.jpeg)
MAGA man
leads the field before Romanian election rerun
George
Simion, the candidate tipped to win the first round of the presidential
election, publicly aligns himself with Donald Trump.
April 29,
2025 4:01 am CET
By Carmen
Paun
BUCHAREST —
Donald Trump’s approval ratings may be at rock bottom but the far-right
frontrunner for Romania’s presidency reckons alignment with the U.S. president
is still a winning ticket ahead of Sunday’s election.
George
Simion, who proudly wears Trump baseball caps, spoke to POLITICO fresh from a
visit to Washington, where he gave interviews to podcast host and former Trump
adviser Steve Bannon and far-right activist Jack Posobiec.
“We are the
natural allies of the Republican Party and we’re almost perfectly aligned
ideologically with the MAGA movement,” Simion said, referring to his party, the
Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR).
To Trump’s
camp, particularly JD Vance and Elon Musk, the Romanian election has become a
cause célèbre after it was dramatically annulled last December.
While the
Romanian authorities said they had to cancel it over alleged election
interference and “aggressive” hybrid attacks from Russia, the far right has
accused them of overturning democracy because they couldn’t accept the
first-round victory of Călin Georgescu, a nationalist firebrand sympathetic to
the Kremlin.
The first
round of the rerun will be on May 4, with a second on May 18. If he wins the
presidency, the 38-year-old Simion has vowed to give a top role to Georgescu,
who was barred from reviving his own presidential bid.
“We’re now
in a campaign to reinstate democracy, the people’s will, the rule of law and
the constitutional order,” Simion said.
AUR is a
socially conservative party with an irredentist view of rebuilding a greater
Romania, raising the prospect of potential territorial disputes and clashes
with Ukraine, Moldova and Bulgaria. While he denies he is pro-Russian, Simion
wants to stop military aid to Ukraine.
Founded in
2019, AUR already holds the second-highest number of seats in the Romanian
parliament after the center-left Social Democratic Party (PSD). Simion came
fourth in last year’s annulled presidential contest but now seems to have
garnered support among Georgescu’s voters.
Whether
Simion’s Trumpian message chimes more widely with the electorate is being
closely watched internationally amid fears that a victory for Simion could
destabilize a key NATO and EU member of 19 million people.
Simion is on
course to win the first round with about 29 percent of the vote, according to
POLITICO’s Poll of Polls. If he wins on May 4, much will then depend on whether
voters rally behind the second-placed candidate, likely to be either former
National Liberal Party (PNL) leader Crin Antonescu (on 22 percent) or Bucharest
Mayor Nicușor Dan (20 percent).
The second
round is a run-off between the top two candidates from the first round.
Job for
Georgescu
Within
Romania, Simion is under scrutiny over attempts to hire a lobbying firm in the
U.S. for $1.5 million to secure meetings with key American political figures
and to set up media appearances with U.S.-based journalists. The controversy
has focused on whether AUR could have used money given to political parties by
the state for this promotional project.
Simion has
insisted that the document mapping out such a deal was not a contract but a
letter of intent. Even so, Romania’s Permanent Electoral Authority said on
April 24 it would investigate the party’s financing.
Antonescu
accused Simion of investing “in his own personality cult and in well-known
conspiracists abroad. Instead of fighting for Romania here, he chooses to pay
someone else, there, to humiliate all of us.”
Simion is
also hoping to harness the support Georgescu built last year by saying he’ll
have a job for him, even possibly as prime minister.
“I think
that’s the normal thing, for him to occupy the role he wants. Because he’s the
Romanian who got the most votes, he’s the one who was supposed to occupy the
role at the Cotroceni [presidential palace] and it’s a way to go back to normal
and fix whatever can still be fixed because democracy and Romanians’ trust in
the rule of law were gravely wounded,” Simion said.
Simion has
previously said that people who rejected Georgescu’s presidential candidacy
should be “flayed,” prompting Bucharest Mayor Dan to describe the AUR leader as
a “thug” who “instigated violence in the public sphere and that has harmed
society.”
Simion would
also not be completely at liberty to appoint a prime minister. Although
Romania’s president nominates the post, he would require the support of a
parliamentary majority.
In the
current chamber, AUR is in opposition, while the PSD socialists and PNL
liberals are part of the governing majority. Antonescu is their common
candidate.
Still,
Simion argues that if Antonescu doesn’t perform well, the coalition parties
would have to accept a new prime minister and drop Marcel Ciolacu, the current
PM.
Anti-establishment
momentum
The far
right has profited from long-running frustrations in Romania about the
corruption and ineffectiveness of the political establishment — the PSD and PNL
— which it has accused of orchestrating the cancellation of the election. Last
year’s presidential election was the first time in Romania’s post-communist
history that a candidate from establishment parties failed to make it to the
second round.
George
Simion is also hoping to harness the support Calin Georgescu built last year in
saying he’ll have a job for him, even possibly as prime minister. | Robert
Ghement/EPA
To Simion,
the annulment offered further proof that Romania is led by the same old cadre
that seized power in 1989, when the country ditched Communism, and that merely
faked a transition to democracy after the death of dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu.
“The
government organized the campaign and the elections and lost the elections,”
Simion said of last year’s vote.
But he also
faces accusations of breaking electoral rules himself.
Several
Romanians who received personal letters from Simion recently complained to
Romania’s election authorities of a likely violation of GDPR rules on the use
of personal data. One regional election authority subsequently sent a complaint
to prosecutors, as reported by the ProTV channel. Simion responded that his
party had access to the electoral register, which contains the data of
Romanians eligible to vote, and said many people on it were dead.
Persona non
grata
Simion, who
is banned from entering neighboring Ukraine and Moldova due to his past
campaigning to reacquire some of their territory, said he prayed Trump would
find a way to bring peace to Ukraine.
The war
poses a dilemma for Simion. Although he’s a nationalist who aligns with MAGA on
leaving Ukraine to fend for itself, he’s far less keen than Trump to align
publicly with Russia. Indeed, Simion styles himself as the candidate who can
keep the U.S. committed to stationing troops in Romania.
“What we
wish, as a country affected by German and Russian imperialism in history, is
that this peace formula comes with new security guarantees for the next 30 to
50 years so that Russia cannot do again what it did, violating all
international treaties,” Simion said.
While
competitors in last year’s election accused him of wanting to take Romania out
of the EU, Simion has insisted he wants his country to remain a member, but
that the bloc should focus solely on the economy and not interfere in culture
and defense.
Simion also
stressed he wanted Romania to stay in NATO, led by the U.S.
“I don’t
believe that a defense force led by France and Great Britain could be an
alternative to the security solution that worked since World War II, the Pax
Americana formula,” Simion said, referencing a new security architecture for
Europe and notably post-war Ukraine.
Instead, he
said, NATO countries should do as Trump demands by increasing their military
expenditures.
“All
countries must raise this spending; I find it fair to pay for your own security
and to invest in your own security,” he said.
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário