“When it comes to pronouns, we don’t even have any!” said Tibor Várady, owner of Espresso Embassy, a popular cafe and specialty coffee shop in downtown Budapest. Várady’s comment is a joking reference to his native Hungarian, a famously difficult language that has no equivalents for the English pronouns “he” and “she,” and the atmosphere in Budapest, which is years, perhaps decades, behind the vanguard of left-wing cultural politics in the United States. As we spoke, Várady was closing the cafe early so he and his staff could march in this year’s Budapest gay pride parade, the latest flashpoint to emerge in Hungarian politics.
Over the past decade and a half, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and his ruling Fidesz party have become unlikely standard-bearers for international conservatism. Orbán and his allies have hardened the country’s borders, abolished gender studies in public universities, and enacted a raft of pro-natalist policies to increase the Hungarian birth rate. In 2014, Orbán notoriously declared that he was building an “illiberal democracy,” a remark that is ritually invoked every time Western journalists feel compelled to scold the current government.
With the 2026 parliamentary elections fast approaching, the annual Budapest Pride Parade seemed poised to become the next fight between Fidesz and Hungary’s embattled Left. Last year, Orbán said that organizers “should not even bother” preparing for the parade. In March, the Hungarian parliament passed a law banning Pride demonstrations on the grounds of child protection. The stage was set for a major showdown between liberal Budapest and the national government. Then, the march went off without a hitch, attracting a record number of attendees and exposing political and cultural rifts in a country often described as a conservative monolith.
The Budapest bubble
Orbán is a resourceful politician, but his footing is not as secure as his most fervent critics or supporters imagine. Budapest, the cultural, economic, and political heart of Hungary, has long been a liberal outlier in a country known for its conservatism. The current mayor, Gergely Karácsony, is a former academic and Green Party member who went to great lengths to give Pride organizers legal maneuvering room and political cover.
Protests against the government’s threats started early. On April 1, a large contingent of young-ish protesters closed Budapest’s Elizabeth Bridge, chanting “Nem Hadjuk Abba” (“We’re Not Going to Stop”) while hoisting Pride banners, Hungarian and European Union flags, and homemade signs decrying Orbán. As the date of the parade drew near, smaller rallies and marches periodically filled the streets of the capital.
Orbán’s opponents sometimes describe Hungary as a one-party state, but the reality is more complicated. Since the fall of communism, Budapest has transformed into a cosmopolitan city, complete with gay pride parades — it hosted Eastern Europe’s first such gathering in 1997 — and its own Chinatown neighborhood in the outlying suburb of Kőbánya-Kispest. The conservative government wields the state media apparatus to great effect, but savvy Hungarians look to foreign news, private television networks, or the internet for alternatives. A characteristic example is “A Dinasztia” (“The Dynasty”), a YouTube documentary from the opposition media outlet Direkt36 alleging widespread corruption on the part of Orbán and his political allies. According to YouTube, the video has received over 3.7 million views, a considerable figure in a country of fewer than 10 million people.
The enthusiasm for Pride is a natural outgrowth of Budapest’s relaxed cultural atmosphere. “In the city, even government supporters aren’t anti-gay,” Várady said. On the day of the march, Várady and his staff had covered the Espresso Embassy with Pride decorations. Servers delivered soft serve affogatos with small rainbow flags on toothpicks. Negative responses from customers, Várady said, were negligible. “It’s not major blowback,” he added.
Várady has marched in gay pride parades for the past 20 years — “casually,” he said, “as an ally.” But this year is different. “I’m OK with a difference of opinion [on gay rights], but taking away freedom of assembly. … It’s why we went stronger this year,” he continued, explaining the cafe’s new color scheme.
Despite threats of legal retaliation, other participants were also enthusiastic about the parade. Péter, a 34-year-old gay Hungarian who lives in Budapest and works at a multinational organization, was eager to march with his partner. “I don’t see any dangers,” he said. “I see it as an opportunity. It will show that this [march] is accepted, and please move on!”
Tamara Fekete, a recent university graduate who grew up in an observant Pentecostal family, admitted to being a little nervous about attending Pride amid a brewing political controversy. “I have a very conservative family,” she explained. The size of the parade and the welcoming atmosphere, however, reassured her. “It’s empowering that you’re not alone,” she said, gesturing to the massive crowd that had assembled at Városháza square.
Hungary’s moderate gay rights movement
One reason opposition to the parade fizzled is the embryonic state of Hungary’s gay rights movement, which is still focused on visibility and issues such as civil partnerships and adoption rights instead of the more radical issues that have lately animated the American Left. As the parade wound its way from Városháza square through the streets of downtown Pest and then over the Elizabeth Bridge to the leafy Buda side of the Danube, the friendly, relaxed atmosphere was a stark contrast to the confrontational tactics that have characterized recent American street protests.
“The government was using extreme examples [from other Pride protests] and carrying it around like a bloody sword, as we say in Hungarian,” Várady said. The actual parade, by contrast, felt like an open-air party, complete with techno music, dancing, and plenty of young families.
Budapest may be a few years, or decades, behind San Francisco, but the city is hardly immune to broader trends in Western culture. Although they were far outnumbered by Hungarian, EU, and traditional rainbow flags, the pastel blue and pink colors of the transgender movement were also present, especially among younger marchers. A few protesters brandished antifa banners and “Free Palestine” signs. Naturally, Greta Thunberg showed up.
More telling than the fringe protest groups was the blend of traditional Pride paraphernalia and more prosaic political grievances. The ubiquitous EU flags were a not-so-subtle dig at Orbán’s antagonistic relationship with Brussels, which has clashed with the pugnacious Hungarian prime minister on everything from immigration policy to the bloc’s relationship with Russia. Many protesters wore shirts and hoisted signs criticizing “NER,” an acronym for the unpronounceable Hungarian phrase “Nemzeti Együttműködés Rendszere.”
NER roughly translates to “National System of Cooperation,” a term that has become Hungarian shorthand for Fidesz’s management of the economy. Unlike many of his fans on the American Right, Orbán has never been a free market purist. His activist economic policies have prompted widespread allegations of corruption and favoritism, issues that are far more likely to resonate with the average Hungarian voter than esoteric debates about gendered language.
After crossing the Elizabeth Bridge from Pest to Buda, the parade made its way south past the Gellért Hotel, an iconic Art Deco building overlooking the Danube often featured in tourist brochures and Instagram photos. The hotel is being renovated by an investment group led by István Tiborcz, Orbán’s son-in-law.
Conservative skepticism
Young Hungarians, especially those who live and work in Budapest, tend to be more left-wing than older voters, but not all of them welcomed the march. Despite Budapest’s cosmopolitan atmosphere, the country is still instinctively conservative in surprising ways. As the parade made its way over the Elizabeth Bridge, a bachelorette party gathered at a nearby terrace. One of the ladies was loudly advertising free cookies baked by the bride-to-be, a marital rite of passage meant to signify her suitability as a housewife. This and similar traditions associated with religious holidays, festivals, and family celebrations are common in Hungary, especially in the more traditional countryside.
“Sometimes I feel like I’m living in a bubble,” said Orsolya, a tattooed 30-year-old bisexual who works at the same multinational organization as Péter. She grew up in Budapest and is acutely aware of how different the capital is from the rest of the country. Orbán’s harshest critics vacillate between claims that he has established a permanent autocracy and predictions of his imminent political demise, ideas often shaped by overexposure to young, Anglophone Budapesters whose politics usually lean left.
Elsewhere, sentiments about the parade were mixed. Balint Blasko belongs to the same age cohort as Orsolya and Péter and also works in Budapest. He regularly commutes into the city from the countryside, although he’s trying to save money to buy a house or an apartment closer in. Blasko described himself as broadly accepting of gay and lesbian Hungarians, but, he added, “I do not endorse events like Pride parades.”
“In a predominantly conservative society [like Hungary], such events often aggravate those with more extremist views and further widen the divide,” he said. “If the goal is acceptance, this approach can be quite counterproductive.”
Other Hungarians were more openly hostile. As Pride marchers made their way through Pest, messages and posts swirled on social media that the Liberty Bridge had been blocked by counterprotesters from Mi Hazánk, a far-right party on Hungary’s political fringes. Slowly but surely, the parade shifted course to the Elizabeth Bridge to avoid the phalanx of police that surrounded a small group of counterdemonstrators.
The Mi Hazánk protesters were mostly an older crowd, but one younger Hungarian in the group was willing to talk. Aside from the large green Mi Hazánk banner he was carrying and the small Byzantine-style cross hanging from his neck, Richárd Kökény didn’t look the part of a far-right protester. Other than the occasional pause to find the right word, Kökény spoke in fluent, unaccented English, something he attributes to YouTube and video games.
“I don’t care if someone is gay,” Kökény said. “It’s a private thing. It’s not for the streets. It’s not for children.”
The importance of protecting children was a recurring theme in Hungarian conservatives’ opposition to Pride. The parliamentary legislation aimed at banning the parade was justified on the grounds of child protection. Behind a line of Hungarian police, Mi Hazánk protesters stretched a large banner with the phrase “Stop LMBTQP” across the Liberty Bridge. The final letter, which stands for “pedofília,” was highlighted in red.
“[The parade] paints a picture that is absolutely wrong for children,” Kökény said. “I worry about a future where this is normal.”
In the June afternoon sun, heat seemed to radiate from the asphalt and steel girders of the Liberty Bridge. Tempers flared as a skateboarder broke the Mi Hazánk cordon to cross the river, ignoring shouted curses and yells to stop. Despite the tension, a substantial police presence was enough to deter serious violence. A few passersby angrily shouted at the Mi Hazánk supporters, but most were content to walk by and gawp.
Many of the older counterprotesters carrying flags and banners had weary looks. At least in Budapest, they knew they were heavily outnumbered by the raucous crowd dancing to techno music on the other side of the bridge.
Beyond the culture war
There was one surprising point of agreement between Kökény and many of the Pride marchers. Just as paradegoers carried signs and wore shirts criticizing NER and decrying the misuse of public funds, Kökény was also dismissive of the current government, which he called ineffectual and corrupt.
“They’re all talk,” Kökény said, referring to the ruling Fidesz party. “We are the only conservative party in Hungary.”
Despite the sturm und drang surrounding Pride, the 2026 parliamentary elections will likely be decided by issues beyond the culture war. Orbán is now Europe’s longest-serving head of state. He governs a country suffering from severe economic headwinds, including inflation, volatile energy prices, and a rising cost of living in suddenly fashionable Budapest, which has transformed over the past decade from a destination for backpackers to an international hot spot.
Orbán also suffers from a severe case of incumbency fatigue. Fifteen years is a long time to govern any country, and weariness with the status quo and corruption is almost palpable among younger Hungarians. Meanwhile, many of the government’s signature policies have stalled or are no longer pressing matters. Despite generous subsidies for young families, the Hungarian birth rate continues to decline. Paradoxically, the success of Orbán’s restrictionist immigration policy, and widespread copycatting across Europe, has made border control a less salient matter.
The Hungarian prime minister now faces a youthful, media-savvy opponent from Hungary’s center-right named Péter Magyar, whose newly formed Tisza Party currently leads Fidesz in the polls. Many Pride supporters think that the half-hearted attempt to ban the parade was actually an attempt to bait Magyar into wholeheartedly endorsing gay rights, something that could cost him votes in rural, traditional Hungary.
Várady, the cafe owner, agreed with this theory. “They’re just trying to rile up support for the government by pushing the other side into identity politics.”
Orsolya, the young multinational employee, believes that Magyar has avoided the trap so far. “He and his party are avoiding this topic,” she said. “I’m totally OK with that. So is Budapest Pride.”
“However, he said that everyone has the right to protest,” she added.
It remains to be seen which side has judged correctly. According to local media, the Pride march attracted over hundreds of thousands of attendees, a new record for Budapest. The conservative Hungarian weekly Mandiner crowed afterward that Magyar had made a strategic mistake by associating himself with the parade.
The end of the Orbán era?
Turnout for Budapest Pride exceeded expectations, but it’s too early to write Orbán’s political obituary. The Hungarian prime minister has gone from youthful anti-Soviet dissident to prime minister in a comparatively brief and unsatisfying stint at the turn of the century to his current run of electoral success. In the process, Orbán became an international celebrity, which was no small feat for the leader of a small and strategically marginal Eastern European country.
The Hungarian prime minister is a skilled practitioner of political hardball who surely benefits from his party’s control of state media. He also has to juggle competing and often contradictory political priorities. On foreign policy, Orbán has courted Chinese investment, maintained economic and diplomatic links with Russia, and tweaked Ukraine. This has led to much gnashing of teeth among his EU and NATO allies, but Hungary is still building the next generation of German armored vehicles at Rheinmetall’s Zalaegerszeg plant. Meanwhile, Orbán has also cultivated links with the Trump administration and conservative and populist figures across the U.S. and Europe. It’s not hard to see the tensions in this web of international intrigue.
THE SPY WHO CAME BACK FROM THE DEAD
Domestically, Orbán has to balance his rural, conservative base with the aspirations of younger Hungarian voters, who are a precious resource in a country with declining birth rates. They are also integral to the cultural and economic dynamism of a place like Budapest. Fidesz supporters may sneer at Pride, but they derive considerable benefits from Budapest’s cosmopolitan atmosphere, which draws foreign investment and tourists by the millions.
Can Orbán keep up this balancing act? Magyar is a formidable challenger, and many younger Hungarians are ready for a change. One thing Pride supporters and critics can agree on is that after years of dominating a fragmented and ineffectual opposition, Orbán now faces a serious political test in 2026.
Will Collins is a lecturer at Eotvos Lorand University in Budapest, Hungary.