On November 7, US President Donald Trump will host Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán at the White House. There, Trump could do something unexpected and, ultimately, to the advantage of his own agenda: demand Orbán stop being an obstacle to Ukraine’s European Union (EU) accession efforts,
Atlantic Council reports.
When it comes to the EU’s mostly aligned position on Ukraine and Russia, Hungary stands as the biggest outlier. Orbán has repeatedly echoed Russian talking points about Ukraine. And while other EU member states have worked to wean themselves off Russian energy, Budapest has deepened its dependency on Moscow, providing more than five billion euros to Russia’s tax revenues since the Kremlin launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Hungary has also both delayed and derailed EU-wide efforts. The EU’s decision-making procedures, which require unanimity on key issues, provide Hungary ample opportunity to delay or veto EU action. Budapest, for example, is almost always among the last holdouts to agree to place new sanctions on Russia. For months, Orbán delayed the fifty-billion-euro package that the EU prepared for Kyiv, before finally relenting in February 2024 after receiving some concessions on its access to EU funds that had been frozen over Budapest’s rule-of-law violations.
