Orbn's Hungary drove a top university campus into exile. JD Vance said it should be a model for the U.S.
www.nbcnews.com

... Its limestone entrance rises above a grand 1820s mansion, its newer additions all hard modern lines and confidence. It has won architecture awards. It was built to suggest a certain kind of Hungary, too: outward-looking, liberal, at ease with the West.

Today it is eerily quiet. ...

Founded by George Soros after the fall of communism, the university says the authoritarian government of Viktor Orbn forced 90% of its teaching operations out of the country in 2019, leaving behind a stark symbol of how far the nation has moved during the prime minister's 16-year regime. ...

"The closest conservatives have ever gotten to successfully dealing with the left-wing domination of universities is Viktor Orbn's approach in Hungary," Vance said in 2024, then a Republican senator from Ohio. "I think his way has to be the model for us " not to eliminate universities, but to give the choice between survival or taking a much less biased approach to teaching." ...

How Orban benefits from Hungary's tailor-made election system
www.france24.com

... Peter Magyar's centre-right Tisza Party might be comfortably ahead in Hungary's parliamentary election polls but he is far from guaranteed victory in Sunday's vote. The country's electoral system has been designed to support ruling Prime Minister Viktor Orban's Fidesz party -- and any institutions that are working in his favour " every step of the way. ...

But although the populist and nationalist leader, who has ruled Hungary unchallenged for the past 16 years, might appear to be struggling, he also has a number of assets up his sleeve.

The first of these is a mixed electoral system tailor-made to benefit his far-right Fidesz party. In 2011, backed by a two-thirds majority, Orban pushed through a controversial law reducing the number of seats in parliament, as well as redrawing electoral districts designed to maximise the conservative party's chances.

"This gerrymandering has become a bona fide national pastime," said Paul Gradvohl, a Central Europe history professor at Paris 1 Panthon-Sorbonne University, with a hint of irony.

"The aim is to use the results of previous elections to take from Peter to give to Paul. In constituencies where Fidesz won by a large margin, less supportive districts have been added, and in return, the opposition has been stripped of seats where it had a chance of winning." ...