{"id":2249,"date":"2025-10-05T19:33:36","date_gmt":"2025-10-05T19:33:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/?p=2249"},"modified":"2025-10-05T19:33:36","modified_gmt":"2025-10-05T19:33:36","slug":"the-political-triumph-of-a-rightwing-billionaire-eurosceptic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/?p=2249","title":{"rendered":"The political triumph of a rightwing billionaire Eurosceptic"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free<\/p>\n<p class=\"article__content-sign-up-topic-description o3-type-body-base\">Your guide to what Trump\u2019s second term means for Washington, business and the world<\/p>\n<p><iframe class=\"article__content-sign-up-iframe close\" scrolling=\"no\" id=\"signUpIframe\" data-prev-url=\"\/register\/in-article-sign-up?ft-content-uuid=a1660d2a-b525-4276-9275-c2dcc6e9a8fa&amp;newsletter-id=65b8fec772badb00166eafc6\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<div id=\"article-body\">\n<p>Andrej Babi\u0161 pulled off a remarkable political comeback on Saturday with a decisive victory in Czech parliamentary elections. The billionaire entrepreneur who served as prime minister from 2017 to 2021 joins the swelling ranks of rightwing Eurosceptics taking or threatening to take power in Europe. <\/p>\n<p>His return to office will embolden central European populists led by Hungary\u2019s Viktor Orb\u00e1n, potentially further constraining the EU from acting more decisively to help Ukraine or tackle climate change. The Hungarian leader said Babi\u0161\u2019s victory was \u201cgood news for Europe\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>The former Czech premier has ridden the same Trumpian wave that propelled ultra-conservative Karol Nawrocki to the Polish presidency in June and carried George Simion, a far-right former football hooligan, to a close second in Romania\u2019s presidential election in May. <\/p>\n<p>Babi\u0161 has long cultivated comparisons with Donald Trump, a fellow billionaire politician. His election campaign also sold familiar-looking red caps, in this case emblazoned with the words \u201cStrong Czechia\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>But Babi\u0161\u2019s victory was part of a decade-long pattern in central Europe where power has swung back and forth like a \u201cpendulum\u201d between centrist, liberal forces and illiberal populist ones, said Daniel Heged\u00fcs, an expert on the region at the German Marshall Fund think-tank. <\/p>\n<p>The exception is Orb\u00e1n\u2019s long rule in Hungary. But even that could end with election defeat next year, if the opinion polls prove to be correct and the contest is free and fair.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"n-content-image n-content-image--full\" data-component=\"image-set\"><picture><source media=\"(min-width: 700px)\" srcset=\"https:\/\/images.ft.com\/v3\/image\/raw\/ftcms%3A44bca4dc-bece-41d5-ba36-f171eee781ef?source=next-article&amp;fit=scale-down&amp;quality=highest&amp;width=700&amp;dpr=1 1x,https:\/\/images.ft.com\/v3\/image\/raw\/ftcms%3A44bca4dc-bece-41d5-ba36-f171eee781ef?source=next-article&amp;fit=scale-down&amp;quality=highest&amp;width=700&amp;dpr=2 2x,https:\/\/images.ft.com\/v3\/image\/raw\/ftcms%3A44bca4dc-bece-41d5-ba36-f171eee781ef?source=next-article&amp;fit=scale-down&amp;quality=highest&amp;width=700&amp;dpr=3 3x\" width=\"2289\" height=\"1527\"\/><source media=\"(max-width: 490px)\" srcset=\"https:\/\/images.ft.com\/v3\/image\/raw\/ftcms%3A07494bd9-584c-4b78-8319-b9018e2b8ca6?source=next-article&amp;fit=scale-down&amp;quality=highest&amp;width=490&amp;dpr=1 1x,https:\/\/images.ft.com\/v3\/image\/raw\/ftcms%3A07494bd9-584c-4b78-8319-b9018e2b8ca6?source=next-article&amp;fit=scale-down&amp;quality=highest&amp;width=490&amp;dpr=2 2x,https:\/\/images.ft.com\/v3\/image\/raw\/ftcms%3A07494bd9-584c-4b78-8319-b9018e2b8ca6?source=next-article&amp;fit=scale-down&amp;quality=highest&amp;width=490&amp;dpr=3 3x\" width=\"1527\" height=\"1527\"\/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.ft.com\/v3\/image\/raw\/https%3A%2F%2Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%2Fproduction%2F44bca4dc-bece-41d5-ba36-f171eee781ef.jpg?source=next-article&amp;fit=scale-down&amp;quality=highest&amp;width=700&amp;dpr=1\" alt=\"Andrej Babi\u0161 shakes hands with a supporter at a campaign rally, surrounded by people and campaign materials, including red hats and books bearing his image.\" data-image-type=\"image\" width=\"2289\" height=\"1527\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/picture><figcaption class=\"n-content-picture__caption o3-editorial-typography-caption\"><span>Babi\u0161\u2019s campaign sold baseball caps featuring the words \u2018Strong Czechia\u2019 in Czech<\/span><span> <!-- -->\u00a9 Milan Jaros\/Bloomberg<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Babi\u0161, whose ANO party once belonged to the European liberal family, has moved sharply to the right in recent years. He co-founded the pan-EU far-right Patriots for Europe group alongside not just Orb\u00e1n but also Herbert Kickl, a far-right ideologue who heads Austria\u2019s Freedom party.<\/p>\n<p>Babi\u0161 campaigned inveighing against immigration, EU climate policies and over-reach by Brussels. He has promised to end Czech bilateral military aid to Ukraine. To govern he will need the support of the pro-Russia Freedom and Direct Democracy party (SPD) and a hard-right populist party representing motorists.<\/p>\n<p>Babi\u0161, together with Orb\u00e1n and Slovakia\u2019s Prime Minister Robert Fico, will try to revitalise the Visegr\u00e1d regional alliance, albeit without the help of Poland\u2019s pro-EU government, as a way to promote a Eurosceptic political agenda for Europe. <\/p>\n<p>But there are policy differences between them, including on Russia and on Ukraine\u2019s EU membership path. And sloganeering is one thing, blocking critical EU decisions is another. EU partners have learnt to \u201cdifferentiate when a dog is barking and when a dog is biting\u201d, Heged\u00fcs said.<\/p>\n<p>The European Council, which brings together the EU\u2019s 27 heads of government, will soon have two far-right Patriots for Europe members in Orb\u00e1n and Babi\u0161 and potentially a third if Fico joins the group. That would create a \u201ccritical mass of disruptive potential\u201d in the EU\u2019s highest decision-making body, said Heged\u00fcs.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Babi\u0161 is no ideologue. He is probably more like Silvio Berlusconi than a second-term Donald Trump \u2014 although like both of them he faces claims of conflicts of interests between his business empire and government responsibilities. <\/p>\n<p>Analysts expect Babi\u0161 to be more pragmatic and less obstructive than his two regional allies. It would be surprising if he ends the Czech Republic\u2019s role in supplying ammunition to Ukraine even when that would be bad for Czech business.<\/p>\n<aside aria-labelledby=\"aside-label\" class=\"n-content-recommended--single-story n-content-recommended--inset\" data-component=\"recommended\">\n<p class=\"n-content-recommended__title o3-type-body-highlight\">Recommended<\/p>\n<div class=\"o-teaser o-teaser--article o-teaser--small o-teaser--stacked o-teaser--has-image js-teaser\" data-id=\"ec3b3a53-0417-4d6d-96f7-702a0b69c91b\">\n<div class=\"o-teaser__image-container js-teaser-image-container\">\n<div class=\"o-teaser__image-placeholder\" style=\"aspect-ratio:2048\/1152\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"o-teaser__image\" src=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/__origami\/service\/image\/v2\/images\/raw\/https%3A%2F%2Fimages.ft.com%2Fv3%2Fimage%2Fraw%2Fhttps%253A%252F%252Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%252Fproduction%252F56fbab65-31a3-4000-8d51-accba0f2f98e.jpg%3Fsource%3Dnext-article%26fit%3Dscale-down%26quality%3Dhighest%26width%3D700%26dpr%3D1?source=next&amp;fit=scale-down&amp;dpr=2&amp;width=240\" alt=\"Former Czech leader Andrej Babi\u0161, holding a cap with the words \u2018Strong Czechia\u2019\"\/><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Domestically, Babi\u0161 faces stronger domestic checks and balances than his counterparts, in particular from Petr Pavel, the former Nato commander who beat him to the presidency in 2023. And Ukraine and other allies can also draw comfort from the worse than expected election performance of pro-Russian parties, with the hard-left alliance failing to make it into parliament at all.<\/p>\n<p>Prague has always tended be a somewhat Eurosceptic voice. And the EU is already watering down its green ambitions and toughening its stance on migration. So Babi\u0161\u2019s return to power may not move the dial much on EU policymaking. <\/p>\n<p>It will allow three central European leaders to project a common front and claim they are the political future of Europe. But with the pendulum swinging the other way in Hungary, the Babi\u0161-Orb\u00e1n-Fico show may not last long.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>#political #triumph #rightwing #billionaire #Eurosceptic<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free Your guide to what Trump\u2019s second term means for Washington, business and the world Andrej Babi\u0161 pulled off a remarkable political comeback on Saturday with a decisive victory in Czech parliamentary elections. The billionaire entrepreneur who served as prime minister from 2017 to 2021 joins the swelling [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2250,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1113,1114,1110,1112,1111],"class_list":{"0":"post-2249","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-billionaire","9":"tag-eurosceptic","10":"tag-political","11":"tag-rightwing","12":"tag-triumph"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2249"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2249\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2250"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}