Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban congratulated President-elect Joe Biden on his election, having previously stated that he was convinced that his ally would win President Donald Trump and that he had no alternative plans in case he did not.
Orban, a leading anti-immigration leader in Europe who had previously criticized Barack Obama’s administration, in which Biden served as vice president, wished the Democrat well in a letter quoted by the state news agency MTI.
“Let me congratulate you on a successful presidential campaign. I wish you good health and continued success in your extremely responsible duties,” Orban wrote.
Orban, who has been in power in Hungary since 2010, had previously told Reuters in September that he could see nothing but a trump card victory and that he might be less cooperative with Biden if he won.
“The only reason I’m sitting here after spending more than 30 years in politics is because I always believe in my Plan A,” he said. “We have an exceptionally good relationship with Trump. Probably the level of openness and kindness and mutual assistance will be lower [if Biden wins]. But my calculation is fine. He [Trump] will win.”
Orban was the first head of state of the European Union to support Trump in 2016 and visited Trump in the White House in 2019. He also accused the Democrats of “moral imperialism.
Elsewhere, Janez Jansa, Prime Minister of Slovenia, where First Lady Melania Trump was born, had refused to accept the election results, stating that the mainstream media had announced the results and “the courts had not even begun to decide.
Jansa, another nationalist conservative, also praised Trump after the president’s premature 2 a.m. election victory speech, when millions of votes were still outstanding.
“It is quite clear that the American people voted @RealDonaldTrump @Mike_Pence for #4Moreyears,” he wrote, “denying any further delays and facts of #MSM.”
In an obvious acceptance of Biden’s victory, Jansa added on Sunday that the US was a “strategic partner” for Slovenia and that he had “established close, friendly relations” with the country “regardless of which party the US president came from”.
“This will not change in the future,” he wrote.
Poland’s President Andrzej Duda, another close ally of Trump during his time in Washington, congratulated Biden on a “successful presidential campaign”.
He added: “While we wait for the nomination by the electoral college, Poland is determined to maintain a high-level and high-quality strategic partnership between Poland and the US for an even stronger alliance.
