{"id":48573,"date":"2026-04-12T12:55:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T12:55:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/?p=48573"},"modified":"2026-04-12T12:55:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T12:55:08","slug":"polls-open-in-hungary-as-pm-orban-faces-major-electoral-challenge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/?p=48573","title":{"rendered":"Polls Open in Hungary as PM Orban Faces Major Electoral Challenge"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"subheading\">Hungarian voters started casting their ballots from 6AM on Sunday morning\u00a0as Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n, an ally of U.S. President Donald Trump, seeks to build on his 16 years in power.<\/p>\n<p class=\"a9d-pre\">It\u2019s a key moment for Orb\u00e1n, the European Union\u2019s longest-serving head of state, alongside\u00a0all 199 members of the national parliament who also face voters.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"D-ROS-B1\" class=\"a9d\"\/>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B1\" class=\"a9d\"\/>\n<figure id=\"gmxrevmore\" class=\"H\"\/>\n<p>The veteran leader and his top challenger, P\u00e9ter Magyar of the opposition Tisza party which is tipped to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/news\/world\/europe\/hungary-elections-2026-live-updates-victor-orban-results-b2955998.html\">win<\/a> the contest, arrived at separate polling stations in Budapest at nearly the same time to cast their votes.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking to reporters outside, Orb\u00e1n, 62, said the campaign had been \u201ca great national moment on our side\u201d and thanked activists and supporters for their work.<\/p>\n<p><iframe src=\"https:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/t\/assets\/html\/tweet-5.html#2035667522905677911\" data-btlnk=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/BreitbartLondon\/status\/2035667522905677911\" class=\"bnn-if-tweet\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"260\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" allowtransparency=\"true\" allowfullscreen=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m here to win,\u201d he added, per an AP <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/hungary-election-orban-magyar-trump-1a4eb0ba6b94e0c80c3cd18bd36254ab\">report<\/a>.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"D-ROS-B2\" class=\"a9d\"\/>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B2\" class=\"a9d\"\/>\n<p>Orb\u00e1n\u2019s government and his Fidesz political party stand as examples of conservative, anti-globalist politics in action.<\/p>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-vxwoax-ComponentWrapper e1aon0op1\" data-block=\"text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-126h8e-Spacer e1aon0op0\">\n<div data-testid=\"rich-text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-nqezkk-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He remains highly valued by U.S. President Donald Trump, who has called on Hungarians to \u201cget out and vote\u201d for his \u201ctrue friend, fighter, and WINNER\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">U.S. Vice President JD Vance visited Hungary in the past week to show his personal support for Orban in the contest, as Breitbart London <a href=\"https:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/europe\/2026\/04\/07\/jd-vance-lands-in-hungary-to-back-orbans-re-election-push\/\">reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><iframe src=\"https:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/t\/assets\/html\/tweet-5.html#2041465855746126307\" data-btlnk=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/BreitbartLondon\/status\/2041465855746126307\" class=\"bnn-if-tweet\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"260\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" allowtransparency=\"true\" allowfullscreen=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Addressing supporters on Saturday night, the Fidesz leader insisted victory was still in reach and kept to his main campaign themes of targeting Brussels and Ukraine.<\/p>\n<p class=\"a9d-pre\">\u201cWe don\u2019t give our children, we don\u2019t give our weapons and we don\u2019t give our money,\u201d Orban said, per a BBC <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/cdxdepjrv95o\">report<\/a>.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B3\" class=\"a9d adSo\"\/>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">His message resonated with the crowd, who chanted \u201cwe won\u2019t let that happen.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe src=\"https:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/t\/assets\/html\/tweet-5.html#2041543893125071047\" data-btlnk=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/BreitbartLondon\/status\/2041543893125071047\" class=\"bnn-if-tweet\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"260\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" allowtransparency=\"true\" allowfullscreen=\"true\"><\/iframe>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-vxwoax-ComponentWrapper e1aon0op1\" data-block=\"text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-126h8e-Spacer e1aon0op0\">\n<div data-testid=\"rich-text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-nqezkk-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Turnout after the first three hours of voting was 16.89 percent, according to Hungary\u2019s National Election Office, a record in the country\u2019s post-communist history with 478,000 more voters having cast their ballot by 9 a.m. than during 2022 elections.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Polling stations opened on \u200bSunday at \u20606 a.m. (0400 GMT) and close at 7 \u200cp.m. (1700 GMT).<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The results should become clear by late Sunday evening.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<h5><em><span style=\"color: #ff0000;\">Follow Simon Kent on Twitter:<\/span> <a class=\"twitter-follow-button\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/SunSimonKent\" data-show-count=\"false\">Follow @SunSimonKent<\/a> <span style=\"color: #ff0000;\">or e-mail to: skent@breitbart.com<\/span><br \/><\/em><\/h5>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/europe\/2026\/04\/12\/polls-open-in-hungary-as-pm-orban-faces-major-electoral-challenge\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Hungarian voters started casting their ballots from 6AM on Sunday morning\u00a0as Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n, an ally of U.S. President Donald Trump, seeks to build on&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48574,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-48573","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48573","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=48573"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48573\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/48574"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=48573"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=48573"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=48573"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}