Orban concedes as Magyar’s Tisza party appears headed for landslide win

Viktor Orban’s concession turned Hungary’s election into a blunt stress test for the populist model he helped export across Europe. Partial results on Sunday put Peter Magyar’s center-right, pro-European Tisza Party on course for a landslide in Hungary’s 199-seat parliament, with projections of about 135 seats and a two-thirds supermajority that could give Magyar the power to drive sweeping institutional change.

With roughly 45% to 46% of the vote counted, Tisza held a wide lead, while Fidesz was reported at about 29% in early results. Magyar said Orban phoned him to congratulate him on the victory. Orban, who has dominated Hungarian politics for 16 years, called the outcome “painful” and acknowledged a defeat that many voters had treated as a referendum on his rule.

The scale of the turnout underscored how much had changed inside the electorate. Hungary’s National Election Office reported participation of 77.8% by late afternoon, the highest turnout in any post-Communist Hungarian election and far above the previous record of 70.5% set in 2002. The race had been shaped by complaints over economic stagnation, rising living costs and corruption, alongside fierce arguments over the European Union, the war in Ukraine, relations with Moscow and accusations of voter fraud.

A Tisza victory could reshape Hungary’s relations with the European Union and alter the country’s standing inside the bloc. It could help unlock suspended EU funds and reopen the way for support for a 90 billion euro EU loan to Ukraine that Orban had blocked. It would also weaken one of Vladimir Putin’s strongest allies inside the EU and hand a setback to nationalist politics in Europe, including currents aligned with Donald Trump.

Magyar has framed his campaign as a bid to pull Hungary back toward Europe and away from Russia’s orbit. If the projected result holds, the vote will not just end a dominant era in Budapest; it will test whether Hungary’s institutions can absorb a transfer of power after years of democratic backsliding and economic strain.