How Orban Helped Shape Project 2025,

What’s Next For America If Hungary Is The Model

Credit:Muhammad Farhad

The Heritage Foundation’s 900-page-long list of policy suggestions, called Project 2025, is shaping Donald Trump’s second term despite his attempts to distance himself from the initiative during his campaign, calling it “ridiculous.” The ultra-conservative blueprint gives us a glimpse into what we can expect in the next two and a half years, and critics fear that if the U.S. president follows all the steps, it will destroy America's system of checks and balances. While Heritage wrote a similar policy plan for the Reagan administration, called “Mandate for Leadership,” without any foreign help, an investigation suggests that the latest edition was heavily influenced by Hungary’s far-right leader, Viktor Orbán. Hungary offers us a preview of what may happen next if Trump follows the playbook and the footsteps of an authoritarian-leaning prime minister in Europe.

Historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat, who often writes about authoritarianism and propaganda, described Project 2025 as “a plan for an authoritarian takeover of the United States” in an essay for The New Republic.

Orbán spent years (and millions in taxpayers' money) building ties with U.S. conservatives. His ministers frequently appeared on Fox News, and his lobbyist wrote countless op-eds praising what he achieved in Hungary, mainly focusing on family policies and anti-immigration measures. He was among the first world leaders to endorse Trump’s first presidential campaign, and from that point on, his government used tremendous resources to strengthen relations not only with Republican politicians but also with nearly every conservative American think tank aligned with his ideology. Heritage is certainly the most prestigious among them. Since Kevin Roberts became president of the institute, Heritage has shifted to the far right and has become even more susceptible to endorsing Hungarian-style leadership in America. Orbán’s efforts finally paid off: from being portrayed as a strange and isolated strongman in the U.S. media, in the past few years, Hungary has come to be mentioned as a “model for the U.S.,” and Orbán himself as a powerful global leader.

As a leaked training video reported by the Hungarian investigative outlet Átlátszó and Pro Publica reveals, many of Project 2025’s authors have worked with organizations funded by the Orbán government. The footage, made primarily for internal use, shows instructions for future political appointees on how to reach the aims of Heritage’s handbook. The training largely focused on loyalty and ideology rather than experience. The video shows Spencer Chretien, one of the co-directors of Project 2025, who was heavily involved in building ties between the Heritage Foundation and Hungary. Last year, the Budapest-based Center for Fundamental Rights, another state-funded organization that also organizes CPAC Hungary, hosted members of the Heritage Foundation, including Chretien. Another video showed Roger Severino, who worked for the first Trump administration as the director of the Office of Civil Rights at the United States Department of Health and Human Services. Severino preciously visited MCC - Mathias Corvinus Collegium, often referred to as “Orban’s pet college,” which also receives vast sums from the Hungarian government. Ed Corrigan, a former member of Trump’s transition team, also appeared in the training videos. Corrigan earlier presented a book written by Orban’s political director, Balazs Orban, a key figure in building Orban’s transatlantic partnerships.

We’re only six months into Trump’s second term, but we’re already seeing several parallels between the “Hungarian model,” Project 2025, and what has already been implemented by the current administration. Heritage officially signed a cooperation agreement with the Daube Institute, a Budapest-based conservative think-tank closely aligned with Orban, in 2022. The Danube is funded by the Hungarian government, and its main mission is to amplify Orban's ideology abroad and gain soft power for Hungary.

One of the goals of Heritage’s policy initiative is a large-scale purge of civil servants, replacing them with loyal political appointees to help advance the administration’s agenda. This process began in 2010 in Hungary, when the Orbán government started to politicize the civil service and replace non-partisan employees with inexperienced loyalists. This step resulted in increased corruption, a concentration of power, and concerns over a decline in professionalism in public administration. We’re seeing the same dynamic playing out in Washington now. Trump’s allies have started reshaping the federal bureaucracy, prioritizing loyalty over competence.

However, Orban did not stop at reshaping the civil service in Hungary. His government slowly started to threaten the independence of the judiciary and academic freedom, attack minorities and immigrants, rewrite the constitution, and turn public media into a propaganda machine.

Experts warn us that the US faces similar threats: expansion of executive power, attacks on academic institutions, human rights, and the erosion of judicial autonomy. Even the tactics the two leaders use to discredit judges are similar: while Trump often mentions “activist judges” (Reagen also used the term), Orban’s media machine launched a smear campaign against members of the judiciary questioning their independence because of a meeting with the former US ambassador that was critical of Orban. Trump, earlier this year, targeted certain universities, similarly to Orban, who forced out an academic institute by changing the law in 2017.

Hungary’s shift from democracy was a gradual process over the past fifteen years, and it not only solidified Orban's power but also caused irreparable harm to democratic institutions. Project 2025 advocates a nearly identical strategy but at a different speed: strategic legal changes that centralize power and a constant attack on political enemies. Once implemented, they become increasingly difficult to reverse, even after electoral defeats, and can set back progress for the upcoming decades. Though Trump never openly said he wanted to replicate the Hungarian model, his policies show he has found Orban’s strategy appealing.

For American voters and institutions, the lesson is clear. Before any election, attention tends to focus on rhetoric and campaigns. But Hungary shows that authoritarianism often advances most effectively post-election, through institutional changes that undermine the foundations of democracy.

We’ll be following up with more on this. Please leave us a comment and let us know what concerns you most about Project 2025. It will help us hone our coverage of it.