US Vice President JD Vance has delivered a strongly worded speech in Europe again, blasting the European Union establishment over its progressive policies and its hostility towards US administration ally Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.
During his visit to Hungary to support Orbán ahead of the country’s parliamentary elections on April 12, Vance described the actions of officials in Brussels as “truly disgraceful” foreign election interference.
Vance accused Brussels of using “digital censorship”, forcing digital media companies to decide what information they are giving to Hungarian voters. He said Hungarian voters were sovereign and adults who should be able to look into whatever information they like without someone in a faraway capital treating them like children.
“Part of the reason why we are here and why the President of the US sent me here is because the amount of interference that has come from the bureaucracy in Brussels has been truly disgraceful,” Vance said.
“I won’t tell the people in Hungary how to vote and I would encourage the bureaucrats in Brussels to do exactly the same thing.”
He said the US President Donald Trump and the Hungarian PM have achieved great things in recent times, but noted that Brussels bureaucrats do not like Hungary’s elected leader.
He said he did not come to tell Hungarians how to vote but to send a message to the EU elite.
“With this visit, I wanted to send a signal to everyone, particularly to those Eurocrats in Brussels who have done everything they can to hold down the people in Hungary because they don’t like the leader who actually stood up for the people of Hungary,” Vance said.
“I think it’s important to say that.”
He stressed the co-operation between the US and Hungary and the economic investments made.
Vance explicitly praised Orbán for his efforts to achieve “energy independence” and added that it was “funny to watch” European leaders talking about the energy crisis, “while frankly, they should have been following the policies of Viktor Orbán in Hungary”.
“If they had, the energy crisis they are experiencing would be a lot less bad,” Vance added.
He said that energy prices in Hungary were elevated but much less so than in the rest of Europe – thanks to the leadership of Orbán.
Vance called Hungary a “model” for the continent.
“We want Europe to be successful, we want European families to be able to afford to heat their homes and to build great things. We want Europe to be energy independent and even energy dominant,” he said.
He warned that Europe will not have energy security if it continues to follow failed policies from the past.
Vance stressed the extended and growing co-operation and partnerships between the US and Hungary but added that he did not come to highlight the economic aspect of those arrangements.
“I’m here because of the moral co-operation,” he said, adding that Hungary and the US fight in defence of Western civilisation.
He also pointed at the Christian roots of western civilisation, which influenced a range of values raging from free speech to rule of law and the protection of minority rights and the vulnerable.
“Unfortunately there have been too few people willing to stand up for the values of Western civilisation,” Vance said.
He called Orbán “a rare exception”.
“I’m here because Viktor is a statesman,” he said, adding that many in Europe have talked about the need for peace but that it was Trump and Orbán “who have been leading the way through diplomacy”.
He said that, despite its size, Hungary was a leading nation on the front of international peace building.
Vance said that “what happened during this election campaign is the worst possible example of foreign election interfere” he has ever seen in the electoral processes of a sovereign country.
“The bureaucrats in Brussels have tried to destroy the economy of Hungary, they have tried to make Hungary less energy independent, they have tried to drive up costs for Hungarian consumers, and they have done it all because they hate this guy [Orbán],” he claimed.
The US VP said Hungarians should not look for who is pro US or pro EU but who would look for their interests, noting that Orbán was “advocating ferociously for the interests of Hungary.”
Press Conference: Vice President JD Vance in Budapest https://t.co/xkai5c6Oh9
— Orbán Viktor (@PM_ViktorOrban) April 7, 2026
