Armed with a strong parliamentary majority, Magyar — whose new administration is eyeing a reset of its relationship with Brussels — has promised to decimate the previous government’s cozy relationship with conservative think tanks, and clamp down on state funding to the network of right-wing groups that flourished under his predecessor. This includes MCC Brussels’ parent organization, Mathias Corvinus Collegium, the Budapest-based educational institution controlled by close political allies of Orbán.
“The state is not going to finance CPAC [Conservative Political Action Conference] events, or Mathias Corvinus Collegium institutions … I think this was a criminal offense, party financing mixed up with government expenditures,” Magyar said on Monday. “The future authorities will have to examine or investigate.”
MCC Brussels — seen by many in the city as a mouthpiece of Orbán’s government, although it maintains it is politically independent — is one of the EU’s loudest and most controversial detractors. Its survival would represent the resilience of Orbán’s values within the heart of the EU.
Since its founding four years ago, the think tank established itself as a leading voice on the European right, co-hosting events with the far-right Patriots group on gender, migration and election interference and spearheading a push to cut EU cash for NGOs, chalking up a win earlier this year when the European Commission slashed funding for pro-European think tanks.
Those groups don’t see the think tank leaving quietly.
“I don’t see them disappearing from the Brussels scene,” said Petros Fassoulas, secretary general at the European Movement International, a pro-European think tank. “They see themselves as part of this wider movement, both intellectual and political.”