CPAC To Change After Orban's Defeat in Hungary
Hungary’s newly elected leader, Péter Magyar, has said the country’s government will not fund the Hungarian branch of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), as the event’s chair signaled right-wing activists and politicians will continue to gather in the European country each year.
“Mixing party financing with government spending-which comes from the budget-is, in my opinion, a crime, and this will also have to be investigated by the future authorities,” Magyar said during a press conference on Monday, shortly after his center-right Tisza party swept to power in Budapest.
Newsweek has contacted CPAC and CPAC Hungary for comment.
CPAC had thrown its weight behind Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s longtime prime minister, who was publicly backed by President Donald Trump, his administration’s top officials and far-right leaders in Europe.
Magyar, a former member of Orbán’s populist Fidesz party, had challenged the four-term leader with an anti-corruption, economics-focused campaign and pledges to move Budapest back toward the embrace of the European Union and NATO.
Orbán was heavily criticized by the EU and observers for chipping away at Hungary’s democratic institutions, including its media outlets and courts.
Orbán’s government was hostile to the European bloc and kept up close ties with Russia despite Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine from early 2022, incensing Kyiv and Brussels.
As Hungarians cast their ballots, CPAC said it stood “firmly” with Orbán, hailed by CPAC as “a true example of a leader with strong conservative values who has courageously stood up to elitists and globalists from the EU and beyond to protect what is right for his country.”
Orbán’s government has long inspired chunks of the American right, the outgoing prime minister described as the “Trump before Trump” by Steve Bannon, an architect of the U.S. administration’s Make America Great Again (MAGA) agenda.
CPAC has held five events in Hungary, including just weeks before the Hungarian parliamentary elections.
“At CPAC Hungary, the key phrase: “No migration! No gender! No war!” was first spoken,” read a promotional message published ahead of the event on March 21.
Magyar, although on the right of the political spectrum, has veered away from the so-called culture wars-a sharp contrast with Orbán, who pushed Christian, traditional values and a hard anti-immigrant stance.
CPAC Chairman Matt Schlapp said he was “very gratified” that Magyar had invited CPAC back to the country after Tisza’s election win.
“We will take him up on that,” Schlapp said in a brief post to social media.
Magyar told reporters CPAC was “very welcome” in Budapest, but “should not be financed with Hungarian taxpayers' money.”
Magyar said the Hungarian government would also no longer fund the Mathias Corvinus Collegium, a conservative think tank tied to Orbán in the Hungarian capital. Vice President JD Vance spoke at the Mathias Corvinus Collegium during his visit to Budapest in support of Orbán last week.
Vance told Fox News on Monday the U.S. had not expected Orbán to “cruise to an election victory,” but that senior U.S. officials traveled to Hungary “because it was the right thing to do, to stand behind a person who had stood by us for a very long time.”
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This story was originally published April 14, 2026 at 2:22 AM.