Putin’s friendship has hampered Europe’s right. Not Hungary’s Orbán.

For many right-wing European leaders who have wooed Russian President Vladimir Putin, the war in Ukraine has been a blow to their popularity.

Not so for Viktor Orbán.

The Hungarian prime minister is facing his toughest election yet on April 3, against a united opposition led by a Christian conservative. Before the invasion, the public fretted about COVID-19, high inflation, migration, the defense of traditional family values versus greater LGBTQ rights, and how Budapest’s conflicts with Brussels over rule of law, corruption, and media freedoms might play out. It seemed like a formula for Mr. Orbán’s ouster.

But the conflict in Ukraine has pushed traditional hot-button issues into the background – and looks likely, experts say, to boost Europe’s self-styled “illiberal” strongman’s chances at the ballot box.

The latest polls suggest Mr. Orban’s Fidesz party could win by a narrow margin. The public’s logic seems to be that Mr. Orbán puts the economic well-being of Hungarian families first and national interests above geopolitical considerations.

“We really trust in Viktor Orbán,” says Gyöngyi Bors, a redheaded hairdresser who came with her grandchildren to hear the Hungarian leader speak in Budapest. “As long as he is in power, this country is safe and the people of Hungary are safe. He is reliable. He is authentic. And whenever we go outside Budapest, we see that Hungary is developing in a great way. Everything is getting more and more beautiful. Things are built.”

While Fidesz is expected to win, it is also expected to lose the supermajority it secured in 2018 – which made constitutional changes possible.

“There is room for surprises,” says Stefano Bottoni, a teacher of Eastern European history at the University of Florence and author of a book on Mr. Orbán. “The war totally changed the situation.”

From freedom fighter to Putin’s ally

Mr. Orbán knows how to pivot and nail down messages that resonate with the majority of Hungarians, analysts say. He shot to political fame as an anti-communist freedom fighter who stood in Budapest’s Heroes’ Square in 1989 demanding that Russian troops exit Hungary. It was Mr. Orbán who oversaw Hungary’s accession to NATO in 1999. And for years, he insisted that Hungary should diversify its energy sources and lessen its dependence on Russia.

“We don’t want to be the happiest barracks of Gazprom,” Mr. Orbán declared in 2007 when his Fidesz party was in the opposition.

That fiery antagonism toward Russia ended in 2010, when Mr. Orbán traveled to Moscow and reset relations with Mr. Putin. In the summer of 2014, he declared Russia – along with China and Turkey – as political models to follow, proudly launching Hungary on the path to “illiberal democracy.” Mr. Orbán’s authoritarian tendencies and sweeping reforms are today major points of concern for the European Union.

On the economic front, Mr. Orbán signed a contract with Russia’s Rosatom to expand the Paks Nuclear Power Plant. More recently, he invited the controversial Russian-led International Investment Bank to set up its headquarters in Budapest, reportedly providing diplomatic immunity to its staff even if critics see it as a front for Russian spying. These projects are perceived to be dear to the Hungarian leader’s heart, fruits of a carefully crafted, pragmatic relationship with Mr. Putin.

They are also why he is widely perceived as Mr. Putin’s last ally in Europe.

“That’s not a viable position,” says Dr. Bottoni. “He seemed quite unsure for a couple of days [after the invasion of Ukraine began]. Then he assumed this new position of peace fighter. He has a pass for victory now because he has a new narrative as commander in chief for peace and many Hungarians want to hear this. The war scares people, and Hungary is a border country [with Ukraine].”

“There is moral risk”

The war changed the dynamic of the parliamentary campaign, as the opposition seized on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to present Mr. Orbán as Mr. Putin’s lackey in Europe. It highlighted that Hungary blocked Ukraine’s accession to NATO, and that Mr. Orbán stood alongside Mr. Putin weeks before Russia invaded Ukraine, celebrating their 12th meeting since 2010.

It’s a matter of “East versus West” and democracy versus greater authoritarianism, opposition leaders say.

“Choose Europe, freedom, and growth instead of East, slavery, and deprivation,” urged Péter Márki-Zay, the joint opposition candidate for prime minister at a rally last month. As a small-town mayor and churchgoing father of seven, he embodies the conservative values that resonate with the right-wing Fidesz voter base but also has the support of liberal parties. Many believe he is the country’s best hope to unseat Mr. Orbán.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has also criticized Mr. Orbán in recent days, blaming him for holding back on some sanctions, blocking weapons transfers to Ukraine via Hungary, and importing Russian oil and gas. “There can be no Russian branches in Europe that divide the EU from within, that are trying to help Russia make as much money as possible even now,” Mr. Zelenskyy said Tuesday. “Europe must stop listening to the excuses of Budapest.”

Hungary has come out looking soft relative to the other central European nations. When the prime ministers of the Czech Republic, Poland, and Slovenia – which, along with Hungary, form the so-called Visegrád Group – went to Kyiv to show support for Ukraine earlier this month, Mr. Orbán stayed home. Hungary’s weaker line toward Russia also led the rest of the Visegrád Group to snub a planning meeting of defense ministers in Budapest this week.

Still, Hungary did fall into line with the EU and impose sanctions on Russia. And for all the cozying up to Mr. Putin in recent years, Mr. Orbán has never called into question Hungary’s membership in NATO or the EU per se, analysts note. “We were trying to expand our range of motion,” says Dr. Bottoni. “Until now, it didn’t seem so risky. It seemed even a smart move, playing a bit with the Russians, with the Chinese, imagining a global role for Hungary.”

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine dramatically changed the equation. “It’s not only risky; there is moral risk,” Dr. Bottoni adds. “You are aligning with bloody dictatorships; you are aligning with isolated regimes. You are perceived as a kind of last ally [to Mr. Putin]. And Hungary has a very bad tradition, unfortunately, in the 20th century of standing on the wrong side.”

Remembering the Soviets

The majority of Hungarians are wary of being dragged into the Ukrainian conflict. Hungary was stripped of two-thirds of its territory in the aftermath of World War I. Hungary sided with Nazi Germany in World War II largely because Adolf Hitler offered to return the land. Large swaths of the population still dream of restoring Greater Hungary, a sentiment Mr. Orbán plays on.

“Hungary had to pay a high price for these wars,” says Ágoston Mráz, director of the conservative think tank Nézőpont Intézet. “That is why the sentiment to stay neutral is so strong in society.”

The stakes of a conflict with Russia are clear for the average Hungarian, even if ties between Budapest and Moscow have been at their best under Mr. Orbán, and even if Fidesz media repeats Russian tropes about the Ukrainian conflict. Hungary lived under communist rule until 1989.

“We know what it is like to fight with the Russians,” says Endre Pokasz, a press officer tasked with showing the aircraft museum, upgraded churches, and cultural venues set up under Mr. Orbán in the town of Szolnok. “If anyone thinks the Russians can be beaten easily, they are wrong. Hungary must keep the peace. What if Russia takes revenge on us? We are too small for this. If they close the gas, we will have no heating. Companies will have to stop working. Nothing will work.”

Russia supplies 80% of Hungary’s gas. Mr. Orbán signed a 15-year deal with Gazprom last year. That makes energy prices in Hungary cheaper compared with the rest of Europe. “It is a powerful weapon for Orbán,” says Dr. Bottoni. “We have to do what is good for us. You are paying less for gas and oil. Do you want to pay more? Please vote for the opposition, break down the agreements with the Russians. ... If not, we have to accept that the Russians are our partners. Whatever they do.”

“Orbán gave a very smart answer saying in wartimes, the most important thing for Hungarians is not who is responsible for the war and not moral issues. But the question is who can guarantee the freedom and peace of Hungary, and through that the prosperity of Hungary?” concurs Mr. Mráz.

Victory for the opposition would mean a complete re-orientation of Hungary’s foreign policy toward the West. That is the fervent wish of lawyer Gabor Matlak, in Budapest. Lingering by the banks of the Danube River with his family after the opposition rally, he clung to the flag of Europe.

“We are afraid we will not be part of the EU anymore if Orbán wins again,” he explains. “It is our last chance for Hungary to stay in the European Union and NATO. I think Europe will not tolerate Orbán anymore if we are not strong enough to kick him out.”