ROB SCHMITZ, HOST:
Here in Hungary, voters head to the polls tomorrow. At stake - the future for populist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Europe's longest serving leader and ally of both Russian President Vladimir Putin and President Trump. Here's Orbán at a rally alongside Vice President JD Vance this week.
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PRESIDENT VIKTOR ORBÁN: (Through interpreter) Freedom-loving people cannot be converted to liberalist ideologies. The same thing will happen always. We will still be here, and they are nowhere, and the Hungarian-American friendship is shining again in its old glory.
SCHMITZ: Orbán is the architect of a style of governance known as illiberal democracy, one where key democratic institutions like the judiciary, the free press and civil society have been methodically weakened but where citizens still retain the right to vote. It's a model that's been a point of fascination for politicians around the world, including those in the Trump administration.
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JD VANCE: You're fighting for your sovereignty, and I am here because President Trump and I wish for your success, and we are fighting right here with you.
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SCHMITZ: Nearly every political poll taken in the lead-up to this election shows Orbán trailing his opponent by double digits, an opponent whose meteoric rise is now standing in the way of Orbán's vision for Hungary. His name is Péter Magyar.
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PÉTER MAGYAR: (Non-English language spoken).
SCHMITZ: The 45-year-old politician broke from Orbán's Fidesz party two years ago out of frustration of the corruption of the party. Soon afterwards, he began posting videos on social media like this one, highlighting the squalid conditions at Hungarian hospitals.
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MAGYAR: (Non-English language spoken).
SCHMITZ: "Everyone here," says Magyar, "is waiting for the construction of a new modern hospital promised long ago, but the Fidesz government was not brave enough to do so. They've had 14 years to start these projects," says Magyar, "but they haven't done anything." Magyar's video tour of the poor conditions of the country's hospitals, schools and communities became so popular with voters that now his party, named Tisza, began to convert Fidesz voters tired of Orbán's politics and corruption.
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MAGYAR: (Non-English language spoken).
SCHMITZ: At a rally this week, Magyar told supporters, "this country is destined for much more than for those in power to ruin, steal and turn it into the poorest and most corrupt country in Europe."
ZSUZSANNA SZELENYI: Magyar doesn't care. He doesn't want to look decent and polite.
SCHMITZ: Zsuzsanna Szelenyi is a former Fidesz politician who is the author of "Tainted Democracy: Viktor Orbán And The Subversion Of Hungary." She says Magyar is the equivalent of a political whistleblower, an exile from Orbán's inner circle who is shining a light on the prime minister's corruption.
SZELENYI: He knows how to fight against a fighter, like a street fighter, but he doesn't do it in the way as Orbán does it because Orbán uses an entire state apparatus, money, people, institution, every possible resources. He has so much power in Hungary.
SCHMITZ: That power is directed at targets like Ukraine, liberal ideology and the European Union, which has frozen funding to Hungary since 2022 based on the Orbán government's backsliding on democracy.
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ORBÁN: (Non-English language spoken).
SCHMITZ: In a recent speech, Orbán railed against the EU, blaming it for maintaining a constant state of war in neighboring Ukraine. He's also criticized the EU for spreading what he calls LGBTQ ideology and for its liberal values. But a recent poll by the European Council on Foreign Relations shows that 77% of surveyed Hungarian voters actually support their country's membership in the EU.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Non-English language spoken).
SCHMITZ: To get a sense of how Hungarian voters feel outside the more liberal Budapest, we drive an hour east of the capital to Bag, a village with a large population of Roma, an ethnic minority that faces widespread discrimination.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Non-English language spoken)
SCHMITZ: The Roma live on the outskirts of town in rows of cinderblock homes along a garbage-lined dirt road. But our arrival is met with glares of disapproval. Nobody here wants to talk to a journalist. One man says he'll do it for a few dollars.
No, we can't pay for an interview. No, we can't pay for an interview.
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SCHMITZ: In the town center, Jozsef Toth tells us the neighborhood we just visited is dangerous. Despite this, he says, Orbán's Fidesz party helps everyone here.
JOZSEF TOTH: (Non-English language spoken).
SCHMITZ: "Orbán has given the people extra pension money. Without that," he says, "I couldn't support my family." When I ask him about Bag's economy under the Orbán government, he says it's better than ever. But fellow resident Sandor Lakatos says the economy has gotten far worse under Orbán.
SANDOR LAKATOS: (Non-English language spoken).
SCHMITZ: "This is the first election that I'm not going to vote for Orbán's Fidesz party," he says. "This past year, I found out how corrupt they are and how much money they've stolen."
LAKATOS: (Non-English language spoken).
SCHMITZ: Lakatos says that in past elections, the Fidesz party sent representatives from Budapest to his village to hand out sacks of potatoes and the equivalent of $30 each to the Roma in this village in return for votes for Fidesz. "That's a lot of money for the Roma," he tells me. "But my people," he says, "are selling out their own future and that of their own children by taking that money. And that's why in this election," says Lakatos, "it's time for a change."
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