A new bill titled ‘On the Transparency of Public Life,’ aiming to protect Hungary’s sovereignty against foreign influence, was submitted to the Hungarian parliament on Tuesday, May 13th.
The draft legislation introduces a registry system for foreign-fundded entities that “threaten the sovereignty of Hungary by using foreign funding to influence public life.”
The bill stipulates that any organisation that “violates, negatively reflects or promotes action against” the values set out in the constitution, including “the primacy of marriage, family, and biological sexes,” is a threat to sovereignty.
If passed, the Sovereignty Protection Office will identify organisations whose foreign-funded efforts jeopardise Hungary’s constitutional values. These organisations will be listed, required to obtain state approval before receiving any foreign funds, and their leaders have to file public asset declarations.
Violations, such as accepting funds without approval, can lead to fines of up to 25 times the value of unauthorised support, or even a ban on further public activities.
The move follows efforts all around the Western world to curb foreign interference, and U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to freeze USAID funding after revelations that the agency was used to spread progressive-liberal ideologies in other parts of the world.
As the spokesman for the conservative Hungarian government Zoltán Kovács explained,
The bill was introduced in response to escalating concerns about foreign-funded organisations and their involvement in shaping Hungary’s political discourse. Investigations and public disclosures in recent years have revealed that millions of dollars, primarily from American and Brussels-based entities, were funneled into Hungarian civil society groups and media outlets with clear ideological agendas.
He emphasised that “democratic decision-making must reflect the will of the Hungarian people, not that of foreign powers or their proxies.”
The ruling elites in Brussels will most certainly oppose the new bill, as they have done with other similar Hungarian initiatives, just because the country is led by a sovereignist government.
This is hypocritical of the European Commission whose own ‘Defence of Democracy’ package also aims to tackle the threat of foreign interference by forcing foreign entities to register in a transparency register.
