The return of Donald Trump to the presidency brought an explosion of joy from among his supporters, not just in the United States, but also abroad, who cheered his victory and offered their congratulations and support. From authoritarian leaders to far-right political parties to racist street activists, Trump’s return has electrified the far-right worldwide and emboldened its efforts to gut democracy and human rights, believing that with the U.S president as their ally, anything is possible. They will make great progress in their efforts to subvert democracy, and strip rights from the LGBTQ+ community, women, immigrants, and people of color.
The most excited supporters by far were Hungarians close to Prime Minister Viktor Orbán who have been pushing for Trump to be reelected for years now, and have been influencing the Republican Party to adopt Hungary’s anti-democratic policies. Orbán was thrilled: “I see a bright victory, perhaps the greatest comeback in the history of Western politics. A huge victory. They threatened him with jail, stripped him of his assets, tried to kill him, the entire media world in America turned against him and yet he has won.”
From the Danube Institute, a pro-Orban think tank that primarily spreads Orban’s propaganda and recruits Western allies, Managing Director István Kiss and Veres Kris celebrated at the official Trump victory party in Florida. Rod Dreher, also of Danube, tweeted his praise for Vice President-elect J.D. Vance saying, “Now he is going to be the next VPOTUS. God is good, and so is @JDVance.” Also appreciative was Orbán’s political advisor Balázs Orbán (no relation), who said “Welcome to our #MEGA world. Cheers from #Budapest,” MEGA, meaning Make Europe Great Again.
At the Center for Fundamental Rights (CFR) office in Budapest, employees of the pro-Orbán propaganda organization whose mission is the “preservation of national identity, sovereignty, and Judeo-Christian social traditions” and “countering today’s overgrown human rights fundamentalism and political correctness,” donned red MAGA hats on election night and decorated the office with American flags. After the election results were announced, CFR director Miklós Szántho congratulated Trump and shared a picture of the two of them taunting President Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, Szántho also tweeted an image of Biden and Harris with the text “We won, they lost.” The young pro-Orbán activist and “wokebusters” signee Ádám Moczár, close to the CFR, retweeted a message from a Twitter user saying “FUCK EVERY LIBERAL IN THIS COUNTRY! WE ARE SO BACK!” (Read the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism’s previous reporting on the “wokebusters” coalition here).
CFR Geopolitical Analyst Zoltán Koskovics on election night; Source: Twitter
Other think tank representatives within the Orbánist network, such as the Spanish Fundación Disenso (Dissent Foundation) and Nazione Futura’s (Future Nation) head Francesco Giubilei, were just as ecstatic about the results (see GPAHE’s previous reporting on Giubilei here).
Further east, Russian dictator Vladimir Putin congratulated and honored Trump: “His behavior at the moment of an attempt on his life left an impression on me. He turned out to be a brave man,” Putin said. Russian neo-fascist intellectual Alexander Dugin, a close Putin ally, expressed his happiness stating: “So we have won. That is decisive. The world will be never ever like before. Globalists have lost their final combat. The future is finally open. I am really happy.” Russian propagandists Olga Skabeeva, Vladimir Solovyov, and Dmitry Suslov cheered the election result on Russian state-run television and its possibility of bringing an end to American aid for Ukraine. The Italian Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, who is close to virulently anti-LGBTQ+ Russian oligarch Konstanin Malofeev, referred to it as a “formidable setback for the criminal plan of the New World Order.”
In India, Hindu nationalist Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated his “friend” Trump on his “historic election victory.” In Britain, Reform UK and Brexit leader Nigel Farage, who regularly publicly supported Trump, expressed sympathy with what he called the “most incredible political comeback of our lifetime.” In South America, congratulations also came from El Salvador’s far-right President Nayib Bukele and Argentina’s far-right President Javier Milei, who tweeted, “Now, Make America Great Again. They know that they can count on Argentina to carry out their task.” And former far-right Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, who is also known as the “Trump of the Tropics” and was inspired by Trump’s January 6 insurrection, declared, “Today, we witness the resurgence of a true warrior..”
In the European Union, praise poured in from members of the EU Parliament’s far-right groupings, the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), the Europe of Sovereign Nations, and the Patriots of Europe (PoE), who said, “Congratulations @realDonaldTrump, now it is our turn! #Patriots.” From the ECR grouping, Romanian Alianța pentru Unirea Românilor (Alliance for the Unity of Romanians, AUR) leader George Simion, the Polish Prawo i Sprawiedliwość (Law and Justice party, PiS) leader Andrej Duda, French far-right party Reconquête’s (Reconquest) head Eric Zemmour, who is rabidly anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim, and other prominent members of the French far right, such as Marion Maréchal, voiced their happiness at the result, saying “Now, our turn to Make France and Europe great again!” In an email, Zemmour’s party claimed that the U.S. election had the effect of boosting membership applications. In Poland, elected MPs for the far-right PiS, which lost power last year, gave standing applause for the new American president-elect, chanting “Donald Trump! Donald Trump!”
The PoE, the EU Parliament grouping spearheaded by Orbán and made up exclusively of far-right parties, also showed support for the incoming president with Italian far-right party Lega (League) MEPs Isabella Tovaglieri and Susanna Ceccardi tweeting pictures of themselves wearing red MAGA hats.
In the national parliaments, MPs from Portugal’s Chega (Enough, CH) Rita Maria Matias, Pedro dos Santos Frazão, and André Ventura, Lega MPs Matteo Salvini and Lorenzo Fontana from Italy, and Dutch far-right party Partij voor de Vrijheid (Party for Freedom, PVV) leader Geert Wilders also showed their support. Wilders, infamous for his anti-Muslim hate speech, said “Patriots are winning elections all over the world. The liberal-leftish woke driven nihilists are full of disbelief and hate and unfit to give the people what they truly want: freedom and their own nation first, their own people first and most of all no more illegal immigration.”
Tweet from André Ventura, the leader of the Portuguese far-right party Chega; Source: Twitter
Other PoE member parties who saw a victory in the election result include Spanish far-right party VOX MPs Santiago Abascal and Rocío de Meer, Belgian far-right party Vlaams Belang (Flemish Interest, VB) leader Filip Dewinter, the French far-right party Rassemblement National (National Rally, RN) leader Jordan Bardella, and former Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiš from Akce Nespokojených Občanů (Alliance of Unhappy Citizens, ANO). Notably, some of these MPs took to taunting their political opponents, with de Meer tweeting out a picture of herself in a “Make liberals cry again t-shirt.” and Chega’s Matias taunting a female commentator on Portuguese television who was visibly disappointed in the election result.
Members of the Europe of Sovereign Nations, the political grouping of far-right parties deemed too extreme by the other far-right groupings, also congratulated Trump on his victory.These included, the Romanian far-right party “Revival’s” leader Kostadin Kostadinov, and the German far-right party Alternative für Deutschland (Alternative for Germany, AfD) leaders Alice Weidel and Björn Höcke, the latter being classified as a “right-wing extremist” by Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV).
A number of voices from the transnational far-right anti-LGBTQ+ and anti-women movements were ecstatic with Trump’s victory, including the Spanish CitizenGo, Italian Pro-Vita & Famiglia (Pro-Life and Family), Spanish HazteOir, and Strasbourg-based European Centre for Law and Justice (ECLJ), who all wrote messages of support from abroad. These organizations have deep ties to the Project 2025 supporters. (See GPAHE’s previous reporting on the transnational ties to the U.S. here.)
Trump also received congratulations from fringe racist groups who are overjoyed with the prospect of Trump returning to the White House. Most enthusiastic were the international supporters of American Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes’ Groypers, among whom the Portuguese influencers João Antunes and Afonso Goncalves issued praise despite their previous reservations regarding Trump’s support for Israel (see GPAHE’s previous reporting on the Groypers here). Goncalves noted that because Trump was “elected by white men,” this was the only group of voters who “vote rationally” in elections. More praise came from the Salazar-revisionist Portuguese Chega activist and pundit for Rádio Observador, Gonçalo Sousa, the German COMPACT magazine, which the government there tried to ban for “anti-human hate speech and agitation,” and the far-right French student organization La Cocarde Étudiante (Student Cockade) (see GPAHE’s previous reporting on Gonçalo Sousa here).
Several Proud Boys chapters in Portugal, Germany, and South Wales also celebrated the victory, who all saw it as an opportunity to free the “January 6 political prisoners” and other Proud Boys behind bars for criminal activity.
Identitarian activists, who believe in the white supremacist “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory which has been the motivation of multiple mass shootings and hundreds of deaths around the world, and advocate for white ethnostates, also sent messages of support. Martin Sellner, the unofficial longtime leader of the Identitarian movement who received a donation for his work from the Christchurch mosque murderer, posted a short video of Trump dancing with the caption, “My MEGA (Make Europe Great Again) MAGA cut.” Other Identitarians who celebrated Trump’s win included Dries Van Langenhove in the Netherlands, Thaïs d’Escufon and Damien Rieu in France, Martin Lichtmesz from Austria, the Generacija identitete in Slovenia, and Philip Stein from Germany’s Jungeuropa and Ein Prozent (One Percent) (see GPAHE’s previous reporting on these Identitarian activists here).
In Portugal, the deeply antisemitic Rui da Fonseca e Castro, leader of the Habeas Corpus movement which is close to the extreme-right party Ergue-te (Rise up!), wrote that “the pussy lost! Something positive,” before lamenting Trump’s supposed ties to Jews for his position on Israel. Neo-fascist and neo-nazi groups, such as Thomas Joly from the Pétainist Parti de la France (Party of France), also joined in the celebration, while Yvan Benedetti’s group Les Nationalistes (The Nationalists) saw this as a move toward the “eradication of the poisons” of “Zionism and Judaism” in Western societies.
