracy, and the rule of law.”
One of the two documents InsightHungary uncovered, titled “Allegations of H. RES. 400,” is an answer to this bipartisan resolution. In it, the authors devote almost two pages to a single sentence in the American resolution: “the Government of Hungary has rehabilitated fascist-era ideologies, facilitated or amplified anti-Semitic messages, and trivialized the Holocaust.” They vehemently deny the revival of any fascist era ideology. “Could you please name one such ideology? In Hungary, the far right is on the retreat, with Jobbik receiving 6.5% of the votes in the recent European Parliament Elections…. The same cannot be said for many Western European countries.”
The Hungarian document also vehemently denies the charge of anti-Semitism. It notes that while in the United Kingdom, Germany, and Sweden there was an increase in anti-Semitism between 2012 and 2018 by 27%, 23%, and 22%, respectively, in Hungary the number decreased by 12% and is one of the lowest in the European Union. Moreover, Hungary is one of the staunchest allies of Israel and the United States. It also argues against the notion that the government has trivialized the Holocaust.
A great deal less space is given to the resolution’s claim of “attacks on the independence of the judiciary.” The answer to any and all such criticism is that “the European Commission closed the infringement procedure in 2013, being satisfied by the measures taken by Hungary.”
As for elections, it diffuses the charge of the Organization on Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Election Observation Missions to Hungary that “the government party enjoyed an undue advantage because of restrictive campaign regulations, biased media coverage and campaign activities.” OSCE, it retorts, is critical of elections in all countries. “It criticized the 2018 U.S. elections too, citing diminished effectiveness of the 1965 Voting Rights Act in safeguarding against discrimination on racial or linguistic grounds.”
The document forcefully defends Hungary’s treatment of NGOs because they “are not elected by the voters, and they have benefited from the large and opaque financial contributions of foreign donors.” The Hungarians remind the American legislators, who are presumably the intended readers of this document, that “many of the same NGOs also criticize the U.S.”
The Hungarian government has a difficult time answering the resolution’s claim of inordinate media concentration, asserting falsely that “in Hungary media concentration is still lighter than in many of the European Countries.” It points out that “90% of the articles that appeared in U.S., preceding and following the Trump-Orbán meeting … were highly critical against Hungary, rehashing the old narrative as part of a concerted effort aimed at derailing the visit.”
In the paragraph on “the lack of agreement between the Hungarian Government and CEU” the document explains that CEU “purported to be an American University” but in fact was a “P.O. Box University.” It further asserts that “to move the American accredited educational activity to Austria was the decision of Rector Ignatieff. This also shows that CEU leadership is opting for an easier path.” The brazenness of this government knows no bounds.
The dissection of “U.S.-Hungarian relations” from the Hungarian government’s perspective is also a fascinating document which I don’t want to shortchange, and therefore I am postponing its discussion until tomorrow.