171 days Until the Elections: Mass rallies in Budapest by Fidesz and Tisza mark Hungary’s national holiday
Every Thursday we round up the most important developments of Hungary’s election campaign — tracking the duel between Viktor Orbán and Péter Magyar. Follow our series as we guide you through the historic campaign leading up to Hungary’s 2026 parliamentary elections.
This week’s highlights include:
A double demonstration on October 23: Fidesz held its “Peace March,” while the Tisza Party organized the “National March” in Budapest. Both Viktor Orbán and Péter Magyar delivered keynote speeches.
The planned Trump–Putin summit in Budapest has been cancelled for the time being – a political loss of prestige for Orbán.
Leaked Orbán speech: “We’re not doing well” – the prime minister urges supporters to mobilize.
AI-powered campaigning is in full swing: government media outlets are flooded with generated images.
The state covered €2000-per-night hotel bills in Brussels for the national economy minister.
Hungary’s independent media wins a prestigious international award for persistence and innovation.
October 23: One of Hungary’s Most Important National Holidays
In Hungary, October 23 is not only a day of remembrance but also a major political event. This year it became a show of strength and mobilization between Fidesz and the Tisza Party ahead of the 2026 elections. It’s a day for political self-definition and messaging — and both of the country’s main political forces staged mass demonstrations in Budapest before this article went to press.
Fidesz and Prime Minister Viktor Orbán held their Peace March from 9 a.m., while Péter Magyar and his Tisza Party launched their National March at 2 p.m.
Both events drew tens of thousands. Fidesz’s rally concluded at Kossuth Square in front of the Parliament with a massive stage and a flyover by state-owned Gripen fighter jets, while the Tisza event ended at Heroes’ Square with a smaller stage and more modest production.
Viktor Orbán’s key messages:
In his October 23 address, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán once again reinterpreted the legacy of the 1956 revolution, reframing the historical struggle for freedom as a contemporary choice between “war or peace.” By projecting the heritage of the 1956 heroes onto his own political role, he effectively rewrote the national narrative in line with his campaign logic. Orbán cast the upcoming election as a confrontation between “pro-war forces” — the opposition and Brussels — and the “pro-peace” camp led by Fidesz.
He urged his supporters to speak to the “misled Hungarians” who had grown dissatisfied with his party. He also took aim at younger generations, accusing them of sitting idly behind computer screens instead of joining what he described as a vital national cause. The comment, inadvertently, revealed his awareness that Fidesz’s support among young people is waning.
Once again, he turned the election into a question of war and peace, equating a vote for the opposition with supporting war. The rally’s slogan — “Those who are Hungarian stand with us” — implicitly excluded the millions of Hungarians who did not vote for Fidesz last time, and who, according to current polls, are unlikely to do so in 2026 either.
The giant banner leading the Peace March read: “We don’t want to die for Ukraine.” In his speech, Orbán reiterated his anti-Ukrainian stance, declaring that while Hungary “wants to be a partner to Ukraine,” it does not wish to share an alliance with it — neither in the EU nor elsewhere. With these words, he sent a dual message: to Moscow, a signal of distance from NATO and EU expansion; to Brussels, a reaffirmation of his sovereigntist posture. Domestically, the line reinforced the image of a leader defending national independence against external pressure.
Péter Magyar’s key messages:
At Heroes’ Square, Péter Magyar promised a “humane transition of power” and urged his supporters to hold on until next April. The leader of the Tisza Party said he envisions a national holiday where two opposing crowds no longer glare at each other with hatred, but come together as one nation. “There is no left, no right, only Hungarians,” he declared. “Imagine a day when our flag no longer divides us, but becomes a symbol of shared remembrance and unity.”
Magyar argued that the one-party state dismantled in 1989 has since been rebuilt under Viktor Orbán’s leadership. He labelled Fidesz not merely authoritarian, but systemically anti-democratic — positioning his movement not simply as another opposition party, but as a force for genuine regime change, transcending both Fidesz and the traditional opposition.
He recalled hearing Orbán speak at Heroes’ Square as an eight-year-old boy in 1989, only to see him, decades later, become “the Kremlin’s most loyal ally.” His closing words electrified the crowd: “Enough. It’s over, comrades!” he shouted into the microphone — first in Hungarian, then in Russian, echoing the anti-Soviet slogan of 1956: “Ruszkik haza! Tovarisi konyec!” (“Russians go home! Comrades, it’s over!”). By invoking the revolutionary chant, Magyar deliberately linked Fidesz’s pro-Russian policies to the trauma of Soviet occupation, while reaffirming his party’s commitment to Europe and the transatlantic alliance.
He also announced a nationwide tour beginning in early November under the title “Road to Victory.”
What do Hungarians commemorate on October 23?
October 23 carries a double meaning for Hungarians. It marks both the beginning of the 1956 revolution and freedom fight — when ordinary citizens rose up against Soviet occupation and the repressive communist regime — and the 1989 proclamation of the Republic of Hungary.
In 1956, Hungarian revolutionaries demanded the withdrawal of Soviet troops, free elections, and national independence. The uprising was brutally crushed in early November, when Soviet tanks rolled back into Budapest. Militarily, the revolution was defeated, but its moral and historical significance was immense: Hungary’s courage captured the world’s attention and became an early crack in the Soviet empire’s façade. The second layer of the commemoration comes from 1989, when on the same date — October 23 — the Hungarian Republic was officially declared, symbolically closing the chapter on four decades of dictatorship. Since then, the day has represented both a longing for freedom and a warning about the fragility of democracy.
The Trump–Putin summit in Budapest that never happened
Despite being triumphantly announced by both Donald Trump and Viktor Orbán, the much-touted Trump–Putin summit in Budapest will not take place after all. The plan collapsed even before the preliminary talks between the Russian and U.S. foreign ministers could begin. According to diplomatic sources, during a preparatory phone call between Marco Rubio and Sergey Lavrov, it became clear that Vladimir Putin had no genuine intention of pursuing peace. The Kremlin insisted on holding on to the occupied territories and continued to reject any ceasefire proposal.
Faced with this, Trump backed out, reportedly calling the idea of a new summit a “waste of time.” His decision was hardly surprising — their most recent meeting, in Alaska, where the Russian leader was greeted with red-carpet ceremony, had already ended without any progress toward peace.
Why the summit mattered to Orbán?
For Viktor Orbán, hosting such a summit in Budapest would have been a political triumph. It would have perfectly fitted his self-styled “pro-peace” narrative and offered a symbolic scene to re-establish his image as a mediator between East and West — a balancing act he has tried to maintain for over a decade.
As Hungary’s 2026 election approaches, such international prestige could have been spun into domestic political capital for Fidesz. Orbán himself hinted that he still hopes for another chance, writing on Facebook this Wednesday: “The date is uncertain. When the time comes, we will make it happen.”
Quick take: Yet for now, the reality remains: Putin refuses to compromise, Trump remains unpredictable, and Orbán — despite his ambitions — has lost the opportunity to play the global peacemaker.
The rise of AI in Hungary’s election campaign
In the government’s latest propaganda push, artificial intelligence has become a campaign weapon of choice. Across Hungary’s regional media network, images generated by AI have flooded the online pages of county newspapers — all owned by the pro-government KESMA media conglomerate.
The images are striking in their simplicity and dehumanization: on one side, a pitiful, kneeling Péter Magyar portrayed as a “chained dog of the EU leaders,” on the other, a muscular, youthful Viktor Orbán radiating strength.
This week, the campaign reached a new level. The same centrally produced AI visuals appeared simultaneously on every local newspaper’s social media page — covering the entire country. The coordination revealed that a central propaganda hub is issuing image prompts to the regional editorial offices.
Selection from local daily newspaper’s Facebook posts on 21st October
The quote of the week from Orbán: “We’re not doing well”
Even during his October 23 address, Viktor Orbán’s tone hinted at unease. Earlier that week, a leaked recording from a closed-door speech confirmed it. Speaking to several hundred Fidesz activists at what was dubbed the “Warriors’ Club” training camp in Zánka, the prime minister openly admitted: “We’re not doing well.”
According to the recording obtained by Telex, Orbán told his inner circle that the party’s voter mobilization system and databases were “not in order.” Polls from Hungary’s 106 electoral districts painted a mixed picture, he said — and victory would depend on personally knowing voters “by name.”
He urged activists to spend at least half an hour each day on digital mobilization — flooding social media with Fidesz messaging and attacking opponents. But he emphasized that the real advantage lies in “offline” efforts: personal persuasion, door-to-door visits, and face-to-face conversations. Volunteers were instructed to identify target voters by name and address and to contact them repeatedly before election day. For the final week of the campaign, Orbán asked for their “full-time commitment.”
The remarks offered a rare glimpse behind the curtain of Fidesz’s campaign machine — and revealed a growing anxiety about slipping support, even among the party’s most loyal base.
The number of the week: €2000 per night
Between €1,700 and €2,000 — roughly 700,000 to 800,000 forints — per night. That was the cost of Economy Minister Márton Nagy’s accommodation in Brussels during a recent EU summit, according to documents obtained by 24.hu through a freedom of information request.
Even by Brussels standards, the figure is extraordinary. The ministry has so far refused to disclose which hotel hosted the minister, prompting 24.hu to file a lawsuit for the information.
The week’s award: a triumph for the Hungarian free media
Hungary’s independent media has been named the winner of the 2025 IPI–IMS Free Media Pioneer Award, granted jointly by the International Press Institute (IPI) and International Media Support (IMS). The recognition honours Hungarian journalists for their innovation, adaptability, and perseverance amid persistent political and economic pressure.
In its statement, the jury wrote: “Throughout Hungary’s history — from the 1848 revolution to the democratic transition of 1989 — the struggle for press freedom has been at the heart of the nation’s fight for liberty and sovereignty. Today’s independent media continues that legacy: with resilience, creativity, collaboration, and courage, they uphold the tradition of Hungarian journalists and writers who, despite censorship and state control, always found a way to share independent news and ideas.”
The organisations noted that in the past 15 years, as Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has built an increasingly sophisticated system of media control, independent journalists have responded with extraordinary ingenuity and determination — founding new outlets, reinventing existing ones, and finding creative ways to reach their audiences.
English version generated using AI translation and revised by the author.