Trump Is Expected to Meet With Orban, Hungary’s Prime Minister, in Florida – The New York Times
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The meeting would come after Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who has long been aligned with the former president, made unexpected trips to China, Russia and Ukraine.
Michael Gold, Maggie Haberman and
Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary will meet with former President Donald J. Trump in Florida on Thursday after the NATO summit in Washington, according to a Trump campaign official and a person close to the former president who was briefed on the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Mr. Trump has been a vocal supporter of Mr. Orban, and the meeting comes after a series of others by the Hungarian leader this month, including one with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, that caught many by surprise.
Hungary took over the European Union’s rotating presidency at the start of July with the promise to “make Europe great again” — echoing the “Make America Great Again” slogan of Mr. Trump, whom Mr. Orban has endorsed for the U.S. presidency.
Mr. Trump, who has a history of praising authoritarian leaders, often cites Mr. Orban’s support on the campaign trail. The two men met in March at Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump’s private club and residence in Florida, where Mr. Trump lauded Mr. Orban as a “boss” because he did not brook political dissent. Both men are aligned in their anti-immigration views and their skepticism of NATO.
Although the E.U. presidency is largely a clerical position, Mr. Orban has engaged in a flurry of meetings with world leaders since taking over the position.
On July 2, he made an unexpected visit to Kyiv, Ukraine, to meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. The move followed in the footsteps of other European leaders, but was one that Mr. Orban, an outlier in the European Union for his support of Russia and other issues, was known to have been avoiding.
Then on July 5, Mr. Orban traveled to Russia, meeting with Mr. Putin at the Kremlin for more than two hours. It was a rare trip to Russia by a European Union leader and one that caused alarm in capitals around the bloc. Zoltan Kovacs, a spokesman for Mr. Orban, said the leader’s trip to Moscow was “part of his peace mission.” There were no signs that the talks had done anything to sway Mr. Putin, however, with Mr. Orban telling reporters after that the positions of Kyiv and Moscow were “very far apart.”
Mr. Orban, a source of frustration for many European leaders, is known for embracing far-right politics and authoritarian leaders like Mr. Putin. He has also made unclear calls for a cease-fire in Ukraine and direct negotiations between Moscow and Kyiv, but has not publicly declared a concrete plan for a settlement.
Mr. Trump has also boasted of his closeness with Mr. Putin, frequently insisting in a hypothetical that his “very good relationship” with Russia’s leader would have kept him from invading Ukraine.
On Monday, Mr. Orban made yet another unexpected visit, this time to Beijing for previously unannounced talks with China’s top leader, Xi Jinping. China’s official summary of their meeting said they exchanged their ideas on ending the war in Ukraine.
Michael Gold is a political correspondent for The Times covering the campaigns of Donald J. Trump and other candidates in the 2024 presidential elections. More about Michael Gold
Maggie Haberman is a senior political correspondent reporting on the 2024 presidential campaign, down ballot races across the country and the investigations into former President Donald J. Trump. More about Maggie Haberman
Derrick Bryson Taylor covers breaking and trending news and is based in London. More about Derrick Bryson Taylor
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