Prime Minister Orbán argued that the domestic opposition cannot be understood on purely Hungarian terms as powerful foreign interests stand behind it.
He referred to arrangements such as journalist academies where opposition journalists teach and receive funding under the label of educational work. “I can show who gets how many hundreds of millions of forints from Brussels,” – he said.
These schemes may be legally packaged, he suggested, but the logic is simple: Brussels money flows to actors working against the Hungarian government.
The prime minister added that foreign involvement does not stop with Brussels. He claimed that Kyiv has also entered the campaign, not necessarily by sending cash, but through “high-value IT services from Ukraine” provided to the Tisza Party, services that “of course are not paid for.” These, he said, are the familiar mechanisms of political influence.
This is why, PM Orbán argued, the real issue is no longer “whether we eat the opposition for breakfast, but whether we can eat those behind the opposition for dinner.” In his view, the decisive factor is the foreign financial, technological, and political backing behind Hungary’s opposition.
The prime minister then placed the debate in a broader historical context. At the time of the Regime Change, he recalled, the West appeared as an unquestioned model. The “hamburger” clearly beat the “seal-fat Soviet boot,” and the West projected prosperity, technological strength, and moral authority.
“The West made us believe that it has a moral superiority,” Prime Minister Orbán said. At the time, freedom and living standards seemed to support that belief. Today, however, he argued this is no longer the case. The West is no longer a role model, Europe is in decline, and the European Union represents censorship, pressure to enter war, money sent to Ukraine, and interference in national life.
In this situation, the prime minister said, there is no longer an external model Hungary can simply copy. “We must derive what to do from the Hungarian national interest,” he argued. The question is no longer East or West, but how Hungarians can live well and feel at home in their own country.
Against this backdrop, Prime Minister Orbán described the opposition’s proposal as importing the Brussels system into Hungary and pushing the national one aside. While they speak about “system change,” he said, this is what it truly means. That is why the election is existential: if Hungary accepts the Brussels model now, returning to the national system later may be nearly impossible.
He also warned that Brussels wants to weaken member states’ ability to block decisions, particularly on Ukraine’s financing, EU enlargement, and war policy. In such a framework, the prime minister argued, “we must know how to say no to Brussels,” and Hungary must not send representatives who want to bring the Brussels system home.
On the question of war, Prime Minister Orbán was blunt. Hungary can stay out, he said, only as long as there is a strong national backing for peace. “We can stay out of the war because there is a people’s will,” expressed through petitions, public pressure, and constant signals that this is not merely a dispute between Budapest and Brussels, but a clear demand from Hungarian society.
Looking ahead, Prime Minister Orbán said the outcome will be decided by work. In the final two weeks of the campaign, he argued, everyone must be reached who is with them or willing to listen. Every door must be knocked on, every conversation held, and debates must be taken on if necessary. “This will be a difficult election,” he said, because there is no extraordinary event in sight that would suddenly tip the balance. What will matter is the accumulated daily work, showing clearly who put in more effort by the end.
If that work is done, he said, Hungary can achieve what it wants and avoid what it fears. The country will not have to send its resources, its children, or its grandchildren into a war. Instead, Hungary can prepare not for war, but for peaceful construction.