How Péter Magyar’s Manifesto Proves He’s Brussels’ Trojan Horse in Hungary

Brussels has a new darling. That Péter Magyar is getting as much love as possible from the Brussels establishment and its obedient pawns in the press hardly comes as a surprise. As Viktor Orbán’s nemesis, Magyar would, if elected as Hungary’s prime minister this coming April, finally rid the Brusselian elite of its greatest and bitterest opponent. On migration, on war, wokery, free speech, or energy policy, Budapest under Orbán has long been a stubborn last redoubt of common sense. Now, the Brusselians can barely contain their glee at the thought of freeing themselves of this much-resented obstacle to their plans.

Today, the euro is the economic straitjacket of a decaying empire. It is a convenient tool of political tutelage and control, submitting the nations of Europe to the whims of a discredited political class nobody really wants to bow to anymore. Except for Péter Magyar, that is. His recently announced programme for the April election formally commits to adopting the sinking single currency and dropping the forint. It isn’t that Magyar is listening to the wrong economists. In truth, there is no economic rationale for Hungary to join the euro zone. Under Viktor Orbán, Hungary has long enjoyed highly favourable economic indicators despite decades of communist-induced misery: real GDP growth over a longer period of time, low unemployment, and strong foreign direct investment figures. The country’s exports have surpassed those of Portugal, a similarly sized economy, and with a government debt of about 74% of GDP, Budapest’s public finances seem solid compared to those of most other European nations. 

Instead, the argument for the euro is wholly political. It is part of Magyar’s Faustian bargain with Brussels, whose support he desires in a bid to become the Union’s loyal satrap in Budapest. The euro, of course, would structurally and permanently tie Hungary to the Brussels system. Its purpose would be to eliminate any possibility of Hungarians again electing a government determined to rule on their behalf rather than that of the Eurocrats. 

Magyar seems wholly uninterested in the terrible dangers he is exposing Hungarians to. As other Europeans already know, the euro was never a good idea. A national currency allows a country to manage shocks independently: an economic downturn can be mitigated by devaluation. Under the euro, smaller European economies have become hostages to the bigger and more powerful states around them. 

In 1997, as Europe prepared to adopt the euro under the heavy pressure of the Eurocrats, Milton Friedman famously published “The Euro: Monetary Unity to Political Disunity?.” Since then, the great monetarist economist’s prediction that the euro would be disastrous has been abundantly and eloquently proved by reality. Indeed, to Friedman, “composed of separate nations, whose residents speak different languages, have different customs, and have a far greater loyalty and attachment to their own country than to the common market or to the idea of Europe”, the continent “exemplifies a situation that is unfavourable to a common currency.” Rather, Friedman argued that “flexible exchange rates are a powerful adjustment mechanism for shocks that affect the entities differently.” For him, the “drive for the euro was motivated by politics, not economics.” It was a folly Europe would come to regret.

Friedman was right here. In the twenty years before the introduction of the single currency, Italy had seen average annual growth rates in real GDP of 2.4%. In the twenty years after the euro, that figure fell to 0.3%. In France, growth collapsed from 2.3% to 1.3%. In Spain, medium growth shrunk from 2.8% between 1979 and 1999 to 1.8% between 1999 and 2018. Portugal, a smaller economy with a size similar to Hungary’s, was hit the hardest—growth fell from 3.0% on average before the euro to 1.1% after.

Hungary has nothing to gain by joining this failed club. However, Magyar’s election manifesto is nothing short of a roadmap for the total surrender of Hungarian autonomy. To understand the danger Magyar poses, one must look at who is cheering for him. While the Hungarian people seek stability and the preservation of their way of life, Magyar’s sponsors in Brussels are salivating at the prospect of a compliant, hollowed-out Hungary. Magyar’s rhetoric of “taking our place at the table” is a transparent euphemism for sitting in the servant’s quarters. He promises to “normalise” relations with the Commission. In the cold reality of geopolitics, what this actually means is abandoning Hungary’s stance on migration, energy security, and foreign policy adventurism. 

The Brussels elite loathes Viktor Orbán precisely because he is a rare beacon of genuine patriotism who dares to prioritise the national interest of his people over establishment dogma. By resisting the suicidal European liberal consensus, whether on migration quotas or the suicidal deindustrialisation of the Green Deal that U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio so poignantly denounced in his recent Munich speech. Whereas Orbán has shown how even a small nation can stand tall and defend its own genuine, strategic interests, Magyar represents the total inversion of that courage. He is the Trojan horse designed to replace a sovereign government with a puppet regime that takes its cues from the Berlaymont.

Hungarians should understand what is at stake when they elect their next leader. Magyar is running to become von der Leyen’s man in Budapest, not to serve as Hungary’s shield in Brussels. Hungarians would soon feel the price of his Faustian bargain with the Eurocrats—in their wallets and elsewhere.