Hungary's Orban Uses Covid-19 Crisis for Another Power Grab
Cracking down on an authoritarian regime, even a seemingly inconsequential one, would send a message to the U.S.’s other backsliding allies.
Wayward ally.
Photographer: Gabriel Kuchta/Getty Images
What do you call a country whose government openly embraces illiberalism and exults in the crisis of democracy, cheers the perceived decline of the U.S. and the rise of its authoritarian challengers, makes irredentist claims against its neighbors, and spreads decay within key institutions of the American-led international order? If you answered “NATO ally,” you are, unfortunately, correct.
Under Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Hungary is weakening the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the European Union from the inside as Russia and China pressure them from the outside; it is setting a terrible precedent as the U.S. reckons with resurgent authoritarianism within a number of its alliances. It may be premature for the U.S. to simply walk away from an ally that more often undercuts than advances American interests. But it’s not too early to start taking steps in that direction.