Romania opts – for now – for a president in the line of Trump

Trump has won in Romania. George Simion, leader of the radical-right party Aur and a pronounced fan of Donald Trump, is the convincing winner of the first round of the Romanian presidential election that took place on Sunday. Partly thanks to his slogan ‘Make Romania Great Again« He got 41 percent of the votes. With that he did even better than planned the polls, where he scored around 30 percent. The turnout was not high: 53 percent.

On May 18, Simion will face the number two in the second round, Nicusor Dan, the current mayor of Bucharest. On Sunday evening late it became clear that the battle for second place with a minimal difference won by Crin Antonescu, the candidate of the government parties. Then ended with 21 percent of the votes, Antonescu by 20 percent. The voices of Romanians abroad gave the last push. Simion benefited even more from the almost one million diaspora votes: 61 percent of that went to him.

If Simion also wins the second round and becomes president of Romania, this probably means a change of course in the foreign policy of Romania. Simion is very critical about the European Union and believes in isolationism. He is behind NATO, but is against Romanian support for Ukraine. In Brussels, a third sleeping – in addition to Hungary and Slovakia – and further undermining of European unity are feared. Simions Helden are Donald Trump and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.

Simion’s victory is at odds with a recent trend: the ‘Anti-Trump Bump’. Where conservative parties in Canada and Australia lost in recent elections due to their ideological relationship with Trump, Simion is not bothered by that. His profit is probably mainly due to a broadly shared aversion to the established middle parties, and to his commitment with a popular presidential candidate who was not allowed to participate in the elections, Calin Georgescu.

Excluded

The ultranationalist Georgescu, an admirer of Putin and fascist leaders from the Romanian past, won in November The first round of the presidential elections. However, it was declared invalid by the Constitutional Court, due to alleged Russian interference. Georgescu became in March ruled out of participation in the resit of the first round.

However, he remained an important factor in the elections, if only because the American vice president JD Vance spoke of the invalid elections declared. According to Vance and others, that was an undemocratic decision and the wish of the Romanians was ignored.

Simion explicitly presented himself as a representative of Georescu’s ideas during the campaign. He also turned against the political parties who have been in control for decades, in particular the Social Democrats. He always spoke about the injustice that Georgescu, and with that his many voters, is affected. On Sunday they appeared together in the polling station. An important difference between the two is that Simion is critical about Putin. Simion has announced that, if he became president, he wants to give Georgescu a prominent position in the government, for example as Prime Minister.

Simion (38) founded the Alliance for the Union of Romanen (AUR) in 2019. The core point of the party is the pursuit of ‘dignity’ and sovereignty for Romania, including the pursuit of reunification of Romania and Moldova. The party attaches great importance to Christian values ​​and won a lot of support during the Coronacrisis thanks to an anti-Vax campaign. By the Last parliamentary elections Aur got more than 18 percent of the votes, and thus became the second party, after the Social Democratic PSD.

Simion started as a right -wing activist, affiliated with football hooligans, but has since adjusted his image. He recently showed himself in the Financial Times Also less critical about NATO. He now guarantees that under his leadership nothing will change for NATO in Romania. Due to its location on the Oostflank, Romania is an important NATO partner, on the Black Sea coast are built On the largest NATO base in Europe. Simion is not welcome in Ukraine and Moldova because of ‘national security’.

Decayed city center

Nicusor Dan (55) is in many ways the opposite of Simion. After a scientific career as a mathematician in France, he initially focused on local politics in Bucharest, as an advocate of restoring the expired city center. In 2016, this led to the establishment of the National Party USR (Union Red Romania), a party that left a year later to continue as an independent politician.

Then Sunday only won in Bucharest and the city of Cluj-Napoca in the northwest of the country. He is popular with urban, internationally oriented voters and much less known in rural regions. His motto is ‘honesty’, he wants to fight against corruption and the influence of security services on politics.

Opinion suits estimate the opportunities Not high from then in the second round against Simion. If government candidate Antonescu had been the opponent of Simion, voters had voted for Antonescu in the second round to stop Simion. Conversely, that is less obvious, because the Antonescu voters then find too progressive and too urban. Antonescu refused on Sunday evening, after recognizing his loss, to recommend another candidate.

In addition, the voters of the nationalist Victor Ponta, number four with 13 percent of the votes, in the second round also for Simion rather than votes for. A small miracle – a much higher turnout, for example – is needed on May 18 to deny Simion the presidency.

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