Viktor Orban adviser resigns after ‘pure Nazi speech’

Zsuzsa Hegedos, one of Orban’s longest-serving advisers, has known the prime minister since 2002 and described her relationship with him as cordial. However, in her resignation letter, published by the Hungarian news agency hvg on Tuesday, she said she had become increasingly uncomfortable with the “illiberal path” that Orbán has been following in recent years.

Orbán has made anti-immigration rhetoric a staple of his political platform since 2015, often using far-right language, but his Saturday rhetoric, which spoke out against the “mixing of generations,” was more extreme than usual.

In the speech, Orban said that mixing of Europeans is acceptable, but mixing of Europeans with non-Europeans creates people of a “mixed race”. “We are willing to mix with each other, but we don’t want to become mixed-race people,” Urban said. He added that countries that are seen as acceptable “are no longer countries.”

Hegedus said she had long defended the prime minister against accusations of anti-Semitism, but found his latest rhetoric untenable. “I am deeply sorry that such an outrageous situation forced me to end our relationship,” she wrote.

Orbán’s office published his response to Hegedüs accepting her resignation but denied that he was a racist. “You can’t accuse me of racism after 20 years of working together. You know better than anyone that my government in Hungary has a zero-tolerance policy towards anti-Semitism and racism.